BIFORUM4 continued from page 28at universities and determined the goalsand the data we needed to analyze. Later,we went back to the suppliers to build asolution.”Explained van der Heijden: “The keydrivers are: getting close to the consumer—insteadof starting with productionand marketing, we should startwith the consumer’s desires, so we cancreate what we can sell. Also, gettingfrom product creation to the shelf muchfaster.”“We aim to discover value from consumerinsights in social media by applyingmining algorithms,” continuedsocial media. “We turn unstructured datainto structured information via keywordanalysis,” said Loh; “We do ‘opinionmining’ via computational linguistics;we track correspondence and providestandard answers to queries; and wedo Social Media Optimization (SMO),which entails getting feedback on whatpeople like and leveraging social mediafor marketing programs.”Panel: user predictionsDuring the executive panel discussionentitled: The challenges of effective BIand embedding intelligence into corporateplanning, the initial remarks concernedthe level of BI maturity in <strong>Hong</strong> <strong>Kong</strong>.analysts is high, we decided to use ourIT colleagues to do the analysis,” saidLoh from AirAsia Malaysia. “We havedistinct customer groups that must beserved differently, and our BI focus is toanalyze service trends.”There is an understanding of BI and analytics forreporting, but less activity in predicting change andacting on it—Gary Jacksonvan der Heijden. “We also want to drivesales by better knowing what consumerswant. We can correlate consumerattitudes to our products [as expressedon] Facebook with the sales curve a fewmonths later.”At AirAsia, the IT department has establisheda high degree of integration betweendatabases for services such as callcenters, flight information, ticket sales,baggage tracing, marketing campaigns,reports and dashboards. “Customer analysesare linked to response programs,”said Alwin Loh Tek Ken, head of BI &Web, AirAsia Malaysia. “These include:premium customers (loyalty program);frequent travelers (cross-sell); highspendingcustomers (maximize customertouch-points); low-spending customers(up-sell and cross-sell); and dormantcustomers (reactivation and win-back).”AirAsia also conducts analyses into“There is an understanding of BI andanalytics for reporting, but less activityin predicting change and acting on it,”said Gary Jackson, director of businessanalytics, CSC Asia-Pacific, <strong>Hong</strong> <strong>Kong</strong>and head of business analytics, deliveryand enablement for AlphaEight Institute,<strong>Hong</strong> <strong>Kong</strong>. “The mainland also needsto move in that direction.”However, the predictive use of data isemerging. “At the moment, users fill inrequest forms and we provide data andanalytical tools in a user-friendly form,”said Ben Lai, head of management information,Industrial & Commercial Bankof China (ICBC) Asia. “We’re talkingabout dynamic data assessment, so userscan analyze data by themselves.”Perhaps trend analysis is part of theprediction process. “We’ve had a teamof business analysts doing BI for severalyears, but since the turnover ofVan Der Heijden from Adidas: We aim todiscover value from consumer insights insocial media by applying mining algorithmsMoving from passive reports tospreadsheet-analysis is a key step. “A lotof our users play around with Excel, butthe data is offline,” said Kevin Tsang,regional IT director, AP, Cookson Electronics,Enthone. “We want to changethe approach to real-time analysis so wecan focus on the future.”The goal is evidence for decision-making.“We need to get rid of data and reports,”said Jackson. “BI is about givingmanagers positive and negative evidencethat can be interpreted to make better businessdecisions.”BI strategy is often tiered. “We classifypeople into three groups,” said ICBC’sLai. “For marketing people, we deliverinformation to support their daily businessoperations. The middle level executivesneed BI skills to analyze their marketingplan. For senior management, we provideconvenient tools such as dashboards, sothey can look at KPIs and consult withbusiness managers over, for example,missed targets.” 330 <strong>Computerworld</strong> <strong>Hong</strong> <strong>Kong</strong> April 2011 www.cw.com.hk
Voters may decide WinnerThe Most Prestigious IT Awards<strong>Computerworld</strong> <strong>Hong</strong> <strong>Kong</strong>Awards 2011http://www.cw.com.hk/awards/www.cw.com.hkApril 2011 <strong>Computerworld</strong> <strong>Hong</strong> <strong>Kong</strong> 31
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