Business Intelligence (BI) Frequently Asked Questions

(FAQ)
What is Business Intelligence (BI)

Business Intelligence (BI) is a broad term for a software technology that provides reporting
and analytical tools for pulling data from various sources to generate customizable reports
and support decision making. It allows administrators and other business decision makers to
view reliable, timely data.

Business Intelligence simplifies information discovery and analysis, making it possible for
decision-makers at all levels of an organization to more easily access, understand, analyze,
collaborate, and act on information, anytime and anywhere. BI helps move from just
consuming information to developing deep contextual knowledge about that information. By
tying strategy to metrics, organizations can gain competitive advantage by making better
decisions faster, at all levels of the organization.

BI is the capability that transforms data into meaningful, actionable information.

Who can benefit from Business Intelligence (BI)?

Business Intelligence (BI) is for businesses that want to drive intelligent decision-making
throughout their organizations and make it easy for everyone in the organization to
collaborate, analyze, share, and act on business information from a centrally managed, more
secure source. Business Intelligence (BI) supports IT professionals, information workers, and
developers. BI can empower and cater to the needs of the business users of organizations of
all sizes.

How can Business Intelligence (BI) be useful to my organization?

Business Intelligence (BI) connects the right people to the right information at the right time.
With 1KEY BI, all the business users right from managers to the operational staff, frontline
executives to back office team get the power to define ad hoc reports with intuitive, highly
interactive & user friendly interface coupled with multi formatted visually stunning &
flexible data presentation layers. It becomes easy to report on and analyze data to efficiently
manage personnel objectives across key indicators. 1KEY end users can perform sales,
category, and inventory analyses more effectively to track product sales, product mix, and
inventory levels.

Does Business Intelligence (BI) works with existing applications and

databases?

Yes. Business Intelligence (BI) solution like 1KEY is designed to interoperate with data that
exists in virtually any enterprise data source, such as Oracle, IBM DB2, or Sybase. For
example, you can use SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services to run reports on data stored in an
Oracle database. Also, SQL Server 2005 Integration Services can be used to extract data to or
from any OLEDB data source. 1KEY can connect to multiple database, multiple applications
like ERP, CRM, SCM, HRM, financial accounting or any other core transactional application
(SAP, Orracle E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, Siebel, QAD MFG/Pro, Microsoft
Dynamics, Navision, Ramco, Tally.ERP)

Does the BI accommodate requirements that organizations have to provide

data across the organization?

The BI capabilities that 1KEY provides are geared more towards reporting and analyzing
data rather than collecting the data.

Should BI projects be prioritized?

Organizations need to determine the tangible benefits such as eliminated cost of producing
legacy reports, with BI. Secondly BI enforces access to data for the entire organization. In
this way even a small benefit, such as a few minutes saved, will make a difference when it is
multiplied by the number of employees in the entire organization.

Does BI project require Data Warehousing?

No. Not all BI projects require Data Warehousing. BI tools like 1KEY, can give reporting
and analytics to the business users across the enterprise from any data source directly without
having the need to build a data warehouse.

Data Warehouse facilitates reporting and analysis. It is used for an organisation’s need for
reliable, consolidated, unique and integrated reporting and analysis of its data, at different
levels of aggregation. Data Warehousing is not just into accumulating historical data, but
analyzing them as well to help Business Decision Makers make effective decisions that affect
their company’s bottom line.

Benefits of Data Warehouse

- Data Warehouse provides a common data model for all data of interest regardless of the
data’s source. This makes it easier to report and analyze information than it would be if
multiple data models were used to retrieve information such as sales invoices, order receipts,
general ledger charges, etc.

- Prior to loading data into the data warehouse, inconsistencies are identified and resolved.
This greatly simplifies reporting and analysis.

- Because they are separate from operational systems, data warehouses provide retrieval of
data without slowing down operational systems.

- Data warehouses facilitate BI reports such as trend reports (e.g., the items with the most
sales in a particular area within the last two years), exception reports, and reports that show
actual performance versus goals.
What do various terms like Dashboard, KPI, Operational BI, Analytics,
OLAP?

An executive dashboard is a user interface, usually Web-based and often with a BI

system/data warehouse on the backend, that organizes and presents information in a way that
is easy to read and interpret. Somewhat akin to an automobile’s dashboard, executive
dashboards often have graphical elements, such as color-coding, gauges and charts.

Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is a measure of performance which are commonly used to
help an organization define and evaluate how successful it is, typically in terms of making
progress towards its long-term organizational goals. KPIs can be specified by answering the
question, “What is really important to different stakeholders?”. KPIs are monitored using BI
to assess the present state of the business and to assist in prescribing a course of action. KPIs
are frequently used to “value” difficult to measure activities such as the benefits of leadership
development, engagement, service, and satisfaction. KPIs differ depending on the nature of
the organization and the organization’s strategy. They help to evaluate the progress of an
organization towards its vision and long-term goals, especially toward difficult to quantify
knowledge-based goals. A KPI is a key part of a measurable objective, which is made up of a
direction, KPI, benchmark, target, and time frame. For example: “Increase Average Revenue
per Customer from $100 to $150 by year end 2010″. In this case, ‘Average Revenue Per
Customer’ is the KPI.

Operational business intelligence is BI that is available enterprise-wide – to mid-level

managers and front-line operational workers. Ideally, operational BI delivers timely
information to employees at all levels, so important metrics and other data are delivered in
the context of associated business processes.

Data analytics is the science of examining raw data, using sophisticated software and analytic
algorithms, for the purpose of drawing conclusions about that information. Data analytics is
often distinguished from data mining by the scope, purpose and focus of the analysis.

OLAP – Online analytical processing is automated processing and analysis of data, defined
by olapreport.com as “fast analysis of shared multidimensional information.

What are the challenges faced while successfully implementing Business

intelligence?

Most companies grasp the potential value of successful business intelligence applications.
However, a common challenge that IT professionals encounter is how to find successful BI
application that are adopted by users and make a positive impact on the organization and on
the bottom line. It can be difficult to structure effective BI project teams, select the right BI
application, manage business-IT communications and measure BI success. BI is robust
application, developing and optimizing successful BI application is always a challenge which
involves structuring BI teams and managing business-IT communication.
How much does Business Intelligence (BI) cost? Is there going to be a
proven ROI?

Believe it or not, you can start benefiting from BI technology for much better than you may
think (and much quicker than you may think). Let’s take an example. Here are some ballpark
numbers and timelines so you can have realistic expectations. For $9,000 and within 4 weeks,
1KEY BI can be implemented enterprise wide. The actual prices may vary depending on the
modules you choose to implement from the BI stack and how many people you deploy them
to. Please contact your local sales representative or MAIA partner for more information about
Business Intelligence pricing.

In the early stages of a BI deployment, most companies measure value based on IT-centric,
quantifiable criteria, including improved operational efficiency and minimized total cost of
ownership. But today, as more BI deployments mature and companies focus on optimizing
business processes, the metrics have changed and are more difficult to interpret. Measuring
the value of BI is more of a matter of mind over money.

Which industries can benefit from BI?

Companies across all the industries like Manufacturing, BFSI, Retail, Service, Telecom,
ITES, Pharma & Healthcare, Infrastructure & Construction, Automotive, Education,
Government, Public Sector, etc. can benefit from BI.

Which business Processes / departments can benefit from BI?

Business processes / departments like Contact Centers, Field Service, IT Services

Engagements, Human Resources, Marketing & Advertising, Supply & Demand Chain, Retail
Operations, IT Operations Performance, Insurance Underwriting can get benefited from BI

What are the examples of BI Initiatives (Focus Areas)?

Customer Satisfaction, Problem Resolution, Loyalty & Customer Value, Up-sell & Cross-
sell, Customer Churn, Customer Segmentation, Cost Control, Revenue & Profitability,
Performance Management, Outage / Downtime, Defect, Marketing Effectiveness, Collections
are some of the examples of BI initiatives.

Who are BI systems intended for?

For any member of the company who makes decisions based on transactional systems’ data.
Such systems may be oriented to different levels (analysts, managers, directors, auditors,
etc.), providing different kinds of information in each case.

Can BI be integrated with any system active at the company?

Yes, BI can be integrated directly, through the development of interfaces that extract and
update transactional systems’ data.
Does BI require a special technological platform?

No, BI can connect to database, because they generate their own repository to upload and
transform the data that will be fed into the multidimensional cubes.

Is it necessary to have specialized staff for BI?

No, BI tool like 1KEY are available with easy to learn and use features for queries,
automation of data extraction interfaces and distance support ensure their use rapidly, without
engaging company’s staff specifically.

Can they be applied to any company area?

Yes, through transactional systems’ data extraction interfaces, you can resolve systems for:
sales, auditing, suppliers, accounting, production, etc., and additionally, integrating key
indicators for each area, summarizing the information required by the company’s first level
decision-makers.

How do I recover my investment?

Companies that have not adopted a decision-making system yet have a “hidden cost” to
access information: time to enter data in transactional systems, upload and transformation,
presentation through reports, etc. Features provided by BI systems decrease such costs
dramatically, because information is available in a timely manner, with integration, security
and orientation to optimize decisions that empower the company’s activities.

