Business Intelligence Consulting - Analysis Team, Inc.

Dave Stark, Founder and President of Analysis Team, was the course leader for two major Strategic Business Intelligence seminars held by The Asia Business Forum, in Malaysia and Singapore in July, 2007. Seminars took place over two days, covering a range of topics about using Business Intelligence to drive bottom line growth, and including significant use of case studies to illustrate the concepts in action.

Several topics were covered, including how Business Intelligence supports corporate strategy, how management can effectively use it and incorporate it into decision making, keys to managing successful Business Intelligence projects, how to measure and maximize ROI from Business Intelligence, ways to implement data governance to assure ongoing value of business information, and more. Attendees, who held management roles across several functional areas, actively engaged in the seminars, enhancing the course value by bringing their own diverse experiences to the discussion.

The Asia Business Forum, recognized throughout the Pacific Rim as one of the top providers of high-value business information, is Asia’s leading business conference producer, working with experts to provide information that drives business results. For more information about the organization, click here.

May, 2007–

Breakout sessions presented by Analysis Team at the 2007 Hyperion Solutions global user conference were well received. Analysis Team and clients Papa John’s Pizza and Seagate Technology talked first-hand about how Analysis Team delivered high-profile analysis and reporting solutions for their businesses. Session descriptions are below. Click here for the session presentations.

How Papa John's Pizza Makes Hyperion Essbase a Key Ingredient for Financial Performance and Service Quality / Session Number: 2144

For quick service restaurant chain Papa John’s International, speed to customer and overall customer satisfaction are imperative to success. Papa John’s needed the ability to process voluminous data to analyze store results quickly, with maximum flexibility and ease of use. To deliver a range of performance indicators covering product sales, food cost, labor, cash controls, and customer service quickly every day for each of its 3,000 stores, Papa John's International deployed the Hyperion Essbase platform. This session revealed how the Vice President of Operations and the Field Operations Directors at Papa John's use the performance dashboard and ad hoc analysis capabilities of this solution to reduce cost, improve efficiency, and achieve top customer satisfaction ratings.

Global Market Segmentation in 18 Easy Dimensions: Modeling a Complex Channel Business in a Single Database at Seagate Technology / Session Number: 3125

Global Channel Sales and Corporate Marketing (GCS&CM) at Seagate Technology suffered from information discontinuity. Every department had a pool of analysts extracting and transforming data with few controls and little oversight. This resulted in multiple versions of reports depicting sales performance worldwide. GCS&CM partnered with Analysis Team to create Channel Marketing Analytics, an 18-dimension Hyperion Essbase application. This session revealed how a complex global channel business was modeled in a single database using Aggregate Storage Option (ASO). The presenters shared how the team overcame key technical challenges and optimized performance. This included a direct demonstration of how the application is being used to increase accuracy, reduce effort, and help Seagate identify and realize new opportunities in its global channel business.

January, 2007–

Click here to read article.

This article features Analysis Team and Xavor, and explains how the two firms collaborated on a major project to deliver a data warehouse and Business Intelligence solution that has provided the client, Virgin Entertainment Group, “probably the best ROI (return on investment) I'd ever had in my life," according to Robert Fort, Director of IT at Virgin Entertainment Group. As stated in the article, Fort attributes 20 percent of the gross margin to the project’s role in Virgin Megastores’ enhanced financial performance.

Analysis Team architected the data warehouse, and designed and implemented the Business Intelligence layer, delivering analysis and reporting functionality. Xavor built the integration layer between source systems and the data warehouse, and between the warehouse’s analytic models and Virgin’s intranet portal. The firms’ expertise and close collaboration enabled Virgin to reap substantial benefits.

Please note: The eWeek article has two major technical errors. First, the solution was not deployed on the Vista operating system, but rather on Windows Server 2003. Second, Microsoft SQL Server was not running on the AS/400 but on standard, Intel-based servers.