CASE STUDY

Rebuilding a Legacy Lease Audit Platform for the Cloud Era

    Rebuilding a Legacy Lease Audit Platform for the Cloud Era
    Rebuilding a Legacy Lease Audit Platform for the Cloud Era

    Project Overview

    In the complex world of commercial lease audits, precision and scalability are non-negotiable. A well-established finance consulting firm had developed its own proprietary software suite over a decade ago. The platform was loaded with powerful custom-built calculators and analytical tools that helped clients benchmark charges, resolve disputes, and generate compliance-ready reports. Despite its unmatched domain logic, the application had begun showing its age, technically and visually. With outdated PHP code, a rigid UI, no API infrastructure, and limited cloud capabilities, the system had become a bottleneck. New users were difficult to onboard, documentation tools were clunky, and performance was suffering under scale. The client needed a tech partner that could preserve the business-critical functionality while re-architecting the platform for the modern enterprise, secure, scalable, and integration-ready.


    Industry

    Finance & Compliance Technology /Enterprise SaaS Modernisation


    The Client

    A reputable financial consulting firm in the lease audit space, known for delivering highly accurate, calculator-driven analysis to clients across sectors. Their platform had been a cornerstone of their services, but it was overdue for a technology refresh.


    Challenges Addressed

    The legacy system, while functionally rich, was creating friction across operations:

    • The PHP-based monolithic architecture was hard to maintain and couldn’t support modern cloud workflows.
    • User interface was outdated, non-responsive, and lacked accessibility standards.
    • Documentation workflows were fragmented, often producing error-prone outputs during exports.
    • On-prem hosting limited uptime, scaling during peak audit periods, and cross-region availability.
    • The codebase complexity made onboarding and debugging painful and risky.
    • No API layer existed, blocking integrations with dashboards or third-party tools.

    The client needed to evolve from a rigid, legacy tool into a responsive, modular, and scalable cloud-native platform, without losing the accuracy or trust built into their calculators.


    Collaboration in Action

    Cubet partnered with the client to engineer a full-scale modernisation of the lease audit software. The transformation wasn’t a rewrite—it was a careful, phased re-architecture that preserved core logic while rebuilding every surrounding layer for performance, scalability, and usability.

    Step One: Legacy Audit & Mapping
    We began with a comprehensive code and feature audit to fully understand the business rules and the proprietary calculator logic that powered the client's success.

    Step Two: Backend Overhaul
    The backend was restructured using Laravel 8, introducing middleware support, modularity, and REST API readiness. Critical business logic was ported with full unit test coverage to retain output integrity.

    Step Three: Frontend Redesign
    The user interface was completely rebuilt using Vue.js, delivering a responsive, accessible, and visually modern experience. Navigation was streamlined and workflows rethought to reduce friction.

    Step Four: Cloud Migration & CI/CD Enablement
    The application moved to a cloud-hosted environment using AWS, with Docker containerisation and GitHub Actions enabling fast, reliable CI/CD. The platform could now scale on demand and deploy across regions.


    Technologies Deployed

    Backend Development:

    • Laravel 8 with Eloquent ORM for robust database interactions
    • PHP 8 with strict typing, modern package support
    • Laravel Horizon queue system for processing heavy calculation loads asynchronously

    Frontend Development:

    • Vue.js 3 paired with Vuex for state management
    • Axios for clean API communication
    • Custom component library built to reflect the firm’s branding

    DevOps & Cloud Infrastructure:

    • AWS with EC2, RDS, and S3 for resilient hosting
    • Docker containers for modular deployment
    • GitHub Actions powering CI/CD pipelines
    • CloudWatch for real-time monitoring and error logging

    Security & Compliance:

    • Encrypted data at rest with automated key rotation
    • Multi-role access control for admins, auditors, and clients
    • JWT authentication for secure session management
    • Complete audit trails for compliance and accountability

    EMR & Reporting Enhancements:

    • Centralised documentation system with annotations
    • Multi-format export engine supporting PDF, XLSX
    • Reporting engine capable of branded, multi-page summaries with dynamic logic



    Innovative Feature

    The most impactful innovation was the creation of a fully RESTful API layer and modular architecture. This didn’t just modernise the platform—it future-proofed it. Whether connecting to external audit dashboards, analytics platforms, or expanding into mobile experiences, the new architecture enables seamless integrations without retrofitting. The enhanced reporting engine and session-based autosave also significantly improved user productivity and reduced errors in documentation-heavy workflows.


    Value Delivered

    • 90%+ user satisfaction with the new interface, described as “significantly better”
    • 40% reduction in report generation time, improving efficiency during audit season
    • 30% increase in monthly active users within the first 3 months post-launch
    • Zero downtime after shifting to AWS-backed infrastructure
    • Faster developer onboarding, thanks to clean Laravel structure and thorough API documentation
    • API-first architecture, ready for expansion into mobile or external analytics

    By keeping the domain-specific logic intact and rebuilding everything else around it, the firm gained a platform that’s both trusted and transformable.


    User Feedback

    The internal audit teams reported significantly reduced time-to-delivery on client reports. New team members found the modern Laravel-based structure intuitive. Clients appreciated faster access to branded, professional reports with zero formatting issues—something the legacy system struggled with.


    Conclusion

    This project wasn’t just about modernising software. It was about unlocking business growth, improving operational efficiency, and reducing long-term tech debt. By rebuilding the platform with Laravel, Vue.js, and AWS, the firm now has the infrastructure and flexibility to scale, integrate, and innovate well into the future.


    Impact Made

    The firm no longer views its software as a maintenance cost; it’s a competitive asset. Audit teams work faster, data is more secure, and the business can onboard new clients without worrying about infrastructure or usability bottlenecks. The foundation is now in place for new features, mobile support, and integration with industry-standard finance tools. This is what true digital transformation looks like: pragmatic, strategic, and value-driven.

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