Trends and Outliers

TIBCO Spotfire's Business Intelligence Blog

09/02
2010

Business Intelligence Solutions Aid Financial Services Fraud Prevention

j04224791 150x150 photo (business intelligence)In recent years, financial services have seen the regulations continue to pile on as this industry is riddled with fraud.  According to a recent blog post at InsuranceTech.com by Mukund Raghunath, senior vice president of Mu Sigma Inc., the industry is particularly susceptible to internal fraud.  However, there is good news within this problem – data-mining and Business Intelligence (BI) are helping make the process for uncovering and preventing fraud a bit easier.

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09/01
2010

A Self-Service and Social Approach To Analytics – BI Webinar

j04118194 150x150 photo (business analytics)For anyone who missed the Aug 25 webinar “BI in the Cloud” with Forrester Research senior analyst James Kobielus, a recorded copy is available here.  I won’t ruin the surprise by spoiling the ending, just keep in mind that analytics and data visualization are just some of the applications that are shifting from hosted, hostage, siloed tools and becoming more collaborative and self-service.

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08/30
2010

Smarter Commuting Starts With Analytics, Visualization

NY Traffic Congestion 150x150 photo (business analytics)Anyone who has driven in New York City’s rush-hour traffic might want to consult with Charles Komanoff before doing it again.  If anyone has the smarts and experience to choreograph the movements of thousands of moving parts and people, it’s Komanoff.  His Balanced Traffic Analyzer is a massive set of spreadsheets and graphical analysis of vehicles, transit, people, speed and directions.  This collection of facts details how people and vehicles interact in a typical day.  This whirlwind of data, of course, required the artistic skills of Wired magazine to beautify the statistics and profile this immense project with infographics.

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Filed under: Business Analytics

08/26
2010

Analytics To Go? Sure, Right Under Your Hood

thumbnailCAFOLB3J 150x120 photo (business analytics)What does your car know about you?  More than you’d imagine.  Data recording chips keep track of engine performance, miles-per-gallon, hard braking or when your engine RPM exceeds a historic average or safe limits.  Analytics tools  and software charting that once let only mechanics review those details are bringing intelligence out of the engine and onto any fleet manager’s desktop or handheld device via the Web.

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Filed under: Business Analytics

08/25
2010

Predictive Analytics and Sales Forecasting: The Latest Power Couple

j03879385 150x150 photo (business intelligence)“To maintain a competitive position in the market, companies are turning to sales analytics solutions that provide an enterprise-wide data flow into the forecasting process,” concludes a new research report from the Aberdeen Group.  The report finds that well-executed sales analytics can assist the business by “creating more refined snapshot of future revenue and empowering more efficient, margin-driven sales activity, as well as more pure selling time by the sales team itself.”

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08/23
2010

Business Intelligence and Analytics for Speedy Businesses

Zipcar 150x150 photo (business analytics)One might assume business intelligence and analytics are used almost exclusively by large enterprises with volumes and volumes of data collected over decades.  Well, yes.  But that doesn’t preclude smaller, nimble, fast-growing businesses that also need to use business intelligence and analytics to understand customer trends and business operations.

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08/19
2010

Analytics Makes Data (And You) Smarter

Spotfire Silver2 300x227 photo (business analytics)Analytics software can be a lot like duct tape (only smarter).  There are countless MacGruber-esque ways to quickly save the day using duct tape.   Well, the same is true for TIBCO Silver Spotfire.  It makes data analytics so easy anyone can apply it.  That’s why I signed up for a year-long test-drive of  ‘analytics in the cloud’ using my own data.

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08/17
2010

One-Day Summer School For Spotfire Online Learning

j04118193 150x150 photo (business intelligence)If you’re shopping for “Back to School” bargains, there’s no better deal than free online events.  So pack a lunch and take advantage of two learning opportunities Spotfire has planned — then relax for the  Labor Day holiday.  Brush up on your knowledge of  data analytics, with insights from Spotfire experts and industry analysts on the vital roles of business intelligence, data visualization and ‘cloud-based’ analytics.

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08/16
2010

Five Top Data Visualizations – Infographics That Persuade

untitled photo (data analytics)Data visualization is an effective way to communicate information … And infographics, a popular form of data visualization, is a growing trend in business and media.  Infographics are being created by data analysts, marketers and other professionals to give executives and sales teams more than just a powerpoint or a pie chart – they are tools to persuade.  Here are five top examples of data-driven infographics that speak to how you can visualize information to persuade.

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Filed under: Data Analytics

08/13
2010

What Ever Happened to Artificial Intelligence?

MH900427654 150x150 photo (unconventional uses) According to predictions from the mid-twentieth century . . . we should all have household robots by now, and they should be able to perform very sophisticated tasks with little guidance (Roomba doesn’t count).  In fact, if we look at influential science fiction flicks of the 1980s, like Blade Runner and The Terminator, it seems that artificial intelligences–better known as AIs–are way behind in their projection to take over the world.

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Filed under: Unconventional Uses