Modernizing a regulatory platform

Modernizing a legacy regulatory SaaS platform whose UI was fused to its database — and learning that the constraint itself, not the look, was the real problem.

this project shows

end-to-end ownership, systems thinking, design-system authorship, cross-functional collaboration, working with ambiguity in a constrained, legacy environment.

deliverables:

Complex B2B / government regulatory SaaS

my role

Product Designer — owned the core forms-and-tables interaction

outcome

A from-scratch design system and a modernization strategy that redirected the company toward a clean-slate rebuild

the constrains

The UI was fused to the database schema. One entity per view, related data buried under "connections."

The stack was old. Vanilla Java, no component library. Every new pattern cost real engineering time.

Government reliability requirements. Changes had to be safe and slow.

The directive was "just a facelift." Don't change the patterns users are trained on.

Reframing the brief

The product wasn't just looked outdated — it was a database admin UI wearing a thin skin. The userflow was the schema, and users paid for it in endless tabs.

First move:
prettier, same bones
prototype->

First, a clean visual pass over the broken flow — on purpose. Proof to the company that design changes how a product is perceived, before asking for expensive structural change.

One view instead of ten tabs

Pulled data scattered across separate database tables into one decision-ready view — so a regulator can approve or reject in one place, without touching the schema.

Chipping away at the pattern

A side panel that edits a record and surfaces related data in place. One new pattern at a time, the interface gets less like a database and more like a tool.

the real answer:

The lesson: stop modernizing dead tech. Build new, move one small client over as proof, expand. That became Thentia Cloud Ultimate — designed from the user's perspective, not the database's.