28 September 2008

BI Glossary - Online analytical processing (OLAP)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Online analytical processing (OLAP)

Online analytical processing. Popular term coined by E.F. Codd in 1993 to describe the multidimensional analysis of data. The term OLAP itself is somewhat confusing and was popularized simply to highlight the difference between databases designed for analysis (OLAP) and databases designed for updates and transaction processing (OLTP).

Source: Business Intelligence Terms, BI Glossary, OLAP, Online Analytical Processing, BI Software, Business Intelligence Application

BI Glossary - Multidimensional analysis

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Multidimensional analysis

Also known as dimensional analysis. The analysis of business indicators by examining them from different points of view. One can examine revenue by product, or revenue by geography, or revenue by time period. In this example, revenue is the business indicator under examination, while product, geography, and time period are the points of view or dimensions.

Source: Business Intelligence Terms, BI Glossary, Multidimensional Analysis, BI Solutions, BI Software, Business Intelligence Application.

BI Glossary - Key performance indicators (KPI)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Key performance indicators (KPI)

Quantifiable performance measurements of performance of an activity that is critical to the success of an organization. KPIs differ depending on the objective of an organization.

Source: Business Intelligence Terms, BI Glossary, KPI, BI Software, Business Intelligence Application

BI Glossary - Information discovery and delivery (IDD)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Information discovery and delivery (IDD)

IDD help simplify the way that business decisions makers use information, allowing users to access, format, analyze, navigate, and share information across the organization. IDD comprises (enterprise) reporting, query and analysis, dashboards and scorecards, and the BI platform (including search capabilities).

Topics : Business Intelligence Terms, BI Glossary, Information Discovery and Delivery (IDD), BI Software, Business Intelligence Application

26 September 2008

BI Glossary - Extract, transform and load (ETL)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Extract, transform and load (ETL)

Extraction, transformation, and loading (of data). Term used to describe the process of extracting data our of a production system, then transforming and cleansing it before loading it into a database dedicated to business intelligence. The term is also used to describe a software industry segment and set of software products designed to manage the data extraction, transformation, and loading process.

BI Glossary - Executive information systems (EIS)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Executive information systems (EIS)

A precursor to business intelligence systems. Before the democratization of information, customized views of business data was accessible only by a limited elite of senior executives via EIS systems. EIS systems were typically expensive to build and difficult to modify, hence slow to adapt to the rapidly changing needs of modern corporations.

BI Glossary - Enterprise resource planning (ERP)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Enterprise resource planning (ERP)

Enterprise resource planning system. Popular acronym for a broader category of enterprise software systems (a.k.a. enterprise business applications). An enterprise system enables a company to integrate data used throughout the organization in functions such as finance, operations and logistics, human resources, and sales and marketing.

BI Glossary - Enterprise performance management (EPM)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Enterprise performance management (EPM)

Applications and services that help users align with strategy by streamlining the planning process, setting targets, and tracking key business metrics via management dashboards, scorecards, analytics, and alerting.

BI Glossary - Enterprise information management (EIM)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Enterprise information management (EIM)

Products and services that deliver physical and virtual data integration, data quality, and metadata management capabilities that ensure BI information is timely, accurate, and trustworthy.

25 September 2008

BI Glossary - Dashboard

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Dashboard

A user interface that organizes and presents information in an easy-to-read format and help organizations align people's actions with strategy by tracking and analyzing key business metrics and goals. Dashboards and scoreboards enable proactive management via "what-if" analysis, customer segmentation, forecasting, and analyzing business processes. The term "dashboard" refers to the visual similarities to a car dashboard.

BI Glossary - Business performance management (BPM)

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Business performance management (BPM)

Business performance management (BPM) is a set of processes that help organizations optimize business performance. BPM is focused on business processes such as planning and forecasting. It helps businesses discover efficient use of their business units, financial, human, and material resources.

BI Glossary - Balanced scorecard

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Balanced scorecard

Companies use the balanced scorecard method, a management process introduced by Robert Kaplan and David Norton, to measure and refine current performance as well as to formulate future strategy. The method consists of measuring business performance in four categories to align individual, organizational, and cross-departmental initiatives. The four categories of indicators measured are: financial performance, customer knowledge, internal business processes, and learning and growth.

