Overhauling a Ticketing Solution for the Seattle Landmark Space Needle

Summary

Industry: Leisure, Travel.
Location: Seattle, WA, the U.S.
Project duration: 2020 – Ongoing.
Size of the project team: 6 experts.
Software products: Microservice-based Web applications, a Mobile (iOS) app, a Desktop (Windows) application.
Expertise delivered: Custom software development, Web development services.

Challenge

In December of 2020, SPD Technology completed the delivery of an AR Mobile app to the Seattle landmark Space Needle. Satisfied with the product and our team’s performance, the client engaged our company to streamline their composite ticketing solution we provided maintenance for at the time.

The client’s legacy system was a complex ticketing solution that was used by them to sell tickets for the Space Needle and an exhibition center the company runs. It consisted of a Web administration application, a media platform, kiosks, and software for physical devices.
The Administration application of the solution allowed managing products (or tours of the company’s locations), modifying these products, configuring promotional campaigns and different sales channels, and handling refunds for sold orders.

At the start of the project, the client’s solution was around 10 years old. The system had monolithic architecture and used antiquated technologies, which made it impossible to make changes to the solution’s business logic or expand it by adding new features. The attempt to overhaul the solution, made by our predecessors, resulted in a botched-up partial transition to a microservice-based architecture.

Additionally, the client was also dissatisfied with the level of security the solution had and wanted to eliminate any possible gaps and weaknesses in the system’s security.

Solution

To implement the project, SPD Technology assembled a project team that consisted of 2 backend developers, 1 frontend developer, 2 QA engineers, and a Team Lead/Project Manager. In the course of the project, the composition of the team varied slightly as more experts were added on a temporary basis, as was required. For instance, during the project’s early phases, it was taken part in by our software architects, who determined which part of the system should be shifted to a microservice architecture.

The project was managed by our Project Manager, who directly interacted with the client’s CIO and business stakeholders.

Our project team started with an attempt to organize a knowledge transfer from the company that developed the client’s system. Our experts interacted with them directly but most of the required information and data still had to be collected, assembled, and organized on our own. To aggravate, the solution was completely undocumented. As a consequence, our experts have had to spend a great deal of time and effort on analyzing the code to determine the way the various functions worked.

It took our project team around 17 months to overhaul the solution’s Administration application. The ticketing functionality has been expanded to create various types of tickets by taking into account the age category, timeslot, and other parameters. It’s become possible to modify products, modify existing email templates, use coupons, and more. While creating a microservice for the Photo gallery, we’ve expanded this functionality by adding the ability to retrieve snapshots using a ticket barcode and send them to an email. We’ve also developed from scratch partner functionality that enables the client’s partners (hotels, inns, and tourist service providers) to sell tickets for their locations.

Completely redesigning the bar scanning application used at the entrances to the client’s locations took us around 6-8 months. We’ve expanded the functionality to include the processing of coupons, application of discounts, and other features.

To uncover and stop any possible security gaps, SPD Technology’s security experts made an end-to-end security audit of the client’s solution, eliminated the vulnerabilities, and enhanced the solution’s level of security.

Technical Solution

SPD Technology’s project team has used the following tech stack to implement the project:

• NET 6
• Azure SQL
• MongoDb
• Azure Functions
• NodeJs

Result

Implementing the project has dramatically improved Space Needle’s ticketing-related business processes and the customer experience they deliver. The endeavor has enabled the client to quickly and flexibly respond to the needs of their customers.

Adding the partner functionality to the client’s solution has allowed Space Needle to start cooperating with hotels and other market players in the Travel and Leisure industry and thus tangibly expand their market.

The company’s infrastructure-related costs have shrunk by a factor of 2.

Changing the architecture of the kiosk and ticketing functionality of the solution has increased the development speed by 50-70%. Implementing the Monitoring functionality has allowed the client’s employees to manage tickets sales a lot more predictably and optimally, which, in turn, has improved the user experience severalfold.