Return on investment (ROI). A ROI can be achieved in a number of ways, such as:

- Lower cost – Costs could be lowered through better inventory management, fewer dollars
spent on unproductive measures, product promotions, and so on

- Improved productivity – Greater productivity could be expected from both IT and the user.
Today user analysts may spend 80 percent of their time gathering data and only 20 percent
analyzing the data. The data warehouse should reverse those numbers. IT will still be
responsible for developing complex reports, as well as writing reports for production systems.
The data warehouse can provide reporting tools with a well documented, clean and easily
accessible database. This capability should significantly improve IT productivity

- Increased revenue – This could be a result of greater market share and increased sales as
marketing is able to more effectively target customers and provide the right products at the
right time to the right market. The effects of costs and revenues may be difficult to assign to
the impact of the data warehouse. As the data warehouse is being implemented, the
organization is not standing still. There are both internal and external factors that impact costs
and revenues, so the actual benefits of the data warehouse may be difficult to determine
Mr. Sanjay Mehta, CEO MAIA Intelligence A+  A-

Mr. Sanjay Mehta,CEO MAIA Intelligence comes to the company

with over 13 years of work experience in the software work space.
His wide knowledge on various verticals from Manufacturing, BFSI
and Distribution has helped made MAIA Intelligence a serious threat
not only to the Indian Software Product companies but also to foreign branded software.

Mr. Mehta had already created various software brands like Udyog Excise which has more
than 10000+ users in India, prior to the development of MAIA Intelligence’s 1 Key, one of
India’s indigenous Business tool. At MAIA Intelligence, he is leading a team of efficient
technocrats with a vision to change paradigm in the BI space and make BI available to
masses.

Mr. Mehta holds a Bachelor of Engineering Degree in Electronics from Mumbai University
and is a Microsoft Certified Professional. He has been one of the founders and Director of
Udyog Software India Ltd. and is currently a director and on the board on XBRL India. He is
a non executive director in ACI India Ltd. a laptop manufacturing Company.

Q: Which sectors are prominently using BI tools in India?

A: In any organization data is scattered across the various transactional systems everywhere
and is increasing day by day. These data needs to be analyzed with reporting to convert in to
informed decisions giving single Unified reporting. MAIA Intelligence’s 1KEY BI helps
companies convert their raw data in to informed decisions. All the companies across the
verticals have huge data & they face challenge for MIS reporting in some or the other way.
Business Intelligence has become must for every organization today to have a single unified
reports from the various applications used across the enterprise.

Number of reports can be provided in the standard/customized application, but when it comes
to the dynamic reporting requirements & the need of ever changing formats, it becomes
difficult to handle the scenarios in time. 1KEY BI software empowers organizations to
achieve the Ad hoc reporting requirement & also do the analysis over their data accumulated
over the period & take important decisions.

Q: What trends are you currently noticing in the industry?

A: BI is one of the most happening segments. Lot of innovation is happening. You find new
solutions and integrations every fortnight. 1KEY Agile now has been integrated with
Windows ADS, Microsoft SharePoint Services, etc. As a part of the product deliverables,
1KEY Agile BI Suite has RSS Feeds integrated in its Dashboard, Tickers like the one used by
Stock Markets helps to flash company information on the desktops of business users. The
Charts have variety of alternatives like Speedometer, heat maps, drillable graphs, etc. All this
is part of the product, just because the BI has to move to the Operational Business Users,
which is currently being restricted to the Analytical users and CXO's. This helps the Business
users to take faster and factual decisions... who need them the most providing them Single
version of truth.
The momentum has already picked up. BI is no longer considered as good to have but it’s
now a must to have and part of the enterprise infrastructure application.

There is a big gap between data and usable information. Information is the most underused
asset in today's organizations. Unstructured way of reporting results in unforgiving data
errors with low satisfaction. Information from a single system is easy, but to have a single
unified view from multiple data sources is a challenge.

Indian CIOs have already invested heavily in applications like ERP, CRM, SCM, HRMS.
They are now struggling to justify the ROI with year-on-year recurring investments. Driven
by market pressures to quickly respond to the dynamic business environment, CIOs now need
to look at leveraging BI for optimizing and streamlining business operations on a daily basis,
by taking BI to the functional level to quickly respond to the MIS requirements of the
business users.