BI Glossary - Analytic applications

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Analytic applications

Software solutions designed to address a specific data analysis need, for example financial analysis or customer intelligence. These applications are presented as 'turnkey' solutions, ready to be deployed to address a business department's specific data analysis needs.

BI Glossary - Activity-based costing

Business Intelligence BI Glossary - Activity-based costing

A practice which identifies activities and then calculates all related costs of performing them - providing actual costs chargeable. It accurately identifies sources of profit and loss, and improves company-wide decision-making.

24 September 2008

Tagetik BI Software - Dashboard and Scorecard Applications

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : Tagetik BI Software - Dashboard and Scorecard Applications

Features
Tagetik allows to manage the dashboard and scorecard applications as part of a single Corporate Performance Management solution that unifies all processes.
Tagetik CPM helps organizations translate strategy into operational objectives that drive both behavior and performance, measure progress with a linkage between cause and effect and monitor, track and analyze performance in real time through a user friendly dashboard improving management insight. Thanks to the unification of processes, Tagetik delivers a solution with a low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).

To support the Dashboard & Scorecards process Tagetik CPM delivers:

Dashboarding: define dynamic dashboards, user friendly and customizable by the users

Monitoring: monitor and track at every level the execution of the strategy of the organization with the help of intuitive displays metrics and indicators

Scorecarding Strategy definition: definition of strategic objectives and their key performance indicators (KPIs)

Methodology: supports most well know methodologies such as Balanced Scorecard, Six Sigma, etc.

Data Collection: define and gather the metrics to measure and control business performance

Unification: scorecard and dashboard can be natively built on data uploaded and processed on Tagetik CPM

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, Tagetik BI solution at tagetik.com

22 September 2008

BI Tagetik Solution - Profitability Modeling Optimization

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : Tagetik BI Solution

Profitability Modeling and Optimization Features

Tagetik allows to manage the profitability, modeling and optimization process as part of a single Corporate Performance Management solution that unifies all processes
Tagetik CPM can help understand overall financial performance and identify how value is created by enabling companies to analyze which products, customers and services drive profitability. Thanks to the built-in allocations process and deep functionalities, Tagetik CPM helps companies reduce Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).

To support the Profitability Modeling & Optimization process Tagetik CPM delivers:

  • Modeling: map of the control structure for cost objects, activities, resources and their relationships
  • Allocations: powerful allocation models that allocate costs and revenues to the subjects of control (resources and activities) and indirect costs to the subjects of analysis (customer, product, channel…), with waterfall cost allocation cycles
  • Drivers: cost drivers based on financial and operational (quantity, head count..) criteria to be used as basis for allocations
  • Reporting and Analysis: reports that visualize the results of the different allocation cycles and analyze profitability with navigation using filtering and drilldown tools (down to individual allocation lines) and automated adjustment journal that provide detailed analysis of the different allocation models
  • Journal entries: manual adjustments and automatic double entry
    ‘What-if’ Analysis: generate alternative analysis scenarios based on simulation
  • Interfaces: automatic data import from multiple sources (e.g. ERP systems, etc.)

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, Tagetik BI solutions in profitability, modeling and optimization information at tagetik.com

BI Tagetik Solutions - Budgeting Planning Forecasting

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : Tagetik Overview

Tagetik allows to manage the budgeting, planning and forecasting processes as part of a single Corporate Performance Management solution that unifies all processes.
In the wake of recent accounting scandals and emerging national and international regulations, the requirements on financial planning have grown exponentially.

Traditional spreadsheet-based budgeting systems, however, cannot handle these new requirements. In order to outperform your competitors and obtain the necessary transparency for compliance, your company needs a sophisticated solution that automates the complex financial rules and processes to consolidate detailed budgets on operational, corporate as well as group levels.

Tagetik CPM unifies the processes of planning, budgeting and forecasting as part of a holistic approach to managing business performance.

As a result, you can easily translate strategy into operations, see how potential sales, production or price changes could affect your bottom line, and achieve the necessary transparency and flexibility to comply with changing regulations.

Translate Strategic Plans into day-to-day operations
Tagetik CPM provides a single solution for all planning and budgeting needs throughout your organization. You can quickly allocate financial targets for the entire group to company and operational levels in a top-down approach.

