Case Study: Duwio

The opportunity for evolution

With almost a decade of success behind them, Spacesuit wanted to take the next step - to evolve their proven concept into a full SaaS product. Duwio would offer dedicated workspaces for subscribers, modern collaboration tools, and a fresh user experience, all underpinned by a scalable and secure cloud architecture.

The challenge

Creative teams were stuck between consumer tools like Dropbox, Google Drive and WeTransfer - none built for high-volume image workflows - and enterprise DAM platforms with enterprise price tags. Rebuilding a mature application as a multi-tenant platform required more than a design refresh. The system needed to handle isolated data per workspace, user roles and permissions, real-time collaboration and global content delivery - without introducing complexity or performance overheads. At the same time, Spacesuit wanted a foundation that could grow to include new media types such as video and design assets.

Partnering for transformation

Our previous work with Spacesuit Media had laid the groundwork for both the collaborative relationships and the technical discovery required to wholistically understand the project and the business goals.

Si Novi worked alongside Spacesuit's core team - Ross (Managing Director), Adam (Designer & Operations) and Jamie (Compliance & Security) - to design both the product experience and the technical framework. Spacesuit Media leaned on our AWS Partner status and extensive AWS experience, with our role combining software engineering, AWS architecture and long-term cloud strategy, guiding the business from traditional hosting to a resilient, automated AWS environment.

Our Solution

Duwio was built as a cloud-native application using the AWS Well-Architected Framework as its guide. Inheriting its core from the original Spacesuit Collections application, the platform runs a containerised PHP stack on Amazon ECS with Amazon RDS for MySQL providing reliable data storage. Assets are served through Amazon S3 with an authenticated Amazon CloudFront CDN, ensuring fast, secure delivery to global audiences.

Amazon ECS for containerised application services and managed scaling.
Amazon RDS (MySQL) for relational data and workspace isolation.
Amazon S3 + CloudFront for deduplicated, high-speed media delivery.
AWS Lambda for background automation such as metadata extraction, thumbnailing and user event notifications.
AWS Backup for cross-region and cross-account protection and recovery of both RDS and S3 data.
AWS CloudTrail for auditing and continuous security visibility.

Designed for creative workflows

The new interface prioritises clarity and flow: tagging and folder organisation feel effortless, previews respond instantly, and every workspace has its own secure customer area for gallery delivery. Role-based permissions make collaboration straightforward, letting photographers, editors and assistants work together safely under one account.

Results and early feedback

Duwio is now live and trusted by global brands including Nissan, Envision Racing and OX Delivers. Spacesuit Media have migrated their entire archive of 600,000 high-res images onto the platform, and users have praised its simplicity, performance and visual cohesion. The AWS foundation allows Spacesuit Media to onboard new clients with confidence while maintaining strict security and performance standards.

What's next

Si Novi continues to support Spacesuit Media as Duwio grows - adding billing automation, advanced reporting and expanded media support. The platform's architecture is designed to scale gracefully as the customer base and content volume increase.