Category: Internet

Kronos

Mar 30, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Seven science team members from Kronos® Incorporated will lead panel discussions and deliver research at the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) 2009 Annual Conference.

USA (March 30, 2009) –

What:

Seven science team members from Kronos® Incorporated will lead panel discussions and deliver research at the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) 2009 Annual Conference.

When:

April 2-4 in New Orleans

Who:

The Kronos science team speaks frequently on a broad range of topics related to industrial and organizational psychology and how it can be applied to the field of selection and hiring. Recognized for their deep expertise, many of the speakers have authored journal articles, books, and encyclopedia entries. In addition to SIOP, they are active members of the American Psychological Association, the Society of Human Resource Management, and Society of Occupational Health Psychology, and are often quoted in the media about issues related to industrial and organizational psychology.

The Kronos science team is delivering six sessions at the SIOP conference:

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Autumn Krauss, Ph.D. and I/O psychologist, will lead a panel discussion on “Performance Management Technology: Advantages, Limitations, and Possibilities.”
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Kristin Charles, Ph.D. and I/O psychologist, and David Scarborough, Ph.D., will co-chair a Forum on “The role of I/O Psychology in Resolving the Healthcare Crisis.”
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Kyle Mack will present his recent study on the “Effects of Corporate Social Irresponsibility on Justice Perceptions and Attitudes.”
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Elizabeth McCune will speak on “Proactive Personality Meta-Analysis: Relationships with Performance and Job Satisfaction.”
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Phillip Mangos, Ph.D. and I/O psychologist, will deliver a presentation on “Innovations in Adaptive Simulation-based Assessment, Training, and Feedback.”
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Aarti Shyamsunder, Ph.D. and I/O psychologist, will lead a panel discussion on “Practical Issues in Developing Construct-based Situational Judgment Tests.”

About Kronos Incorporated

Kronos is the global leader in workforce management solutions that enable organizations to control labor costs, minimize compliance risk, and improve workforce productivity. Tens of thousands of organizations in 60 countries — including more than half of the Fortune 1000® — use Kronos time and attendance, scheduling, absence management, HR and payroll, hiring, and labor analytics applications. To learn how Kronos uniquely delivers complete automation and high-quality information in an easy-to-use solution, visit www.kronos.com.

© 2009 Kronos Incorporated. Kronos and the Kronos logo are registered trademarks of Kronos Incorporated or a related company. All other product and company names mentioned are used for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Source: Kronos

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MicroStrategy Announces General Availability of MicroStrategy 9

Mar 26, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Business Partners Support MicroStrategyâ??s Latest Software Release

McLean, VA (March 26, 2009) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence (BI) software, today announced the release of MicroStrategy 9(TM), the company’s most significant software release in nearly a decade. MicroStrategy 9 was introduced in January 2009 at the Company’s annual user conference and was made generally available on March 20, 2009.

MicroStrategy 9 delivers new technology and features to:

* Extend the performance, scalability, and efficiency of enterprise BI;
* Enable the rapid deployment of departmental BI applications; and
* Provide a seamless consolidation path from departmental BI to enterprise BI.

Extending Enterprise BI
As BI systems grow to thousands of users and hundreds of terabytes of data, maintaining fast query performance can be a tremendous challenge. MicroStrategy 9 includes new adaptive caching technology called In-memory ROLAP, which takes advantage of the large addressable memory now available on 64-bit Unix, Linux, and Windows computer servers, and provides a performance-optimized middle-tier database that can respond directly to data requests from reports, dashboards, and OLAP analyses. MicroStrategy 9 also introduces new SQL generation optimizations that can greatly improve performance for sophisticated queries involving complex metrics.

As companies merge and expand, there is an increased urgency for business intelligence to span all operations, across business units, across departments, and across the globe. This expansion introduces new requirements on BI systems to support global deployments. MicroStrategy 9 offers the ability to present reports, dashboards, or OLAP analyses in the local language of business users viewing the information. In addition, MicroStrategy 9 offers numerous capabilities to streamline coordination between development teams working around the globe on the same BI applications.

Enabling Rapid Development and Deployment of Departmental BI
MicroStrategy 9 includes significant new architectural components and features designed specifically to support the needs of smaller-scale BI systems for departments. MicroStrategy 9 enables departmental BI applications to be set up quickly, providing end users with the ability to create reports and dashboards, and to distribute information among themselves with little or no IT support.

MicroStrategy’s new Multi-source ROLAP, In-memory ROLAP, and rapid metadata creation enables business departments to quickly set up small BI environments, accessing multiple databases without the time-consuming and technically-intensive work of first creating a data mart or data warehouse.