Go with the flow through powerful forecasting
In order to seize opportunities and minimize risks, your company has to constantly monitor the market and respond by reorganizing your planned resources. Tagetik CPM supports powerful forecasting and modeling through a driver-based approach to planning.

Manage multiple budgets
For most companies, managing multiple budget versions is a manual, timeconsuming process. Tagetik CPM minimizes human error by uniting all operational, corporate and group budgeting processes into a single application. Following the built-in workflow, budget owners can collect, approve and certify data for each area of the enterprise and pass it on to the next highest level.

Ensure transparency and compliance
Tagetik CPM uses built-in audit trails to document who added or modified what, when and where. This functionality ensures maximum transparency, so your executives can validate financial statements without a second thought.

Unify planning with reporting and closing processes
Since Tagetik CPM unifies planning with other key CPM processes, you seamlessly consolidate this budget data to generate management reports for internal decision support. Through the closing process, you can also match and reconcile intercompany bookings and create P&L statements, balance sheets and cash fl ow statements based on budget and historical data to disclose accurate financial forecasts to the public.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, Tagetik BI solutions, budgeting planning and forecasting information at tagetik.com

18 September 2008

BI Solutions - Solutions for SAS® the Utilities Industry

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : Solutions for SAS® the Utilities Industry

The intelligence to power effective, forward-looking decisions in volatile markets
Utility companies operate in a unique climate where the challenges of rising costs and competitive and regulatory pressures intensify daily. Companies struggle to accurately predict retail demand, control supply costs, protect delivery systems, minimize regulatory disallowances and sustain good credit ratings in an environment sharpened by deregulation.

Across all sectors, utilities must make reliable decisions amid hundreds or even thousands of variables – while improving profitability, controlling costs and enhancing operational efficiency.

SAS solutions for the utilities industry combine award-winning software and best-practice services to transform masses of data about your operations, suppliers, risks, assets and profitability into strategic business intelligence – the power behind a clear competitive advantage.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for Utilities at sas.com

BI Solutions - SAS® Solutions for Retail

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : SAS® Solutions for Retail

Enhance retail profitability by transforming insight into action
More than any other business driver, competition characterizes the retail industry. Globalization, deflation, diversification of sales channels and, most of all, changing customer demands have merged to create a cutthroat environment in which retailers struggle to turn a profit.

These profitability challenges involve both revenue and cost. Sales remain flat as many companies don't understand customer behavior and buying habits well enough to make the right decisions about product, price, promotion and placement. And without the ability to explore every facet of the organization across business units and geographies, it can be a struggle to understand and manage the costs required to do business.

Robust retail intelligence powered by leading analytics
SAS solutions for retail turn data about customers, merchandise and operations into knowledge that provides greater insight into performance and empowers retailers to make more informed decisions, gain a competitive advantage, strengthen customer and vendor loyalty, and improve profitability.

Retailers can select from a wide range of powerful SAS solutions that include nearly three decades of SAS retail analytics experience, along with retail expertise and merchandising best practices from Marketmax.

Four integrated groups of solutions comprise SAS retail intelligence:

  • Customer intelligence helps retailers identify, acquire, activate, serve and retain the most profitable customers.
  • Merchandise intelligence helps retailers drive revenue, protect margins and earn customer loyalty with optimized merchandise plans, assortments, pricing, promotions, space plans and allocations – all driven by unparalleled demand forecasting and predictive analytics.
  • Operations intelligence lets retailers leverage organizational assets to trade with vendors and serve customers more efficiently and profitably.
  • Performance management solutions provide the ability to analyze, forecast and maximize profits across the entire retail enterprise by monitoring cost and performance, helping retailers drive disparate functional units toward common goals.

SAS solutions for retail are built on a common retail intelligence platform that provides an integrated, open and extensible foundation for creating and delivering accurate, in-depth retail intelligence. Prebuilt data models and analytical models, along with streamlined processes and techniques, ensure rapid implementation and results.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for Retail at sas.com

BI Solutions - SAS® Solutions for the Oil & Gas Industry

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : SAS® Solutions for the Oil & Gas Industry

A detailed view of integrated operations, subsurface and overall performance, with the data management and predictive capabilities to fuel proactive decision making
The volatile nature of our carbon-based energy economy has put the oil and gas (O&G) industry squarely in the spotlight, with analysts and investors closely monitoring performance and evaluating future growth claims against a company’s demonstrated ability to deliver on needed performance improvements in the face of major challenges:

  • An aging work force and large, looming skills gap.
  • Excess demand and the associated need to find more reservoirs while mitigating environmental impacts.
  • Huge volumes of historic and real-time data scattered throughout operational silos in fragmented legacy systems.
  • Technological complexities associated with multiple, disjointed planning and monitoring systems.

