IBM Unveils Software and Services to Help Organizations Make Sense of Their Deluge of Data

ROME, May 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- To help clients transform their businesses through information management and analytics, IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced new software and services designed to help organizations take advantage of the growing and diverse forms of data and content.

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The importance of business insight and analytics can be found in IBM's 2010 Global CEO Study, which reveals how leading companies are using new approaches to managing complexity and finding opportunities for growth. In fact, more than 60% of CEOs surveyed cite industry transformation and the information explosion as the most significant factors facing their organizations over the next 5 years.

With today's news, IBM is expanding its portfolio and furthering its investments in information and analytics with:

• New services and solutions for business and IT professionals to address the emerging challenge companies face around the petabytes of data, otherwise known as Big Data.
• New software capabilities to help companies improve case management challenges such as social services, healthcare member enrollment and insurance claims in a more collaborative and efficient way. This includes enterprise content management, business process management, analytics, business rules and social software.
• New industry specific analytic models for banks and insurance companies to meet regulatory compliance requirements such as Basel II.

To view a video of Michael Rhodin, senior vice president of IBM software solutions group discussing the importance of IBM's information and analytics business, click here.

As part of today's news, IBM is also announcing new customers such as Avis, FUJIFILM Imaging Colorants, Spain's Social Services Agency and Hildebrand who are turning to IBM to extract new insight from their data.

"The ability to identify and stay ahead of customers' ever-changing activities and needs is key to Avis Europe's competitiveness in the market, and one of the biggest benefits provided by IBM business analytics software," said Chris Parker, direct analytics specialist at Avis Europe. "By gaining intelligence from 'click-throughs' on email and past transactional behavior, we are able to generate a new level of insight and deliver personalized emails best suited to a customer's car preferences, such as convertible or SUV. With IBM business analytics, we have been able to transform our marketing campaigns, increase participation in our Avis 'Preferred' customer loyalty program, maximize revenues and cut costs by 50 percent."

To listen to Chris Parker of Avis Europe discuss the importance of analytics to his business, click here

With Analytics, Size Matters -- New Solutions Help Clients Analyze Massive Amounts of Data

Organizations and the Web are exploding with data and business professionals want to analyze that data -- both structured and unstructured such as feeds, tweets, videos and images -- to gain actionable insight. To help organizations benefit from these massive and new sources of information, IBM today unveiled a new portfolio of services and solutions called IBM InfoSphere BigInsights.

Powered by Apache Hadoop, an open source technology designed for analysis of big volumes of data, the new portfolio will help organizations analyze and visualize petabyte sized quantities of data. Consisting of specific analytics solutions that can be used by business professionals and easily be deployed by IT professionals in data center and cloud configurations, the portfolio includes:

• A package of Apache Hadoop software and services, code named BigInsights Core, designed to help IT professionals quickly get started with Big Data analytics including design, installation, integration and monitoring. The package helps organizations quickly build and deploy custom analytics and workloads to capture insight from internet-scale volumes of data.
• A software technology preview called BigSheets designed to help business professionals extract, annotate and visually uncover insights from vast amounts of information quickly and easily through a Web browser. BigSheets includes a plug-in framework extension for analytic engines and visualization software such as ManyEyes (to view a video demo click here).
• Industry specific solutions for the finance, risk management and media and entertainment sectors that help clients get started with analysis of massive volumes of information.

Performing analytics on massive quantities of data enables people to spot patterns and uncover insights hidden in the information they have stored across their organization as well as data available via the web. For example, using the new offerings from IBM, a financial analyst could combine historical market data trends with historical currency fluctuations and current news feeds to better predict risk exposure. The new solution can also help an agricultural company integrate satellite imagery with water tables and weather data to analyze optimal planting techniques and locations.

Created in February 2006, following the acquisition of Avecia's electronic materials businesses by FUJIFILM, FUJIFILM Imaging Colorants (FFIC) has grown into a world leader in the development and supply of innovative, high performance colorants for the global digital printing market.

