Morgan Stanley

Client & Industry

Morgan Stanley, a global leader in financial services, sought to enhance the analytical capabilities available to its Financial Advisors through sophisticated dashboarding tools. These tools needed to aggregate and display complex data across multiple hierarchies (Product, Organization, Time).

The Challenge

The project faced several significant challenges:

• An aggressive timeline, with an initial project estimate of two years needing substantial acceleration.
• Complexity in translating user interface interactions (oData queries) into backend proprietary XML queries processed by a stored-procedure framework.
• The need to generate accurate data aggregates (Trades, Assets, Revenue) based on complex, multi-dimensional hierarchies.
• Ensuring high code quality and minimizing defects within a rapid development cycle.
• Integrating and customizing various UI components (charts, grids, navigation trees) for a cohesive user experience.
• Managing a full-stack team encompassing UI, Services, and Database development.

Solution by Nimbletec

Nimbletec delivered end-to-end technical leadership and execution, achieving accelerated delivery and superior quality through decisive actions:

• Spearhead Full-Stack Technical Leadership: Drive project execution from inception to accelerated delivery using Microsoft Visual Studio, ensuring alignment with strategic objectives across the entire technology stack.
• Assemble and Direct Elite Development Team: Rapidly staff and lead high-caliber User Interface (UI), Services (C# .NET Web API), and Database (SQL Server) engineers to meet aggressive timelines.
• Implement Optimized Development Methodologies: Compress a 2-year estimated timeline into 5 months through rigorous project management, efficient development practices, and clear API contracts defined with Swagger and tested via Postman.
• Provide Strategic Information Architecture (IA) Insight: Establish reusable frameworks based on deep Information Architecture analysis, cutting development time 4x across multiple Morgan Stanley teams by promoting component reuse and standardized data access patterns.
• Direct Full-Stack Design and Development: Architect scalable backend services using C# and the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern, build robust SQL Server stored procedures leveraging Common Table Expressions (CTEs) for complex hierarchical data aggregation, design efficient Extract, Transform, Load (ETL) pipelines, mentor engineers, and enforce stringent best practices.
• Engineer Bespoke UI Components: Develop sophisticated, intuitive user interface elements (charts, grids, navigation trees) using TypeScript, Angular 5, and Bootstrap, tailored specifically for the Financial Advisor workflow and consuming data via the oData protocol.
• Negotiate Deliverables and Manage Releases: Secure agreement on project scope with senior management; orchestrate resource allocation, timeline adherence, and flawless release execution, ensuring seamless deployment of the integrated solution.

Key Results & Impact

Nimbletec's strategic leadership and technical execution delivered quantifiable, high-impact results for Morgan Stanley:

• Accelerate Time-to-Market by 80%: Delivered the full 2-year project scope in under 5 months by assembling an elite team and implementing optimized development practices, deploying critical tools to Financial Advisors significantly ahead of schedule.
• Achieve Unparalleled Code Quality: Reduced post-release defect counts by a factor of 4 compared to organizational benchmarks through rigorous code reviews, mentorship, and adherence to best practices, setting a new standard for engineering excellence.
• Generate 4x Development Efficiency Gains Across Teams: Implemented strategic Information Architecture insights that enabled framework reusability, cutting development time significantly not just for this project but across multiple related teams.
• Deliver Mission-Critical Financial Advisor Dashboards: Successfully designed, developed (using C#, Angular, SQL Server), and deployed sophisticated dashboards, exceeding complex technical and functional requirements for multi-hierarchy data analysis (Trades, Assets, Revenue).