Business intelligence equals data-based decision making

Making business decisions based on fact, rather than just gut feel, is a driving force behind the continued worldwide growth of business intelligence (BI) and analytics. According to information technology research firm Gartner, BI and analytics will remain a top focus for CIOs through to 2017 as the benefits of fact-based decision-making become more and more evident across a range of industries. The falling cost of acquiring, storing and managing data will allow companies to apply BI and analytics in a far wider range of situations than previously.

The firm predicted that companies will shift their future investment away from IT-developed reporting solutions toward business-user-led analysis solutions. By 2017 more than 50 percent of analytic implementations will make use of event data streams gathered by a variety of sensors from machines, applications, and individuals.

As part of this trend towards BI and analytics, Teletrac Navman recently launched Adaptive Intelligence, a cloud-based business-intelligence-as-a-service system. Adaptive Intelligence allows organisations to measure and manage fleet expenditure and leverage their own data for KPI-based decision-making and to gain insights into future trends. The data captured within Adaptive Intelligence becomes an asset to the business that grows in value over time.

Adaptive Intelligence fills a gap left by traditional BI solutions: that of capturing data from 'plant and people'. Many organisations are already looking for better tools to measure fleet expenditure and efficiency, especially when it comes to fuel consumption and idling. With Adaptive Intelligence and the integration of Teletrac Navman location-based information they're able to identify parts of the business with the greatest expense and the most opportunity, and use this information for strategic improvement.

Construction and transport firm Smith and Davies turned to BI and analytics when they were looking for improvements in the safe operation of their vehicle fleet. By installing Adaptive Intelligence, Smith and Davies saw a 79% reduction in speeding and a 10% improvement in distance travelled per litre of fuel purchased. Smith and Davies is now able to see, monitor and measure the KPIs that they use in their business. This has allowed the senior management to engage more with their management teams to seek further improvements.

The increased use of data in making business decisions will become more and more prevalent across a range of industries, as the ability to collect and analyse many different types of data improves, the value of the data asset grows over time, and as the costs of acquiring, analysing and storing data falls. The field of business intelligence and analytics looks set to be a growth area for many years to come.