There are too many report requests coming from business users, CIO and his team are under
constant pressure, everything wanted YESTERDAY. Everyone expects instant results and
don't want to wait for answers. Hence, Indian CIOs give high priority to BI, which empowers
the business users within the organization to reduce the time gap between the business event
and action taken. BI application like 1KEY, gives business users the power to define and
generate ad hoc reports with intuitive, highly interactive and user-friendly interface, coupled
with multi-formatted visually stunning and flexible data presentation layers.

Q: What is the business model of MAIA Intelligence & Go to Market strategies?

A: MAIA is 100% Channel Company working with partners to deliver its 1KEY BI at the
clients end. We would prefer to do everything ourselves. It’s the best way to make sure your
know-how stays under your own roof. Yet we seem to have external experts coming and
going, just about all the time. Fact is, we want to stay focused on the product development,
branding & Marketing activity, and neither can we be expected to know everything about
everything.

MAIA Intelligence is not an expert in all aspects of every sector of industry. We are a
primarily a software provider, not an organizational consultant. Therefore we work together
with partners that specialize in specific industrial sectors and disciplines. Partners who are
able to support 1KEY continually in improving its software, by providing detailed reports on
experiences gained with previous implementations.

Our Partners are closely involved with most of our implementations. Their involvement starts
with problem analysis and reporting definition, moving from analytical descriptions through
to implementation, hardware choice, and at the end of the road, to system management and
hosting. All MAIA Intelligence Partners have their own specific area of specialization. Each
concentrate on a certain sector of industry and/or certain solutions, and each stands out on
account of an individual approach.

MAIA has a massive partner network across India, UK, USA, Singapore for ASEAN region,
and now starting its operations in the Middle East marketplace. MAIA Intelligence is a
partner driven company and due to the huge BI Market opportunity there is enough space for
more companies to partner with across the globe for providing 1KEY BI product solutions to
the organizations across vertical.
Indian Economy is booming and BI evolving in India. Indian Companies are going GLOBAL
and creating a great pressures for their Global counter-parts. This is providing a great need of
Business Intelligence... Today it has hardly penetrated 5-10% of the total Potential market.
This shows the Market Size and Opportunity for all. Channel Partners would be the key
gainers of the momentum, as they are nearest to the last mile.... Customers. 1KEY Agile BI
Suite, at affordable price and host of solutions for Operational users provides a huge
opportunity for the Partners to gain. At MAIA we have a mission of democratizing BI, and
make it available to Masses. This can be achieved at a greater pace only with the help of
partners. We ensure appropriate training and support network, to empower partners and grow
with us.

Q: Can you mention some of your clients who are actively using BI tools?
A: Reliance Capital, Tata Chemicals, Edelweiss Capital, Essel Propack, Pidilite Industries,
Wockhardt Hospital, SRL Ranbaxy, Elbee Express, LOK Housing, Gujarat State Petroleum
Corporation, Marwadi Financials, Afcons Infrastructure, Birla Sun Life Insurance, Emerson
Network Power, Anchor Electricals, Financial Technologies, India Infoline, Thyrocare
Technologies to name a few.

Q: What are your expansion plans in India and abroad?

A: MAIA Intelligence is 26 months young and emerging company. In such a short span
company has alliance with more than 20 partners in India, US, UK, Singapore (for ASEAN
region) & Dubai (for Middle East). The company is in the process of signing more customers
in these regions.

 Target regions:
India, Middle East, South East Asia, US, UK
 Average deployment site:
100+ users – A very unique achievement in BI
 Total User base will over:
5000+users across all customers

Q: According to you, what is the growth potential of the BI industry in India?

A: There is a big gap between data and usable information. Information is the most
underused asset in today's organizations. Unstructured way of reporting results in unforgiving
data errors with low satisfaction. Information from a single system is easy, but to have a
single unified view from multiple data sources is a challenge.
Indian CIOs have already invested heavily in applications like ERP, CRM, SCM, HRMS.
They are now struggling to justify the ROI with year-on-year recurring investments. Driven
by market pressures to quickly respond to the dynamic business environment, CIOs now need
to look at leveraging BI for optimizing and streamlining business operations on a daily basis,
by taking BI to the functional level to quickly respond to the MIS requirements of the
business users.

There are too many report requests coming from business users, CIO and his team are under
constant pressure, everything wanted YESTERDAY. Everyone expects instant results and
don't want to wait for answers. Hence, Indian CIOs give high priority to BI, which empowers
the business users within the organization to reduce the time gap between the business event
and action taken. BI application like 1KEY, gives business users the power to define and
generate ad hoc reports with intuitive, highly interactive and user-friendly interface, coupled
with multi-formatted visually stunning and flexible data presentation layers.

Business Intelligence is one of the most sought after solutions in the Enterprise segment. BI is
one of the highest priorities of the CIO's in India and globally.