"Working with big volumes of financial and corporate data spread out across our global operations makes it challenging to provide timely and accurate information to headquarters and meet tight internal reporting deadlines," said Christine Proffitt, Financial Controller at FUJIFILM Imaging Colorants. "As our data grows, we will continue to rely on IBM analytics solutions to help management monitor business performance and make informed decisions based on clear, consistent, accurate and timely information."

Building on its commitment to open source projects such as Linux, Java, Eclipse and Apache, IBM is working with leaders in the Big Data community Cloudera and Karmasphere to expand and develop the use of Apache Hadoop for enterprises (to learn more click here). IBM's Apache Hadoop strategy brings together the best of IBM software, services and Research portfolio to provide organizations with analytics solutions for internet-scale data. InfoSphere BigInsights expands on IBM's analytics strategy, complementing InfoSphere Streams, SPSS, and Cognos Content Analytics with new Internet-scale analytics processing power.

Applying Analytics to Resolve Industry-Specific Challenges

Today, organizations are facing an increasing need to manage important case-related processes such as benefits enrollment, patient care, insurance claims, audits, and loan applications. To improve case outcomes in the face of growing information volumes, cost pressures and increasing regulations, organizations need to bring people, processes and information together with a deeper level of insight to make decisions with increased precision.

To address this challenge, IBM is launching a new strategy with end-to-end software capabilities called advanced case management. Advanced case management brings together IBM's expertise in enterprise content management, business process management, advanced analytics, business rules, collaboration and social software in one integrated approach, helping to enable users to better manage business activities such as requests for service, investigations and incidents management.

Advanced case management capabilities are designed to help cross-industry experts capture best practices in reusable templates, empowering users and accelerating return on investment. IBM's approach includes a new solutions design environment designed for business users and an integrated Web 2.0 user experience which brings IBM software capabilities together in role-based and context appropriate business scenarios.

Spain's Social Services Processes Claims 25 Percent Faster

The regional government of Castilla y Leon, one of Spain's 17 autonomous regions, administers a broad range of social programs through its Social Services agency with more than 50,000 people benefitting from the agency's social assistance programs for the disabled, elderly and younger, and child protection.

"Spain's recent passage of a law introducing new social benefits to the elderly and the disabled dramatically increased the number of cases entered into the system," Jose Maria Molina, Project Director, IT Department Social Services, Social Services Management, Family and Equal Opportunity Council, Junta de Castilla y Leon. "By combining the strengths of IBM software and services, we are dramatically reducing the time to process paperwork by 25%, allowing the staff to put more focus on handling exceptional cases. As each application is processed faster and more accurately, the agency can now deliver social benefits more efficiently."

IBM Accelerates Adoption of Analytics with New Industry Models

IBM is helping organizations implement an analytics strategy faster with the new InfoSphere Warehouse Pack for Market and Campaign Insight. This new software provides pre-packaged report templates and physical data warehouse tables needed to analyze key metrics such as understanding the purchase behaviors of customers, conversion rates for marketing leads, and overall marketing campaign effectiveness.

IBM is also providing an update to the IBM Industry Models, with a new release of IBM Industry Models for Banking and Insurance. These models help organizations to design databases to manage their data according to industry-specific business needs. For example, an insurance company is able to more quickly comply with Solvency II by using the models to design a data warehouse and create reports that meet the regulatory reporting requirements. The new releases include new process models for payments, wealth management, and consumer credit for Banking, along with updates for ACORD and Solvency II for Insurance.

To listen to Rob Ashe, general manager of IBM Business Analytics, discuss IBM's analytics strategy click here.

To check out the IOD EMEA 2010 online press kit, click here.

Follow along on Twitter: #IOD2010

For more information on InfoSphere BigInsights, click here

For more information on advanced case management, click here.  

Related Links:

IOD EMEA 2010 online press kit

SOURCE IBM