MicroStrategy 9 offers numerous new features that make assembling reports simpler and faster. Business users can quickly create their own dashboards using new features in MicroStrategy 9, including out-of-the-box dashboard templates, support for custom-designed templates, and new design assistants that aid novice users in creating their own dashboards.

Because of its ROLAP architecture, one of MicroStrategy’s long-standing strengths is the ability of business users to freely investigate the data or ‘surf’ through the data warehouse without having to design a new report for each new combination of data they want to see. MicroStrategy 9 has extended this ability by allowing users to perform these same OLAP manipulations such as pivoting and drilling directly on graphs.

MicroStrategy 9 gives users greater control of report and dashboard distribution with its new Distribution Services product. Users can set up report distributions for themselves or for other users, sending reports via e-mail, networked printers, or directly to recipients’ computers or servers. Business users are empowered to create and manage their own information subscriptions, without the intervention of a centralized IT administrator.

Providing Seamless Consolidation from Departmental BI to Enterprise BI
Organizations often have a mix of departmental and enterprise BI systems, and face the problem of having multiple ‘versions of the truth’ across these BI islands that can undermine the credibility of its BI systems. A solution to this problem is to merge the islands of BI into a more cohesive, enterprise-wide BI system gradually and incrementally.

MicroStrategy 9 was designed to enable the easy merger of independent islands of MicroStrategy BI into a more expansive enterprise BI system. Using the new Multi-source ROLAP capability, metadata and reports from departmental BI islands can be gradually merged into larger enterprise BI metadata, without also having to move any of the original data into data warehouses or data marts. As a next step, MicroStrategy 9 also enables companies to gradually move their data from disparate databases into the data warehouse simply by ‘re-pointing’ the metadata to access the same data, but at its new location, with no disruption to reports or redesign required.

MicroStrategy Business Partners Support MicroStrategy 9
MicroStrategy works with a broad range of business partners, including technology partners, consulting partners, systems integrators, resellers, and OEMs. Many of these business partners have previewed MicroStrategy 9 beta software and provided positive feedback on its new features and enhancements.

“The innovations in MicroStrategy 9 will enable our business partners to attract new customers looking for a BI platform that extends performance and scalability at the enterprise-level and is easy to deploy for smaller BI applications,” said MicroStrategy’s COO, Sanju Bansal. “We are delighted that MicroStrategy 9 has been well received by our business partners.”

Fujitsu Consulting
“MicroStrategy 9 supports our view of BI as a strategic enterprise asset, which is central to our approach to driving real and measurable change in the organization through the deployment of BI and Performance Management solutions,” said Norm Mackay, VP Business Intelligence, Fujitsu Consulting. “By leveraging this enterprise-caliber BI technology for departmental BI requirements, Fujitsu enables our clients to consolidate all their departmental applications into a single, integrated BI system. This truly represents a technological breakthrough that will allow our clients to maximize the returns on their BI investment.”

Harris Corporation
“MicroStrategy 9 is a huge jump from previous releases,” said Peter Wickwire, Product Manager, Broadcast Communications Division Report Services, Harris Corporation. “The features in MicroStrategy 9 will allow us to deliver the best business intelligence implementation possible to our very demanding clients.”

HP
“Customers want the ability to respond to business events faster with current and relevant information,” said Giuliano Di Vitantonio, director, marketing and alliances, Business Intelligence Solutions, HP. “The combination of HP platform and services and MicroStrategy software gives customers an integrated solution that supports and improves the decision making process with greater scalability, performance, and efficiency.”

Informatica
“MicroStrategy 9 sets a new standard for reporting and analysis for the enterprise as well as for departmental implementations,” said Don Tirsell, Senior Director Technical Alliances, Informatica. “The redesigned interfaces and many new self-service features of MicroStrategy 9 make information easily available to all levels of users across the organization.”

Marketing Direct
“The enhancements in MicroStrategy 9 are very exciting and will deliver instant value to our customer base,” said Chad Wainscott, Business Intelligence Analyst, Marketing Direct. “The features such as multi-source data access, personal prompt answers, and In-memory ROLAP address several of the demands from our user community. These enhancements will make all of our users more efficient and productive.”

Sybase
“MicroStrategy 9 sets a new standard for reporting and analysis decision-making when used in tandem with the Sybase® IQ Analytic Server,” said Dan Lahl, Director of Analytics at Sybase. “Using completely redesigned interfaces, hundreds of new features and optimizations for Sybase IQ 15, MicroStrategy 9 and Sybase IQ 15 quickly turn raw data into decision-ready information for all business owners throughout the enterprise.”

