Frequently Asked Questions

---

We built Insight out of necessity because there are not commercially available, comprehensive end to end research administration solutions to help our PI’s, Department Users and others maximize their time and their efficiency.  The other commercially available marketplace solutions have more limited features and functionalities across the entire research lifecycle

We began working on Insight about 20 years ago and have continuously expanded its capabilities based on researcher needs and expectations. So, it is really a solution built with researchers for researchers 

About fifty-five people. Our development team has thirty-four people, and we also have delivery managers and product owners who interact actively with end users and stakeholders to help establish key priorities and deliver researcher expectations

We have seven exceptionally large academic medical centers who use Insight, including Mass General Brigham, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Mass Eye and Ear, McLean Hospital, Newton Wellesley and other hospitals and research areas 

 Approximately $2.2 Billion dollars annually. Some funding continues across multiple years 

We release approximately twenty times a year. Large features releases are quarterly, production support releases are bi-weekly. We also have daily hotfix capabilities if needed

 We have over 130,000 registered users. On average, we have 10,000-12,000 concurrent users without any issues with performance

We have approximately 10,000 Contracts being managed concurrently at any point in time.  Insight is scaled and capable of managing as many open contracts as needed

We schedule releases and inform our end users about upcoming releases first to make sure we are not interrupting business as usual

Insight is Cloud-based SaaS solution which is licensed to end users

It depends on which modules you license. We have a tiered pricing structure and bundle pricing. If you are interested in more detailed pricing estimates, we can review which modules and tiers you may need and provide pricing accordingly 

Insight is a Managed Cloud solution   delivering continuous updates, upgrades, and optional deployment across   multiple availability zones with multiple replicas for high availability and   disaster recovery by default. We provide ongoing maintenance and support   at an additional annual cost

Our dedicated Insight Help Desk will triage incoming service request tickets with expedited resolution. We can also provide Help Desk reporting as needed

We begin with an assessment of a client’s current state. Then we develop a set of recommendations with a project timeline and organize the implementation team. In addition, we provide training and support to the client team as part of our professional services offering

When we do the initial assessment, we meet with you and your teams to understand your integration points and back-end systems which need to integrate with Insight. We then determine the level of effort needed, staffing needs from Insight and your company, and come up with a timeline and cost estimate   

Our Research Support Services (RSS) team helps guide investigators, research departments and organizations to administer the grant life cycle. We provide staffing and advisory services with experts who are trained in the research administration lifecycle. We help you fill staffing gaps, advise you on structuring and organizing research teams to achieve your research goals

Our system up time SLA is 99.9 percent. We have a documented Disaster Recovery Plan, which is tested annually

Data is backed up and stored on   read-access geo-redundant storage (RA-GRS) blobs that are being replicated in   paired regions. Also, Insight uses Okta as the identity management platform.   A copy of Data Protection policies can be provided as needed 

Absolutely! We can provide additional information if needed, but here is a recap. 

• UI communication via APIs use HTTPS with at minimum TLS 1.2
• Azure Service Endpoints used to securely connect our application services with Databases and Documents Storage
• All internal communication is done within secured VNET, any connections outside is forbidden
• The only supported option for   external connection to SQL MI Managed Instance Private Endpoint Connections.  This allows for encrypted communication between different Azure networks

Only authorized support team members can access production environment websites. Direct access to production databases and document storage systems is limited to users who are members of the database administrator team and access is audited annually 

Each client has its own separate Database and separate Documents Storage. In addition, we can provision a separate isolated application service environment for each client dependent on your enterprise’s security policies 

Yes! We perform Veracode Static and Dynamic scans with each major application release or on an annual basis (whichever comes first). Our audit policies require scans to be conducted at a minimum of once per year 

 You own your data and metadata. Your data is stored on separate client Databases and your documents are stored in separate client Data Storage containers