SAS provides solutions that enable the O&G industry to transform masses of data about your sub-surface, operations, reservoirs, fields, other assets, suppliers, contractors, risks, costs and profitability into strategic business intelligence—the fuel for competitive advantage.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for Oil and Gas at sas.com

17 September 2008

SAS BI Solutions for Media

Business Intelligence BI Software Application : SAS BI Solutions for Media

Media executives face the complete transformation of their industry. Audiences have not only begun migrating to new media, they have brought their heightened expectations of immediacy, relevance, customization and participation back to traditional media channels.

This shift leaves traditional media brands struggling with the balance between old and new ways of doing business. New formats and media sites quickly emerge into powerful competitors. Executives are forced to make strategic decisions about digitization, distribution, content management, subscription packages and advertising avails. They are scrutinizing their revenue-generation and subscriber-retention strategies in a quest to understand audience desires and expectations.

To dominate their markets, media companies of any size – from giant conglomerates, interactive media sites, cable and satellite providers to publishers and film and music studios – need to harness the information hidden in their customer and operational data.

SAS offers technologies and solutions that can adapt to the diversity of the media industry, helping to solve your company's unique problems while building on the technology investments you have already made. With SAS, you can maximize success in many areas.

Subscriber intelligence
To acquire, retain and cross-sell subscribers, you must offer them what they want. With SAS, you can learn your subscribers' preferences, behaviors and unmet needs through sophisticated analysis during your day-to-day interactions. Such analysis, coupled with powerful campaign management, enables you to deliver more effective marketing communications and improve the success of your acquisition, retention and cross-sell strategies.

SAS provides subscriber intelligence and award-winning campaign management for every industry subsector, available either as in-house customer intelligence solutions or as a hosted solution.

Circulation and subscription forecasting
Current economics exacerbate the pressure on publishers to get an accurate forecast of qualified subscription levels and newsstand sales. This forecasting process serves as the basis for decisions on distribution, promotional spending and activities, material planning, advertising evaluations and, ultimately, corporate financial projections. The more accurate your predictions, the better your outcome.

SAS offers superior forecasting technologies that provide a range of capabilities for:

Time series analysis and forecasting.
Econometrics and systems modeling.
Financial analysis and reporting.
Web visitor retention
Even the most established media brand is facing unprecedented threats from the Web's immediacy, personalization and participatory nature. Steadfast rules are being challenged as geographies, time zones and unidirectional formats are no longer constraints; they are quickly being replaced by advertising backlash, smaller screens and mobility. As a result, all media and entertainment Web channels are looking closely at strategies for enhancing direct relationships with consumers. SAS provides web visitation intelligence with a Web analytics solution.

Enhanced advertising effectiveness
To maintain a competitive edge, marketing executives must make faster, smarter buying decisions and be able to justify their purchases – based on real knowledge rather than gut instinct. The problem is that there is so much data on so many platforms that it's difficult to access, manage and analyze it to articulate a particular medium's buying power.

SAS helps you optimize your marketing mix by identifying which media and advertising activities generate the greatest ROI. With SAS you can understand your audience's motivations and behavior, so you can assess the likelihood that they will respond to specific offers. You can also promote customer loyalty and satisfaction through more efficient and better-targeted marketing communications.

SAS data integration technology lets you access data from any source or platform and clean it to ensure a single, enterprise view that allows more accurate, reliable analysis. And SAS text mining enables your media advertising experts to group, subgroup and match an audience to its client advertisers' exact target segments.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for media at sas.com

SAS BI Solutions : Creating Competitive Advantage in Manufacturing

Business Intelligence BI SAS Software Application for Manufacturing : Creating Competitive Advantage in Manufacturing

Making a great product isn't enough anymore. Success requires that you enhance your competitive advantage.

In this competitive world, manufacturers can no longer rely on low prices, high quality and on-time delivery alone to keep them on top. These attributes – advantages a decade ago – are now just requirements to stay in the game. And the rules of the game are constantly changing. Manufacturers face increasing globalization, more competition than ever, and customers whose demands reflect their own knowledge and expectations of a global market.

