PIF Co-Builder: a smart incubator workspace on Liferay DXP 7.3, connected to the building itself
Saudi Arabia
The Public Investment Fund's Co-Builder hub in Riyadh houses Saudi Vision 2030 portfolio companies. ATS replaced its paper and desk-bound operations with a dual-interface Liferay DXP 7.3 platform — a member-facing app and an operational portal — with headless APIs reaching into the smart building's IoT systems.
The challenge
An elite incubator run on visitor books and paper forms
The Public Investment Fund's Co-Builder innovation hub in Riyadh is an elite incubator for portfolio companies working towards Saudi Vision 2030. The building was smart; the operations around it were not. Visitors were managed manually, physical access was requested by hand, and service requests to the hub team travelled on paper. For a workspace whose purpose is to show founders what a frictionless, modern environment looks like, that gap was the problem.
The management team needed one system that members could use for everything they asked of the hub — invitations, access, services — and that gave operations staff a single view of what had been requested, approved and fulfilled. It also had to talk to the building: decisions taken in software had to reach the smart-building systems rather than be re-keyed at a desk. That integration requirement is what made this a Liferay DXP project with a headless architecture rather than a conventional portal build.
Our approach
Two interfaces on one platform, delivered as configurable modules
Delivered by our Liferay DXP practice.
ATS designed the platform around the two audiences it serves. Members — the founders and teams of the portfolio companies — get a member-facing app for everything they need from the hub: inviting guests, requesting access, raising service requests and following their status. The incubator management team gets an operational portal with dashboards that show request queues, approvals and fulfilment across the hub.
Both run on a single Liferay DXP 7.3 instance, so identity, roles, content and workflow are shared rather than duplicated. The core capabilities — user management, invitation workflows, the access-request lifecycle and branded email communication — were delivered as configurable modules. Hub staff can change approval rules, invitation policies and email templates without a code change, which matters for an organisation whose programmes and residents change year to year.
- Smart workspace member portal: guest invitations, access requests, service requests and status tracking in one place
- Operational management dashboard for the hub team: queues, approvals, fulfilment and reporting
- Access-request lifecycle — request, review, approval, provisioning, expiry — modelled as a workflow, not an inbox
- Invitation management with branded email communication generated from templates the hub controls
- Headless and REST APIs so the same services serve the member app and the building's systems
Architecture
Liferay DXP 7.3 as the system of record, headless APIs to the building
Liferay DXP 7.3 holds the members, companies, roles and requests, with Microsoft SQL Server as the database and custom Java modules on Spring MVC for the workflow logic. Rather than rendering everything through portlets, the workflow services are exposed through Liferay's headless and REST APIs. The member app consumes those APIs; so do the integrations.
That API layer is what connects the portal to the physical hub. An access request approved in the operational portal flows through the integration layer to the smart-building IoT systems, so the building reflects what the software decided instead of waiting for someone to re-enter it. The same pattern carries invitations and service requests to the people and systems that fulfil them. It is the reference architecture we recommend whenever a Liferay portal has to drive systems outside itself.
Building blocks
- Liferay DXP 7.3 on Java with Spring MVC modules; Microsoft SQL Server
- Headless API and REST API layer for the member app and external systems
- IoT smart-building connectivity through the integration layer
- Workflow engine for the access-request and invitation lifecycles; templated, branded email
- Operational dashboard built on the same services as the member portal
Technology stack
What changed
A service desk that mostly runs itself
Every incubator service request now enters through the platform, and the physical service desk's load fell by 70%. Member onboarding — previously a two-day exercise of forms, approvals and access provisioning — takes 30 minutes through the digital workflow. The headless integration means the portal and the building's IoT systems act on the same decisions, which removed the manual re-keying that had made access management slow.
The platform has been recognised as a model digital workspace for Saudi Vision 2030 innovation hubs. For ATS it is also the clearest example of what we mean by headless Liferay: the portal is the system of record and its APIs reach everything else — apps, dashboards and, in this case, the building. For another two-portal Liferay DXP 7.3 architecture in the Gulf, see the National Library & Archives of the UAE.
Key results
All incubator service requests digitised — physical service desk load reduced by 70%
Headless API integration connected the Liferay portal with smart building IoT systems
Member onboarding time reduced from 2 days to 30 minutes with digital workflows
Platform recognised as a model digital workspace for Saudi Vision 2030 innovation hubs
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