Teradata Corporation
“As a business intelligence Partner, MicroStrategy ensures that their business intelligence software easily integrates with all members of the Teradata Purpose-Built Platform family to leverage the data within our customers’ data warehouses,” said Randy Lea, vice president, products and services, Teradata Corporation. “MicroStrategy 9 will extend and improve the ability of our joint customers to make better, faster decisions by infusing real-time intelligence into frontline operations and long-range strategic planning.”

For more information on MicroStrategy 9, visit www.microstrategy.com/9info.

About MicroStrategy
Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a global leader in business intelligence (BI) technology. MicroStrategy provides integrated reporting, analysis, and monitoring software that helps leading organizations worldwide make better business decisions every day. Companies choose MicroStrategy for its advanced technical capabilities, sophisticated analytics, and superior data and user scalability. More information about MicroStrategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) is available at www.microstrategy.com.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy 9 are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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U.S. Department of Education Uses WebFOCUS to Accurately Allocate Billions of Dollars of Student Aid

Mar 25, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Information Builders’ Business Intelligence Technology Helps Colleges Award Nearly Two Billion Dollars of Federal Pell Grants During the 2007-08 Year

NEW YORK, NY (March 25, 2009) –

Information Builders, the independent leader in operational business intelligence (BI) and integration solutions, today announced that its customer, Federal Student Aid (FSA), a division of the United States Department of Education, has successfully rolled out the Institutional Student Information Record (ISIR) Analysis Tool to 200 colleges and universities across the country. The tool helps these educational institutions assess the accuracy of student aid applications and determine eligibility for need-based aid such as grants, subsidized loans, and work-study programs.

FSA oversees the distribution of massive amounts of federal money to students. The 150 schools participating in the Quality Assurance Program are required to use the BI tool to monitor the accuracy of these awards. These schools deliver approximately $2 billion in Pell Grants each year. Billions more in federally subsidized loans as well as state and institutional grant aid are awarded based on the financial information students provide on aid applications. Previously, schools would collect the students’ financial aid data on their own, and then attempt to analyze it using a variety of distinct systems at each campus. Now FSA personnel, and all of the participating colleges and universities, use the tool to analyze their data under one highly effective system.

“We can now analyze real-time data using common reports in spite of the schools’ disparate systems,” said Anne B. Tuccillo, senior management/program analyst at FSA. “By using the ISIR Analysis Tool, schools can ensure that the right aid is being distributed to the right students. The tool also helps schools to prevent hundreds of millions of dollars in potential improper payments within the Federal Pell Grant Program.”

These substantial savings stem from better procedures for verifying the accuracy of students’ Free Applications for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), a form that millions of students fill out each year. The reports generated by the ISIR tool allow schools to identify which FAFSA items are most likely to be misreported, which groups of students are most likely to make errors on the form, and which errors are most likely to affect eligibility for need-based aid. A recent FSA study determined that if Pell Grants were awarded with no verification at all, they would have awarded nine percent of grant recipients too much aid and six percent of grant recipients too little aid – a potential discrepancy of more than $600 million among the 150 schools participating in the Quality Assurance Program. The ISIR Analysis Tool allowed schools to prevent most of the potential 15 percent error rate by verifying the students most likely to make mistakes on their initial applications.

“With an increasing emphasis on online communication in government offices, FSA looked to increase the effectiveness of its interactions with both students and colleges, while simultaneously decreasing the cost of that enhanced communication,” said David Rhodes, senior management/program analyst at FSA. “BI technology is at the heart of these efforts.” FSA selected Information Builders’ WebFOCUS BI platform because it combines intuitive dashboards and drillable reports with complex analytic capabilities that casual business users can quickly comprehend. “WebFOCUS is powerful enough to handle hundreds of thousands of records from schools across the nation and process all of that information through standard Web browsers,” he added.

In the past, many financial aid departments at post-secondary institutions focused their verification efforts on the neediest students within their school populations. This seemed like a logical strategy, until the ISIR Analysis Tool helped FSA determine that errors on these student applications typically are not significant enough to change their eligibility for aid. This meant that schools were essentially wasting their time by asking students and their families for financial information that rarely led to any meaningful change in their eligibility. The ISIR Analysis Tool helps financial aid professionals use their time more wisely as they become more selective in students they decide to verify and which data elements to confirm. For example, the Field Change Report lists items on the FAFSA that are most frequently changed after the application verification process. Tracking this information allows schools to discern which items their students are most likely to answer incorrectly, enabling financial aid staff to specifically target those items for verification. Schools can also use this information to improve their community outreach and education efforts as they help new students fill out the FAFSA correctly.

