BAASS Connect 2013 Why Business Intelligence is Important to SMB's
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The document summarizes a presentation about demystifying business intelligence (BI) tools for an organization. It includes an agenda for presentations on four different BI tools: BAASS BI, Sage BI, Info Explorer, and BI Metrix. Each presentation section provides 3-5 key points about the features and benefits of the tool, such as customizable reporting, accessing multiple data sources, intuitive dashboards, and quick implementation timelines.
BAASS Connect 2013 Why Business Intelligence is Important to SMB's
- 1. Demystify BI tools for your organization Presented By: Bharti Meisuria
- 2. Agenda When What Who Introduction Your BI questions demystified BAASS BI 10:00 – 11:30 am Bharti Meisuria Sage BI Debbie Hill Info Explorer Rob Lavery BI Metrix Ram Hasson
- 3. What is BI? Technology that transforms raw data into meaningful and useful information for business purposes
- 4. Why BI? A LOT of time is spent preparing information in MS Excel or other tools for presentation
- 5. Why BI? Data is in various locations over the network (sometime offsite), with people - often too hard and costly to retrieve Final report content Anna Dave
- 6. Why BI? We spend more time pulling the data together than focusing on analysis and interpretation of it
- 7. Why BI? Inability to report data from multiple databases or systems without manual steps Slice & dice data for various requirements
- 8. Why BI? We rely on external resources to produce critical information that drives business decisions
- 9. Selecting a BI Tool OR
- 10. Selecting BI Tool We offer customized engagement (BI Demystified) to work with you through the selection process (See: http://www.baass.com/services/business-intelligence) o Your needs o Resources & skill-set o Budget considerations – short & long term o Current applications & IS environment o Future vision & goals o Much more…
- 11. Solutions Overview What are the different types of reports that can be generated – financial and operational? Management, analytical, trend, drill down etc. What is involved in configuring the tool to extract reports for various needs? What are the different sources of data – applications, third party, modules etc. Typical installation / configuration / roll-out timelines How the solution will scale
- 12. BAASS BI One of the recent additions to the BAASS add-ons family…(demo)
- 13. Sage BI Presented By: Debbie Hill
- 14. Sage BI Sage Research and Investment Three key business issues will be top of mind for both the CEO and the CIO in the coming years. 1 The Essential CIO: Insights From the Global Chief Information Officer Study,” IBM, May 2011.
- 15. Sage BI Reporting Trees • Typical company hierarchical reporting structure • “Reporting Units” are either Parent/Child or Summary/Detail • Lower units “roll up” to higher units
- 16. Sage BI Full Chart of Accounts Flexibility
- 17. Sage BI Distribution Options • Confirm, set and apply distribution settings • Send now, or select a scheduled command
- 18. Sage BI
- 19. Sage BI New Profitability Dashboard
- 20. Sage BI New Profitability Dashboard 2013
- 21. Info Explorer Presented By: Rob Lavery
- 22. Info Explorer Info Explorer Slides
- 23. Info Explorer • Info- Explorer is great for Operational Analytics • Represents a tool that can play a key role in the strategic planning process of an organization. • Can drill down into underlying Sage 300 ERP screens • More cost effective than creating multiple Crystal Reports • Can easily access other databases • Does not require advanced Excel knowledge
- 24. Info Explorer • User-defined formatting, filtering & formulas helps you focus on what is most important to measure. • Summarize, drill down, drill into and “slice and dice” your Sage 300 ERP data in real time. • Avoid creating multiple custom report templates
- 25. Info Explorer The Problem with Custom Crystal Reports: • • • • • • Hard/costly to implement Hard to modify (static) Not scalable No process for upgrading Out of an accountant’s comfort zone Managers have to ask for them
- 26. Info Explorer • Intuitive, multi-dimensional data cubes & graphical reporting combined in customizable Dashboards. • Cater for your individual reporting needs by saving your own “views” on the desktop. • Clear insight into business operations to help you make the right decision, every time.
