Submitter
Deepti Goil, Chief Operating Officer
Company
Ignatiuz Software
Industry
Information Technology
Business Challenge
Ignatiuz works with an investment management firm that provides investment solutions to various foundations and charitable institutions. Requests on behalf of investors were a daily occurrence and often required the manual extraction of data from various locations. Mining the data from a secured shared server, third party document management system, and multiple pre-existing databases was a big challenge. Once statements were extracted, they were integrated into a single document and manually arranged by specific fund and date order, which was also a manual, time consuming task that ultimately was a resource drain for the firm. On average, one audit request could take multiple hours, and in some cases, an entire day to precisely complete. With 600+ investors, this was an extremely inefficient process that resulted in delays, errors, and client frustration. An accurate data mining solution was needed, given the nature of these requests.
Analytics Solution
To improve accuracy and resource efficiency, Ignatiuz designed a unique Microsoft SharePoint-based application that reduces the time spent on each request while seamlessly working within a client’s existing IT infrastructure. Through this data mining application, all past and present data were reconciled and securely stored within a centralized data warehouse program. The firm’s member services team was provided with a unique user interface where they could request an investor’s account statements utilizing various filters, such as investment fund, year, month, or time period. The application integrates with external data sources and puts the data into a custom designed dashboard. The dashboard allows the member services team to access the data at a centralized point, resulting in the requested account statements merged into a single document, sorted by fund and date.
Impact
Overall, the custom-developed application resulted in more efficient processing of audit requests. The amount of time required to extract data was reduced from a few hours to a few minutes, and ultimately reduced operational costs for the firm. The application has already generated a multi-fold return on investment with future cost savings as Ignatiuz continues to make enhancements.