“The ISIR Analysis Tool has enabled us to do some very in-depth analysis of the students we verify, thus giving us the information we need to focus on data elements that are most error-prone,” confirmed Janet Roecker, associate director, Office of Student Financial Aid, University of Kansas. “The tool has definitely made our verification process much more efficient.”

The FSA recently launched a demo site so that interested schools could “test drive” the BI environment before they sign up to use it. Their goal is to increase the user base to at least 500 schools in the next two years and ultimately to engage 1,500 post-secondary institutions throughout the U.S.

“The ISIR Analysis Tool allows me to easily import records for analysis,” added John McPherson, associate director of Scholarships and Financial Aid at Ball State University. “Once records are loaded, the built-in reports and point-and-click menus allow me to see immediate results. We have been able to use the data to modify processes and streamline communications with our students.”
About FSA

Federal Student Aid, a performance-based organization within the U.S. Department of Education, ensures that all individuals who meet the eligibility standards of the needs analysis formula created by Congress can benefit from federally funded or federally guaranteed financial assistance for education beyond high school. FSA plays a central role in supporting postsecondary education by partnering with postsecondary schools, financial institutions and other participants in Title IV Student Financial Assistance programs to help students and their families to afford education beyond high school.
About Information Builders

Information Builders’ award-winning combination of business intelligence and enterprise integration software has been providing innovative solutions to more than 12,000 customer for the past 30 years. WebFOCUS is the world’s most widely utilized business intelligence platform. It provides the security, scalability and flexibility needed at every level of global extended enterprises. Its simplicity helps create executive, analytical, and operational applications that reach dozens to millions of users. Information Builders’ iWay Software suite provides state of the art, multi-purpose, pre-built integration components that address all SOA, application, data and information management requirements. Its integration adapters have been adopted by the leading software platform providers. Together, these products give Information Builders’ customers the ability to grow and innovate according to their needs.

Information Builders’ customers include most of the Fortune 100 and U.S. federal government agencies. Headquartered in New York City with 90 offices worldwide, the company employs 1,450 people and has more than 350 business partners.

Source: Information Builders

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Levy Home Entertainment Creates a Bestselling BI Environment With Information Builders’ Technology and Services

Mar 19, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Leading Book Wholesaler Boosts Internal Efficiency, Streamlines Supply Chain With WebFOCUS

NEW YORK, NY (March 19, 2009) –

By accessing current business information and sharing it with suppliers, Levy Home Entertainment is improving operational efficiency, both internally and in its dealings with suppliers. The premier distributor of paperback and hardcover books used Information Builders’ WebFOCUS BI platform to build a self-service reporting environment that has increased transparency, efficiency, and cost-savings throughout its national organization – and beyond.

By using WebFOCUS to directly access data in IBM AS/400-based business applications, Levy was able to avoid the expense of developing and managing an enterprise data warehouse. With intuitive dashboards and easy-to-use reports at their fingertips, managers are cutting supply-chain costs, tightening up inefficiencies and continuing to provide enhanced services to national retailers like Target, Wal-Mart, and Toys ‘R Us.

“We wanted to get to the information-production stage very quickly,” said Marty Wehrle, senior vice president and chief information officer for Levy. “Information Builders enabled us to access the data and create meaningful reports almost immediately. They showed us how we could directly access the data in our production systems and create intermediate data stores for reporting.”

Levy retained Information Builders Professional Services to help them complete the enterprise-wide business intelligence project. “I was pleased with the progress we made, especially within the first 90 to 120 days,” said Steve Carlson, senior vice president and chief financial officer for Levy. “Our time to market was greatly advanced by choosing this solution and dedicating the appropriate internal and external resources.”

The new BI environment is currently delivering information throughout Levy’s organization. For example, WebFOCUS sales reports organize information from more than 10,000 retail locations every day to provide insight into which titles are selling. Warehouse managers use WebFOCUS to analyze the performance of Levy’s distribution centers – improving the efficiency of picking and packing operations to ensure inventory reaches retailers expeditiously. Levy also created a Publisher Portal that gives more than 300 partners visibility into Levy’s sales and inventory data. The portal provides instant information about which titles are selling, along with the ability to track purchase orders and gauge inventory shortfalls.