- 27. Info Explorer Key Benefits of Utilizing Orchid’s Info Explorer • Creates a process for consistent, high quality delivery of value-added data. • Effectively communicates an understanding of trends / value in your organization. • Decision Makers love it!!
- 28. Info Explorer Info Explorer Addresses Pain Points Like: • Lack of accurate and timely reporting resulting in guesswork and poor decision making • Key operational data not available for reporting • Time consuming & inefficient report preparation • Over reliance on spreadsheets for reporting • Business and productivity monitored using intuition and not operational metrics
- 29. Info Explorer Orchid’s Info Explorer Lite – How To Get Started FREE tool can be downloaded and installed in less than 15 minutes. Runs for 30 Days. Sample Cubes can be connected to your live Sage 300 ERP database for analysis purposes. After 30 Days, request an Activation Code to run the software indefinitely at no charge. Limitations of Info Explorer Lite: 1) Can’t create new cubes or modify existing cubes 2) Can’t export to Excel
- 30. Info Explorer 1) Info Explorer handles financial, operational, management, analytical, budget, forecast and ad hoc reports. 2) Write a SQL Query to extract data out of the Sage 300 ERP database to create 1 cube file (versus multiple report templates/files) which allows a user to format and filter data into multiple views/reports & graphs = dashboard 3) Info Explorer can access 1 or multiple Sage 300 ERP company databases (any table) and any other ODBC compliant data source in 1 cube file.
- 31. Info Explorer 4) Info Explorer installs and connects to a Sage 300 ERP company database in 15 minutes. Custom Cubes can typically be developed in 2 or 3 Hours based on requirements. Training is usually 30 minutes or less. Most implementations are 20 Hours including budget and analytics cubes. 5) InfoExplorer has been based on “in memory” technology as it enables users to have immediate access to accurate information which results in more informed decisions.
- 32. Info Explorer 5) Con’t Info Explorer handles up to 1 to 2 million rows of summarized data – depending on number of fields etc) which translates into many multiples of individual rows of data in the data base. This is typically what most Sage 300 ERP customers need and can afford versus a full blown traditional BI data warehouse and implementation.
- 33. BI Metrix Presented By: Ram Hasson
- 34. BI Metrix 1. Supports both financial, operational and management reporting drill-downs, slicing-and-dicing, trend analysis, dashboarding, budgeting, planning, forecasting, drill-throughs to detail. • Reports are created through a wizard-like Report Designer where you drag-and-drop dimensions onto a report layout inside Excel • We don’t rely on long Excel formulas or pivot tables – Free-form, formula-free approach • Drill-downs, Filtering, drill-throughs are done through a double-click action on report members • Budgeting, Planning and what-if analysis is facilitated through a write-back to the data cube • Forecasting (monthly and rolling) is facilitated through asymmetrical reports
- 35. BI Metrix 2. BI-Metrix BI for Sage 300 configures within a few hours. • Written using Sage 300 SDK • Integrates with the Sage 300 toolbar – acts and feels like an additional module • Steps required are: 1. identify the Sage 300 database 2. complete an account hierarchy set-up (GL cube only)
- 36. BI Metrix 3. BI-Metrix BI for Sage 300 out-of-the-box supports the following Sage 300 modules: GL, AR, AP, OE, IC • Additional modules and other data sources are covered through custom integration 4. Typical installation is to budget 1.5 - 2 days for both configuration and training • We offer both remote or onsite training
- 37. BI Metrix 5. BI-Metrix leverages SQL Server OLAP cubes (SSAS) and portable cube files. The product scales very well – from a data perspective and other data sources. BI-Metrix BI-Analyzer • Designed for the business user • Powerful analytics, reporting, planning Microsoft SQL Server OLAP cubes • Out-of-the-box Cubes • Custom Cubes Supports multiple data sources and databases Sage 300 ERP Sage CRM Other Databases
- 38. Thank you! Talk to your Account Manager, email or visit our booth for more information