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Preparation of a dedicated billing system based on AWS cloud-native services
What was the project about?
In July 2022, our client, Panek company, had a nearly finished billing system, which turned out to have not met its practical business demands after all. As a result, the client decided to create a new, comprehensive internal billing system from scratch.
The system had to work with existing solutions responsible for individual services (e.g. the carsharing system) and be easy to integrate with payment service providers and the client’s own financial and accounting system. The main challenge of the project was to keep up with the pace: the client had set aside just 8 months for this billing system to be built practically from scratch. If we had not relied on cloud-native AWS services, the deadline would have been impossible to meet.
2022 – now
CarSharing, TSL
- Software engineering
- Cloud services
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Who was our client?
Panek provides a carsharing service, which is an innovative way of travelling within the city: a special mobile app allows people to rent a nearby car per minute, per hour or per day. Users only pay for time and mileage, and don’t need to worry about any other fees. Today, Panek CarSharing has more than 2500 vehicles available throughout Poland.
What were the key challenges of the project?
Apart from the deadline, which meant the billing system had to be created in just eight months, the new solution was meant to support the client’s business strategy in terms of:
- Developing new business lines (e.g. bike rental, food delivery);
- International expansion (multi-currency billing);
- Building competitive advantage thanks to unique functionalities (“continuous” cost calculation).
How did we address the problem?
The client performed a business analysis and defined all their requirements as user-stories. We then set up a team of developers experienced in building billing systems and went on to develop solution architecture and the system in accordance with their requirements.
We worked on functionalities such as:
- Publishing pricelist information;
- Receiving and saving events;
- Charging payment elements;
- Publishing events;
- Core billing;
- API;
- Payment components;
- Documents;
- Communication with the accounting system;
- Currency exchange rates (integration with three providers).
The version we deployed could be described as an MVP+: since early April, the system has been deployed in production, integrated with a new car rental mobile app and the client’s accounting system. Our team continues to iron out the details, smooth out functionalities and add new elements.
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What did we do?
Quick start
Given the tight deadline, the client expected advanced domain-specific knowledge and quick deployment.
Proof of Concept
We started off with a two-month PoC project, which opened the doors to further cooperation.
MVP
In just three months, we had an MVP ready so that the client could start using the new billing system in their business practice.
Continued development
The project has entered the continued development stage. In cooperation with the client, we continue to work on new functionalities.
What did the client get?
modelling
Flexible tariff models do not need to be managed by IT staff, which reduces operating costs.
algorithm
Business rules for context-based process orchestration.
calculation
A key element of the solution is its ability to work in a “continuous” cost calculation mode.
What technologies did we use?
Spring Boot / Java 17
Spring Cloud
AWS RDS / DynamoDB
Amazon SQS/SNS
JsReport
ElasticSearch
Kafka
AWS StepFunctions
Junit
IT Manager, AWS Unit at Altkom SoftwareA crucial requirement that determined the further fate of the project was that we had to set out the scope of our project in great detail. We had to analyse goals, capabilities and expectations very meticulously to enable full backlog refinement. Working at this level required the client to be highly involved in our cooperation. Fortunately, thanks to the open attitude of the team at Panek and the good communication between us, we were able to pull it off.
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