“In a tough economic environment where every dollar counts, being able to analyze accurate information and make quick decisions is crucial to corporate growth, profitability, and sometimes even survival,” said Gerald Cohen, CEO and founder of Information Builders. “From competitive advantages with partners to enhanced visibility into sales data and increased awareness of warehouse efficiency, Levy is experiencing an information revolution throughout its organization.”
About Levy

Levy Home Entertainment is the nation’s premier distributor of paperback and hardcover books to America’s finest retailers. With over $600 million in annual sales, Levy provides books and services to Target, Meijer, BJ’s Warehouse Clubs, Wal-Mart, Toys ‘R Us, and other national retailers.
About Information Builders

Information Builders’ award-winning combination of business intelligence and enterprise integration software has been providing innovative solutions to more than 12,000 customers for the past 30 years. WebFOCUS is the world’s most widely utilized business intelligence platform. It provides the security, scalability, and flexibility needed at every level of global extended enterprises. Its simplicity helps create executive, analytical, and operational applications that reach dozens to millions of users. Information Builders’ iWay Software suite provides state-of-the-art, multi-purpose, pre-built integration components that address all SOA, application, data, and information management requirements. Its integration adapters have been adopted by the leading software platform providers. Together, these products give Information Builders’ customers the ability to grow and innovate according to their needs.

Information Builders’ customers include most of the Fortune 100 and U.S. federal government agencies. Headquartered in New York City with 90 offices worldwide, the company employs 1,450 people and has more than 350 business partners.

Source: Information Builders

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Kronos

Mar 16, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

As the U.S. unemployment rate has soared to a 16-year high of 8.1 percent1, service industries that employ a high percentage of hourly workers are experiencing a sharp increase in the number of job applicants

CHELMSFORD, Mass. (March 16, 2009) –

As the U.S. unemployment rate has soared to a 16-year high of 8.1 percent1, service industries that employ a high percentage of hourly workers are experiencing a sharp increase in the number of job applicants. This surge has created a massive hiring challenge for Kronos customers in industries such as retail and hospitality. In 2008, these organizations saw a 40 percent increase in the average number of applications per hire compared with 2007. The challenge is further complicated because these organizations have fewer dollars to spend on technology and solutions to automate the selection and hiring process, but acknowledge that putting the best employees in front of their customers is critical. In response to this dynamic, Kronos® Incorporated today announced the availability of pay-per-hire pricing for its selection and hiring solution targeted at medium to large sized companies.

“The growing misalignment in the applicant-to-job ratio has added complexity for employers seeking to hire the best people,” said Steve Earl, director of marketing at Kronos. “In a down economy, employee selection becomes even more critical because hiring the best employees is imperative to maintaining desirable levels of customer service. By providing the Kronos selection and hiring solution on a pay-per-hire basis, we’re addressing employers’ needs for hiring best-fit employees without a long-term commitment or large up-front costs.”

The first on-demand pricing model of its kind for field and hourly hiring enables organizations to pay only for the hires they make, with minimal up-front investment or long-term financial commitment. Earl added, “The premise of this model is simple: once up and running, if organizations do not hire, they do not pay.”

“Today’s uncertain economic climate has changed hourly hiring for the foreseeable future,” said Lisa Rowan, program director, HR, learning, and talent strategies at IDC. “Faced with more applicants, fewer job openings, and increased applicant diversity, hiring managers stand to benefit from a cost-effective, easy-to-own solution that enables them to find best-fit employees quickly.”

The new pay-per-hire pricing model is also more cost effective for businesses that have cyclical hiring patterns. Many retailers, for example, hire as much as 50 percent of their employees during the months leading up to the holiday season. This new pricing structure from Kronos will enable such organizations to save dollars during months when hiring is at a minimum.
Availability

Pay-per-hire pricing is available now. Call (800) 355-4547 or visit our website for more information.

About Kronos Incorporated

Kronos is the global leader in workforce management solutions that enable organizations to control labor costs, minimize compliance risk, and improve workforce productivity. Tens of thousands of organizations in 60 countries — including more than half of the Fortune 1000® — use Kronos time and attendance, scheduling, absence management, HR and payroll, hiring, and labor analytics applications. To learn how Kronos uniquely delivers complete automation and high-quality information in an easy-to-use solution, visit www.kronos.com.

Footnote 1: Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor, “The Employment Situation: February 2009,”
www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm, March 6, 2009.

©2009 Kronos Incorporated. Kronos and the Kronos logo are registered trademarks of Kronos Incorporated or a related company. All other product and company names mentioned are used for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Source: Kronos

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Oc

Mar 12, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence (BI) software, today announced that Océ Business Services, a leader in document process management and electronic discovery, has selected MicroStrategy for its Océ MAX� Advanced document performanc

McLean, Va., (March 12, 2009) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence (BI) software, today announced that Océ Business Services, a leader in document process management and electronic discovery, has selected MicroStrategy for its Océ MAX(TM) Advanced document performance management system.

Océ MAX Advanced is a next-generation Internet application that enables clients to use information to reduce document management costs and improve operational efficiency. Using MicroStrategy software, Océ Business Services can offer its clients interactive, customizable reports and dashboards for deeper insights into document management. Some of the capabilities available in Océ MAX Advanced include near-real-time volume and performance reports, customizable dashboards with “stop light” performance management of key metrics, and automated e-mail alerts when metrics deviate from established performance standards.