Manufacturing companies today have extensive inventories to track and move, a greater number of products to generate, numerous suppliers to negotiate with and quality standards to maintain. They also have an ever-increasing need to acquire, satisfy and retain additional customers to remain profitable. Because of these complex pressures, it is imperative that all the links in the supply chain be managed successfully.

SAS solutions deliver critical advantage by helping companies turn data into knowledge, enabling them to develop unique demand, supply, operational and customer insights. As a result, companies improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their supply chain, manufacturing process and after-sales service network, thus maximizing profits at optimal levels of customer satisfaction.

These powerful solutions include:

SAS Supplier Relationship Management – Collect, analyze and leverage all aspects of your supplier data and purchasing history to optimize your strategic sourcing and achieve significant cost savings. This comprehensive, modularized solution helps you realize substantial returns in three main areas of procurement: strategy alignment and scorecarding, opportunity exploration, and detailed spend analysis with decision support.

SAS Warranty Analysis – Reduce warranty costs and improve quality by using warranty claims, call center data and more to identify fraudulent claims, detect emerging issues, focus problem solvers and forecast warranty costs.

SAS Service Parts Optimization – Forecast short-term, new-part, end-of-life and high-demand parts using industry-leading forecasting models. Then generate optimal inventory replenishment policies that account for the variability in demand and supply. This solution helps you immediately reduce costs, improve customer satisfaction and protect your brand image.

SAS Enterprise Intelligence Platform – A scalable, extensible, robust environment that provides the foundation for creating enterprise intelligence in the overall supply chain.

Every day, you receive volumes of data that could help you move into a more competitive position. This data flows from all directions – the boardroom, the assembly line, customer contacts and all points in between. But unless you know what to do with it, all that valuable data is useless. With SAS, you can turn data into a powerful tool for your business.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for manufacturing information at sas.com

13 September 2008

BI Solutions : Drug Safety using SAS® for Patient Safety

Business Intelligence BI Software Applications for Life Sciences - Drug Safety using SAS® for Patient Safety

A comprehensive safety solution featuring safety reporting, signal detection and root cause analysis in a single offering

Regulatory authorities, patients, healthcare professionals, government officials and the media are increasing their scrutiny of drug safety based on continuing, high-profile patient safety issues. Now more than ever, healthcare professionals and patients must continuously evaluate risks against benefits when making decisions about the right therapy.

SAS for Patient Safety is a comprehensive safety solution that features safety reporting, signal detection, and root cause analysis in a single offering. While less rigorous analytics work for certain applications, the critical nature of patient safety demands the best analytics available.

Benefits

  • Reduce your programming and validation efforts. Standard safety analyses address FDA guidance on drug safety information and leverage CDISC implementations that produce standard safety reports and provide the flexibility to adapt quickly to changing regulations.
  • Mitigate potential late-stage development failures and post-marketing risks. Identify and evaluate true pre-approval safety signals so you can make better, more informed drug development program decisions.
  • Efficiently produce PSUR submissions. SAS for patient safety lets you efficiently and comprehensively produce Periodic Safety Update Reports (PSURs) for submission to the FDA.
  • Achieve the highest level of post-approval safety reviews. Implement a standard set of signal detection algorithms and take a proactive approach to emerging post-market safety concerns.
  • Respond rapidly to inquiries and media events. SAS delivers the most complete scientific information available in order to minimize revenue erosion, protect shareholder value and maintain the public trust.

Source: Business intelligence BI software applications, SAS BI solutions for life sciences information at sas.com

BI Solutions : Drug Discovery & Development using SAS® Drug Development

Business Inteligence BI Software Applications - Drug Discovery & Development using SAS® Drug Development

Challenges ... Opportunities ... Now, more than ever, life sciences organizations are at a crossroads.

The key to overcoming industry challenges and capitalizing on new opportunities lies in an organization's ability to access relevant, accurate information that can be used to make informed business decisions with clarity and confidence. Enter SAS Drug Development.

SAS Drug Development provides a centralized, integrated system for managing, analyzing, reporting and reviewing clinical research information. The solution enables life sciences organizations to make informed business decisions with confidence, to assess the safety and efficacy of research compounds more effectively, to collaborate across trials, phases and therapeutic areas successfully, and ultimately get better products to market faster.

