Nexus Project Wins Prestigious Award for Innovation in Customer Experience
Nexus Project Wins Prestigious Award for Innovation in Customer Experience
Hitachi Solutions is proud to announce that our Nexus Project (part of our work on the Environment Agency’s (EA) Regulatory Services Programme (RSP), the primary delivery vehicle for digital environmental regulation delivery) has won the Customer Experience Award at the Smarter Working Live Awards.
This achievement underscores the success of a multi-year effort to digitally transform and improve the effectiveness and efficiency of EA’s regulation and to enhance regulatory decision-making to better protect and enhance the environment.
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What is the Nexus Enforcement Programme?
Nexus is an innovative, efficient, data-driven platform representing a significant leap forward in modernising EA’s regulatory approach.
Built in-house, the platform replaced the outdated Case Management System (CMS) and other legacy platforms used by EA to manage environmental investigations that no longer supported the effective and efficient handling of their enforcement responsibilities.
The creation of Nexus also addressed the critical need for improved priority workload management and performance reporting.
Legacy systems, which once managed over 90,000 investigations, five million data entries, and 50,000 intelligence records, had become costly and inefficient, with support costs exceeding £1.5 million annually. Nexus was designed to simplify these processes, provide a consistent user experience, and offer a modern, easily accessible, mobile-friendly interface adaptable to the organisation’s evolving needs.
Nexus is the cutting-edge solution for EA thriving in a modern digital landscape. Leveraging a low-code approach (Microsoft Power Platform, Intelligent Data Platform, and Azure), the platform now supports over 1,700 users across the organisation, and Microsoft has acknowledged it as one of the top five Power Platform implementations in the UK.
Built on collaboration
The development of Nexus has resulted in remarkable collaboration between EA, Defra and Hitachi Solutions teams. Over five years, technical teams worked to translate a bold vision into a physical product. This collaborative effort between in-house technical product teams, project teams, and third-party support has been crucial in scaling Nexus for national rollout.
The rollout phase for Nexus was further supported by Nexus Champions and Lead Super Users, who act as key points of contact in their respective areas, helping to mobilise and support end users. This collaborative approach ensured that the platform’s benefits were widely understood and effectively implemented across the organisation.
Users at the heart of Nexus
User adoption has been a central focus throughout the project, with various tailored training paths developed to meet the needs of a diverse workforce. Recognising that a previous system’s inadequate rollout had created resistance to change, the team prioritised delivering a simplified, consistent, and dependable user experience to ensure users started learning confidently. Out of 1,883 users, 1,633 have been trained, achieving a 98% training attendance rate and a satisfaction score of 4.6 out of 5—well above the initial target.
Nexus is so much easier to access than CMS. It’s better to look at and easier to use. It’s also great at telling you what you haven’t filled in if you leave something out!
The future of Nexus
Although Nexus’s expansion into new areas and regimes is still in progress, its impact is already apparent, with 80% of users feeling confident that Nexus will enhance their enforcement responsibilities.
Nexus embodies EA’s vision of digitally transforming regulatory services by delivering smarter, end-to-end digital journeys and leveraging analytics and intelligence to modernise environmental regulation. While the platform’s expansion into new areas and regimes continues, its success demonstrates the value of collaboration, innovation, and a user-first approach in driving meaningful digital transformation.
About Hitachi Solutions Europe
Hitachi Solutions Europe, Ltd. helps its customers on their digital transformation journey using powerful, easy-to-use, affordable industry solutions built on the Microsoft Cloud. Hitachi Solutions Europe provides global capabilities with regional offices in the United States, Canada, Europe, India/Middle East, Japan, and Asia Pacific. For more information, visit: https://www.hitachi-solutions.co.uk
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About Hitachi Solutions, Ltd.
Hitachi Solutions, Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is a core member of the Information & Telecommunication Systems business of Hitachi Group and a recognised leader in delivering proven business and IT strategies and solutions to companies across many industries. The company provides value-driven IT services, from systems planning to integration, operation, and maintenance. Hitachi Solutions delivers products and services of superior value to customers worldwide through key subsidiaries in North America, Europe, India/Middle East, and Asia Pacific. For more information on Hitachi Solutions, please visit https://www.hitachi-solutions.com.