With MicroStrategy’s information dashboards, Océ Business Services’ clients can monitor Service Level Agreements (SLAs), view a detailed breakdown of a specific SLA at the enterprise or location/user level, and monitor performance by month or day. The actionable insights from MicroStrategy-based dashboards enable Océ Business Services’ clients to pinpoint problems quickly, improve efficiencies, and reduce costs.

“We were looking for an intuitive reporting solution to augment the services that we provide to our clients with advanced reporting requirements,” said Elizabeth Halaki, chief marketing officer for Océ Business Services. “MicroStrategy’s flexibility, robust reporting capabilities, and ease-of-use for our diverse user population were all factors in our decision.”

“We are pleased to count Océ Business Services as a new MicroStrategy customer,” said Sanju Bansal, MicroStrategy’s COO. “Our highly visual information dashboards empower business users to interact with their data in compelling new ways, providing at-a-glance insights to help users make data-driven business decisions.”

About Océ Business Services
Océ Business Services is a leading international provider of document process outsourcing services and technology to businesses and the public sector. By improving and managing non-core yet critical document processes, Océ Business Services enables organizations to reduce costs, increase efficiency, mitigate risk and improve operational performance. Océ Business Services’ solutions span the document lifecycle, from creation through disposal, including business records, eDiscovery, imaging, print and mail management. Proprietary service delivery methodologies apply Six Sigma® to improve results. To learn more, visit http://www.obs-innovation.com.

About MicroStrategy
Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a global leader in business intelligence (BI) technology. MicroStrategy provides integrated reporting, analysis, and monitoring software that helps leading organizations worldwide make better business decisions every day. Companies choose MicroStrategy for its advanced technical capabilities, sophisticated analytics, and superior data and user scalability. More information about MicroStrategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) is available at www.microstrategy.com.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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Information Builders Customers Embrace Active Reports Technology

Mar 11, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Leading Organizations Harness Power of Visualization Via Industryâ??s First Portable Business Intelligence Solution

NEW YORK, NY (March 11, 2009) –

Information Builders, the independent leader in operational business intelligence (BI) solutions, today announced that leading organizations around the globe are rapidly adopting WebFOCUS Active Reports for portable sorting, filtering, and analysis to better understand customer needs in real time, greatly improve decision-making, and operate more cost effectively. As the industry’s first portable BI platform for delivering interactive analytic applications, WebFOCUS Active Reports has its own API, components, security, and analytic engine, enabling users to create active dashboards and receive Active Reports on mobile devices.

“Many vendors’ dashboards are only available to select users instead of being distributed to all employees with operational responsibilities,” said Gerald Cohen, CEO and founder of Information Builders. “Our active technology empowers everyone within the organization to give businesses the competitive edge and increased business productivity needed to thrive in today’s economy.”

Customer benefits of WebFOCUS Active Reports include:

* Improved user experience and decision-making – Multiple reports are consolidated into a single interactive view making viewing data and performing analysis easier
* Guaranteed single version of the truth – Users can receive scheduled updates to the dashboard, ensuring that they always have the latest information in their e-mail folders
* Scales to unlimited numbers of users – All interactions are self-contained and occur in the browser, meaning a virtually unlimited number of concurrent users can analyze data
* Requires no specialized software and no connection – Data and interactive capabilities are bound together in a single file that can be managed without installing additional software; users without a network connection can access reports from anywhere

Dealer Services Manages Dealer Risk and Increases Profitability

Dealer Services Corporation (DSC), a national inventory financing company for used car and power sports dealers, relies on WebFOCUS as its enterprise BI standard to provide more than 450 of the rapidly growing organization’s non-technical business users with self-service access to the information they need, when they need it, to accurately manage dealer risk and make better decisions. DSC currently uses three types of Active Report dashboards: departmental (currently five in use), one company dashboard (used company-wide), and one executive dashboard slanted toward more financial data.