SAS Drug Development enables significant efficiency and productivity improvements within your R&D organizations, which translate into decreased development costs, a faster time-to-market and improved earnings.

Drawing on the power of the SAS®9 Intelligence Platform, SAS Drug Development specifically addresses the compliance requirements of life sciences organizations, while supporting your business objectives and aims to:

  • Integrate molecular information with clinical outcomes.
  • Deliver better therapies to market more quickly.
  • Control costs.
  • Comply with increasing regulatory requirements.
  • Collaborate globally.
  • Build a centralized, searchable repository of all research information.
  • Assess safety and efficacy more effectively.
  • Meet shareholder expectations.
  • Optimize efficiency and productivity across the life sciences value chain.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for life sciences information at sas.com

BI Solutions : SAS® for Clinical Data Integration

Business Intelligence BI Software Appolciation, BI Solutions for Life Sciences -SAS® for Clinical Data Integration

A complete environment for delivering full-spectrum clinical data integration capabilities
Inefficiencies in the collection, processing and analysis of clinical information slow the pace of drug development and can dramatically increase the cost of research and development. Many firms are leveraging data standards like CDISC to provide more efficient and effective use of clinical information.

SAS for Clinical Data Integration is the foundation you need to ensure standard, trusted clinical data. With SAS, you can gain both speed and efficiency by automating repeatable clinical data integration tasks.

Benefits

  • Build a single, integrated platform that lets you access and manage data from a wide range of sources—including EDC systems, in-house CDMSs, labs and CROs.
  • Identify and automate repeatable processes based on a common platform to reduce manual intervention, speed processes and improve decision making.
  • Ensure the proper use of standards by analyzing both the structure and the content of the data and using CDISC standards such as ODM and SDTM.
  • Provide an accurate, real-time view of the information by applying reliable data quality measures that let you address potential issues proactively before they have a negative impact on your study.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for life sciences information at sas.com

BI Solutions : SAS® Solutions for Life Sciences

Business Intelligence BI Software Applications : SAS® Solutions for Life Sciences

With so many challenges facing the life sciences industry – pricing pressures, pipeline pressures, impending patent expirations, the soaring cost of developing new drugs – the strength of these companies as well as the intellectual property they need to improve the health of the public is being threatened. While the focus seems to be shifting to personalized medicine – the right drug for the right patient – personalized drugs will most likely mandate significant changes to life sciences companies' business practices. How can drug companies remain profitable so they can continue to deliver the best drugs to the public?

SAS solutions for life sciences companies optimize the flow of valuable scientific and opera tional data within these companies – helping them bring therapies to market faster and more profitably. SAS is the only company that offers an end-to-end solution to drive efficiencies throughout every stage of a drug's lifecycle: from discovery, through development, commercialization and beyond.

SAS has a deep commitment to the development of data standards in life sciences. Anticipating the movement of the industry and its governing regulatory bodies toward standards, SAS has developed technology available today to support the emerging CDISC data models.

Globally recognized as the industry leader in analytics, the de facto standard for clinical data analysis, the FDA standard for electronic submissions and the choice of 100% percent of the Fortune 500 life sciences companies, SAS assures accurate, consistent and reliable analysis of pharmaceutical research data. By providing a way to warehouse, manage and analyze your data more efficiently and effectively, SAS solutions enable life sciences companies to:

  • Transform biomedical data into clinical insights quickly.
  • Analyze operational data to manage risk and maximize profits.
  • Convert intellectual property from discoveries into effective drug treatments.
  • Integrate scientific, customer, and operational data to make research and commercialization programs even more successful.

A suite of solutions to help bring your drug to market successfully
SAS understands that each stage of bringing a drug to market has unique needs. SAS Solutions for Life Sciences distinctly address the needs of each of these unique stages. Powered by SAS technology, SAS Solutions for Life Sciences are also designed to work collaboratively, enabling you to combine solutions as needed in order to bring your drug to market more quickly and successfully.

SAS® for Clinical Data Integration is the foundation you need to ensure standard, trusted clinical data. With SAS, you can gain both speed and efficiency by automating repeatable clinical data integration tasks.

