Regulatory Solutions Firm Boosts Efficiency

An IT firm providing services and solutions for the financial services industry has experienced tremendous growth in the past few years. Its offerings are provided to a customer base that includes insurance carriers and brokers, securities firms, and banks.

The different kinds of products and services that the firm offers for its clients historically have generated enormous quantities of paper documents, such as paperwork for first-time licenses and license renewals, name- and address-change paperwork, and documents associated with continuing education classes such as class rosters and sign-in sheets. But after years of business, the company officials recognized that they were inundated with paper. Data retention requirements for its business activities led to increasingly large and expensive on-site and off-site storage needs, and employee workflows that were frequently hampered by difficulties in locating paper-based files. "By 2009 we were certain about our need for some kind of enterprise content management solution to support our continued growth. But what technology we would use was an unknown," says the systems administrator for the firm. The company evaluated off-site solutions managed by third parties, large applications with detailed licensing features, and proprietary turnkey solutions.

The firm decided to install a KnowledgeLake enterprise content management (ECM) solution that operates seamlessly with the company’s existing Microsoft SharePoint technology. "Our company is an avid proponent of SharePoint, and the solution from KnowledgeLake allowed for seamless integration and a much shorter implementation time," says the systems administrator. "We felt like other solutions would not only take longer to implement, but the learning curve would have been more involved as well.

The firm deployed several KnowledgeLake products that provide a range of capabilities for a comprehensive solution, including scanning documents and uploading document images to SharePoint; optimizing document capture and uploading processes from remote locations that may have limited bandwidth; and helping employees easily upload documents into SharePoint from common business applications, such as Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat software. The firm uses Fujitsu fi-6670 scanners for its scanning hardware. The ECM solution is housed in a remote data center that is connected to the corporate offices by a wide area network link.

"An important aspect of the solution design was controlling the KnowledgeLake data flow from the front-end software products in the office to the back-end server products at the data center," says the systems administrator. "The KnowledgeLake Capture solution enables us to limit the amount of bandwidth the products used, especially during peak usage hours. This flexibility was an important consideration for us when evaluating solutions."

The firm had issues during its deployment due to the need for custom coding, but received ongoing support from KnowledgeLake’s Professional Services group.

With the KnowledgeLake solution and Microsoft SharePoint, the firm has an ECM solution that is helping to increase both the automation and security of daily tasks. The firm also has a better business-continuity system and is experiencing lower costs by reducing the need for off-site storage and filing cabinets. The firm has also benefitted from the seamless integration of the KnowledgeLake solution with SharePoint, which has helped to minimize the need for extra training.

Improved Automation and Security
The ECM solution using KnowledgeLake and SharePoint technologies is helping to increase business-process automation and the security of data. "Employees working inside SharePoint can leverage customized features in KnowledgeLake to complete transactions faster, automate repetitive manual tasks, and easily meet service-level agreements that we have with our customers," says the system administrator. "We can also search for and export information faster than before, and do it in a secure manner. The tangible benefits gained just from transaction processing delivered a fast return on investment in the KnowledgeLake solution, and were enough to support moving forward with a far more extensive KnowledgeLake ECM deployment."

Enhanced Business Continuity Planning
The firm has bolstered its business-continuity planning by converting paper files to electronic documents. "We are no longer dependent on off-site storage to protect critical documents, and our on-site documents are no longer susceptible to disaster or being misfiled," says the system administrator. "We’ve also reduced storage costs associated with on-site and off-site paper document storage. We’ve stopped buying filing cabinets, and will soon be recovering valuable floor space to support company growth by removing filing cabinets that are no longer needed. Plus, we anticipate additional annual cost savings after historical documents start meeting regulatory retention requirements and can be recycled."

Seamless Integration with Existing IT System
By choosing the KnowledgeLake products, the firm was able to leverage its existing IT investments. "We were already a Microsoft shop, and the KnowledgeLake solution fit nicely into our existing SharePoint and SQL Server infrastructure with minimal impact," the system administrator says. "The integration with the Microsoft products also meant a shorter learning curve, and allowed us to capitalize on much of our own expertise. The KnowledgeLake solution footprint has taken minimal resources and represented the most efficient and cost-effective solution we considered."