New dealers enter the market and existing dealers exit the market on a regular basis. With a WebFOCUS Active Report on dealer risk, DSC can track and monitor the situations that usually occur before a dealer gets into trouble. This helps the dealer avoid default and minimizes the consequences for DSC should the situation deteriorate. DSC can also run Active Reports on loan activities to view the different risks involved with certain loans. The reports can identify anomalies or evidence of risky behavior, such as inconsistent loan repayment patterns. Active Reports allow them to take into consideration a wide number of factors that they may have previously dismissed and help reduce to amount of human error in the loan decision process.
Israeli Credit Insurance Company Gains Offline Analysis – With Zero Overhead

As the leading credit insurer in Israel, Israeli Credit Insurance Company (ICIC) protects more than $11 billion worth of credit each year in both local and foreign trade transactions. ICIC needed to quickly build a versatile reporting environment to help policyholders identify, analyze, and reduce risk via secure, controlled access to their policy information. ICIC used Information Builders WebFOCUS software because of its comprehensive application development and deployment capabilities including Active Reports and Active Dashboards. Powered by highly portable JavaScript technology, Active Reports can be downloaded and viewed within a browser, either online or offline, meaning ICIC customers did not need licensed BI software to view and analyze information. The reporting application also features automatic exports to Excel spreadsheets and interactive graphs that let users visualize the exposure data.

The ICIC online reporting system has been in production for about a year and it already has 600 registered users. ICIC customers are particularly intrigued by WebFOCUS Active Reports since it enables them to slice and dice the insurance data without having to be connected to ICIC’s information systems. In the future, developers plan to use WebFOCUS Active Dashboards to make it faster and easier to present information. This will enable customers to compile multiple tables and charts into a single customized dashboard.

“WebFOCUS gives us a competitive edge by making it easier for customers to create and manage their exposures,” said Ofer Resh, chief information officer, ICIC. “We regard BI software as one of our primary market differentiators.”

In an industry where information is the primary currency, WebFOCUS Active Reports let policyholders more thoroughly track and manage their exposures, saving time for internal developers and providing a unique set of services that gives ICIC a competitive edge.
University of North Carolina -Chapel Hill

The University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill, the nation’s first state university, recently established the student data warehouse (SDW), an enterprise resource planning (ERP) companion project focusing on admissions and recruiting. Eventually the SDW will contain all data pertaining to a student stored in the ERP transactional system and the data will be structured for easy retrieval, analysis, and reporting. The SDW project will incorporate the business needs of stakeholders ranging from undergraduate admissions to the Office of Institutional Research and Assessment into a new data warehouse tool. Business units and end users will then be able to access that data through WebFOCUS.

“Each year we make decisions that affect the lives of nearly 25,000 students and their families. We can’t make those decisions without reliable and up-to-date information,” said Stephen Farmer, associate provost and director of Undergraduate Admissions. “The student data warehouse will give us just this kind of information, and there’s no doubt it will help us make good decisions on admissions.”
New York Public Library Betters Public Service While Reducing Costs

The New York Public Library (NYPL) is one of the nation’s great scholarly resources, serving the citizens of Manhattan, the Bronx, and Staten Island with more than 1.86 million cardholders. Each year the NYPL processes more than 15 million borrower transactions. After struggling with outdated data management systems for decades, managers at NYPL began working with Information Builders in 2006 to gather, analyze, and deliver pertinent information to all 3,000 employees spread across 86 branches and five research facilities. The NYPL used WebFOCUS to develop a BI solution called Metrics On Demand (MOD), which delivers information about operating costs, traffic patterns, asset acquisition and inventory management via a dashboard-driven environment. In 200X, NYPL took reporting to a new level by leveraging WebFOCUS Active Reports so users can output results for additional sorting, filtering, and analysis. This permits managers to drill down into the data, visualize specific drivers of change and evaluate performance at each individual site.

“We realized that capturing and making available better metrics would have a huge positive impact on our organization’s data strategy department,” said NYPL Statistical Analysis Manager Anthony Fischetti. “Our goal was to have a tool that could pull real-time information in from all of our operations and make it available from a centralized repository and disseminate statistics instantly to managers and staff.”

The Library Branch Activity Rankings dashboard reveals the most popular programs and materials, helping branch managers ensure that the items most in demand are always available to the public.

Today, about 125 managers depend on MOD to keep track of local activities within their purview as well as share best practices about improving services to the public. By accessing operational data through interactive dashboards, NYPL managers and staff benefit from greatly improved decision-making, enabling them to maintain a more responsive and cost-effective public library system.
Scherer Brothers Lumber Company Gains Unmatched Information Access

Scherer Brothers Lumber, a leading Midwest building materials supplier and manufacturer, standardized on WebFOCUS to automate complex financial reporting and provide greater access to disparate data sources. Company executives and managers have on-demand access to critical financial data from their PeopleSoft Enterprise One ERP system. Scherer uses Active Reports to provide sales reporting and analysis to account managers. The data can be spliced into several report combinations without downloading additional data.