SAS® Drug Development provides a centralized, integrated system for managing, analyzing, reporting and reviewing clinical research information. The solution enables life sciences organizations to get better products to market faster by more effectively assessing the safety and efficacy of research compounds and by facilitating collaboration across trials, phases and therapeutic areas.

SAS® for Patient Safety is a comprehensive safety solution that features safety reporting, signal detection, and root cause analysis in a single offering. While less rigorous analytics work for certain applications, the critical nature of patient safety demands the best analytics available.

SAS® for Life Sciences Sales and Marketing delivers unique customer insights that life sciences firms can use to execute more efficient marketing, sales and service strategies. SAS provides proven analytics to power sales and marketing execution.

Source: Business intelligence BI software application, SAS BI solutions for life sciences information at sas.com

11 September 2008

BI Solutions : SAS ® for Insurance

Business Intelligence BI Software Solutions : SAS ® for Insurance

Ensuring long-term success

In insurance, policyholders demand certainty in an uncertain world. Insurance firms must confront that uncertainty as they protect policyholders, retain agents, assure regulators and satisfy stockholders. Insurers face many challenges in today’s uncertain world:

How to achieve profitable growth in a soft market
How to respond to changing demographics and consumer demands
How to protect against fraud and achieve compliance while controlling operational costs
Insurers must also comply with ever-changing regulations and increasing demands from rating bureaus, consumers and investors. Midmarket insurers face their own set of challenges. Failure to address any of these issues can spell disaster.

Delivering peace of mind to insurers
SAS can help ease the uncertainty facing the industry. We tackle insurers’ top issues head-on with proven, industry-specific solutions and a robust foundation technology that enable you to:

  • Build innovative pricing models using the most advanced analytic techniques available.
    Accurately forecast business trends using our high-performance forecasting server software.
  • Make access to information simple and painless for all users with our business intelligence and advanced analytics platforms.
  • Respond quickly and thoroughly to regulatory and rating bureau demands using transparent reporting applications.
  • Detect and prevent fraudulent activity by mounting a multifaceted defense against would-be fraudsters and organized fraud rings.
  • Effectively manage all aspects of risk – operational, market or credit risk.
    Determine customer LTV and predict behaviors such as attrition and cross-sell response with considerable accuracy and ease.
  • Monitor all these initiatives with easy-to-use, industry-specific scorecards and dashboards.

Source: Business intelligence BI software solution, SAS BI solutions for Insurance at sas.com

BI Solution : SAS® for Hospitality and Entertainment

Business Intelligence BI Software Solutions : SAS® for Hospitality and Entertainment

For the fast-growing and highly competitive hospitality and entertainment industries, sustaining top-line and bottom-line growth is everything. Hotels and entertainment companies are challenged with building the brand, tapping emerging markets that are reshaping world tourism, focusing on human assets and leveraging technology.

Hotels and entertainment companies need to maximize revenue from existing assets and investments, build customer value and sustain a reliable workforce. A number of business issues in particular present challenges for hospitality and entertainment providers:

Difficulty measuring total customer value
The number of siloed operational systems for reservations and ticketing, player tracking, property management, retail, entertainment, food and beverage, spas and other areas makes it hard to obtain a single customer view.

Inability to model customer preferences and behaviors
Accurately predicting which offers are most effective for particular guests ultimately builds customer loyalty. It is critical to make an impression on guests at every touch point to increase the frequency of visits and increase their spend per visit.

Ineffective targeting and promotions
Marketers need better ways to identify and address new market segments and understand which guests to target based on behavioral trends and potential value. They also need the ability to track customer communications and measure results to learn whether promotions are driving new business.

Incomplete demand forecasting and pricing optimization
Better inventory and pricing management requires visibility into customer-specific buying behavior, pricing history and performance. Many organizations also lack the ability to optimize pricing using methods that account for dynamic market conditions and profitability implications.

Difficulty acquiring and retaining a workforce that can consistently deliver superior service
Many hotel and entertainment executives agree that the one of the most challenging issues is employee retention. While some turnover is unavoidable – and perhaps even desirable in certain instances – voluntary separations carry a significant expense for the enterprise. What's more, voluntary separations inflict hidden costs, such as the impact on competitive advantage when turnover affects customer service.

Source: Business intelligence BI software, SAS solution for Hospitality and Entertainment at sas.com