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AI

AI-assisted application modernization

Our engineers use Claude and other current models on the slow, high-volume work in older estates: security backlogs, framework upgrades, codebase consolidation and legacy ETL. Here is what that looked like on two client engagements. “I attribute much of the quality of the work and especially the compressed timeline to Smart Data’s mastery of AI,” the client’s IT leader wrote.

National distributorDistribution

Customer portals secured and upgraded

620+

known vulnerabilities eliminated

Two engagements, in detail

Customer portals for a national distributor, legacy ETL for a national retailer

Upgrades, remediation and conversions are where AI changes the work most: there is a lot of it, the details matter, and tests and scanners can confirm each change. Security remediation, framework upgrades and codebase consolidation come from the distributor engagement, and legacy ETL conversion comes from the retailer.

Security remediationScanner findings and pen test items closed across a portfolio

Vulnerability and security remediation

Scanner findings, open penetration test items and the dependency debt behind them, closed across whole application portfolios. On one engagement for a national distributor, that meant more than 620 known vulnerabilities eliminated and every penetration test finding remediated, with results cross-checked against a second vulnerability database that surfaced issues the first scanner missed.

  • Commercial scanner findings remediated and cross-checked against the open-source OSV database
  • Penetration test findings closed, with the evidence your security team needs
  • Real vulnerabilities found beyond what the scanner reported, and fixed
  • OSV
  • OWASP
Read the case study
Framework upgradesAngular, .NET and their dependencies brought current

Framework and runtime upgrades

Applications several major versions behind are a security problem before they are a feature problem. We bring frameworks and runtimes current: on the distributor’s portals, Angular 16 to 21 and Azure Functions from the .NET 6 in-process model to the .NET 10 isolated worker, with Angular bundles about 50 percent smaller.

  • Several major versions closed in one engagement
  • Packages updated across every project
  • Dead infrastructure found and removed along the way: more than $25K a year realized on that engagement
  • Angular
  • .NET
  • Azure Functions
  • TypeScript
Codebase consolidationCopies of one application brought into one platform

Codebase consolidation and multi-tenancy

Many estates carry the same application deployed once per customer or business unit, each copy drifting and each one billed. We consolidate them into one multi-tenant set of services, so a new customer means a new database rather than a new suite of cloud resources. For the distributor, five to six copies of one codebase are moving onto one multi-tenant platform, with about $78K a year in projected savings.

  • Per-customer copies mapped, compared and folded into shared services
  • A new customer becomes a new database, not a new suite of Azure resources
  • Duplicated cloud resources retired as each tenant moves across
  • Azure
  • Multi-tenant architecture
Legacy ETL conversionLegacy pipelines converted into tested Databricks code

Legacy ETL conversion to Databricks

For a major national retailer we built an AI-assisted migration tool, using Claude and structured prompts, that converts legacy ETL logic, orchestration scripts and deployment configurations into PySpark pipelines on Databricks. Unit tests and infrastructure as code are generated with every conversion, and in the first phase the tool handled 78% of the legacy transformation types.

  • Legacy transformations converted into PySpark pipelines on Databricks
  • Unit tests and Terraform generated alongside every pipeline
  • Senior engineers validating output against known behavior instead of translating by hand
  • Databricks
  • PySpark
  • Claude
  • Terraform
  • GitHub Actions
Databricks consulting

The retailer migration tool

How the tool turns legacy ETL into Databricks pipelines

The retailer had hundreds of legacy workflows and orchestration jobs. We built a tool on Claude and structured prompts instead, and tested it across a real cross-section of the estate in a three-month first phase.

  1. 01

    01Scope from real production

    31 workflows, 36 mappings, 60 orchestration jobs and 50 shell scripts, drawn from live domains rather than a curated sample.

  2. 02

    02Convert with Claude

    Legacy ETL logic, orchestration scripts and deployment configuration converted into PySpark pipelines on Databricks.

  3. 03

    03Generate the proof

    Unit tests, plus Terraform and GitHub Actions deployment code, generated alongside every converted pipeline.

  4. 04

    04Validate, then run

    Senior engineers validate output against known behavior instead of translating by hand, and the platform team can run what they review.

Scope, approach and results in full.Read the case study

Industries

Industries we work in

A few practical questions

Questions about AI-assisted modernization

What engineering leaders usually ask before the first codebase is opened.

Ask us about your situation
Which AI tools do your engineers use?

Mostly Claude, with other current models where they suit the task better. The retailer migration tool runs on Claude with structured prompts. We only use AI tools with training on your data turned off, and if your contract restricts AI or requires stricter handling, your contract wins.

Does AI-written code meet our standards?

On the distributor’s portals, every commercial scanner finding was closed, the results were cross-checked against the open-source OSV database, which surfaced real issues the scanner missed, and every penetration test finding was remediated.

Can you modernize software you did not build?

Yes. Both engagements on this page were on software someone else wrote, years earlier. Getting the current behavior pinned down, and writing tests where they are missing, comes first.

What does a first engagement look like?

Usually small and specific: one codebase and its backlog, or a first phase of a migration. The distributor engagement started with the security backlog and grew into the consolidation.

Is this only for Angular, .NET and Databricks?

No. Those are the stacks on these two engagements. The same approach works on other stacks, and our modernization work from before today’s AI tools reaches IBM i and VB6 desktop software.

Next step

Which codebase would you modernize first?

Tell us what it runs on and what is holding it back. Here is what happens after you reach out.

  1. A short call about the codebase

    What it runs on, what the scanners say and what is driving the timing.

  2. An engineer looks at what’s running

    Scope comes from your systems as they are, before anything is priced.

  3. You get a written proposal

    Covering scope, team, approach and price.

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