“WebFOCUS allows our staff to generate financial reports in minutes that previously took hours to run,” said Scherer CIO Marjorie Arnold. “With Active Reports our general managers can now get key financial information for their specific business units rather than having to wade through cumbersome hard copy report books. We anticipate similar efficiencies for our account managers using this business intelligence tool to do offline analysis of important customer data.” By using WebFOCUS and Active Reports, Scherer Brothers Lumber is defining, building, and automating metrics to track progress on a daily basis, allowing them to react to customers’ needs in real time.
About Information Builders

Information Builders’ award-winning combination of business intelligence and enterprise integration software has been providing innovative solutions to more than 12,000 customers for the past 30 years. WebFOCUS is the world’s most widely utilized business intelligence platform. It provides the security, scalability, and flexibility needed at every level of global extended enterprises. Its simplicity helps create executive, analytical, and operational applications that reach dozens to millions of users. Information Builders’ iWay Software suite provides state-of-the-art, multi-purpose, pre-built integration components that address all SOA, application, data, and information management requirements. Its integration adapters have been adopted by the leading software platform providers. Together, these products give Information Builders’ customers the ability to grow and innovate according to their needs.

Information Builders’ customers include most of the Fortune 100 and U.S. federal government agencies. Headquartered in New York City with 90 offices worldwide, the company employs 1,450 people and has more than 350 business partners.

Source: Information Builders

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Kronos

Mar 09, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Enhancements reduce frontline hiring costs and improve workforce productvity

CHELMSFORD, Mass. (March 09, 2009) –

Kronos® Incorporated today announced availability of Workforce Acquisition(TM) 8.4. The selection and hiring solution enables employers to better predict job performance by applying science to their hiring decisions, ultimately leading to reduced frontline hiring costs and improved workforce productivity.

Workforce Acquisition 8.4 provides hiring managers with enhanced selection tools to help them quickly identify best-fit candidates in today’s rapidly expanding candidate pool. “The application-to-hire ratio — the number of job applicants for each position filled — has shifted sharply higher due to the state of the economy. With more job seekers competing for fewer job openings, the hiring process can be overwhelming,” said Steve Earl, director of marketing at Kronos. “We believe that hiring doesn’t have to be so hard, even in a tough economy. Workforce Acquisition 8.4 includes new capabilities aimed at enhancing the selection and hiring experience for managers and job applicants.”

Major enhancements in Workforce Acquisition 8.4 include:
Advanced selection science for long-term care organizations

In a tough economy, putting best-fit employees in front of customers is critical. The impact of a bad hire in long-term care is far greater than other industries. As a result, managers in long-term care must hire caregivers who are well-suited to the demands of the job and who are less likely to quit.

Workforce Acquisition 8.4 includes an enhanced Frontline Healthcare Assessment built by Kronos scientists specifically for long-term care. This behavioral assessment uses innovative scoring methodologies to produce two results from a single assessment: a prediction of job-fit; and a prediction of retention-related outcomes. These scores are made available immediately to the hiring manager to enhance their ability to select best-fit employees.

According to Lee Ann Lecheler, director of human resources at Cambridge Healthcare, a privately owned and operated community of rehabilitation and healthcare centers in Virginia, “Hiring and retaining the best caregivers who can provide a high quality of care to our residents and their families is critical to our success. The Kronos Frontline Healthcare Assessment has enabled us to create a repeatable, quality-driven process for selecting the best employees across our facilities.”
Support for field/hourly hiring in the UK

Workforce Acquisition 8.4 expands capabilities of the product to support the hiring of field-based employees in the UK. Support for UK-specific postal codes, international telephone numbers, job search by postal code, and applicant pooling functionality help hiring managers minimize the cost and time they spend hiring frontline staff. Online job applications now provide familiar, localized formats for telephone numbers and addresses to applicants in the UK.

After an initial rollout in the U.S. last year, Yum! Brands — parent company of A&W All American Foods, KFC, Long John Silver’s, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell — launched the Kronos online hiring solution in the UK last month. “An online hiring process that is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week is critical for our geographically dispersed, multi-branded business,” said John Kurnick, vice president, global talent management, Yum! Brands. “Workforce Acquisition will provide a consistent hiring experience throughout our company. We’re delighted to partner with Kronos to deploy this application to our first international business unit.”
Enhanced behavioral interview guide

An enhanced behavioral interview guide enables hiring managers to conduct more effective interviews and more efficient hiring decisions. The interview guide now provides visual indicators when specific follow-up is needed. It displays clear visual links between questions, responses, and follow-up questions, and better identifies marginal responses in the candidate application.
Applying to multiple brands

With new cross-site functionality in version 8.4, hiring managers can quickly and easily move applications from one brand to another without requiring job applicants to complete multiple job applications within the same company. These enhancements improve the candidate’s ability to apply for multiple jobs in less time, and save the hiring manager’s time by enabling them to assign the applicant to a location of a different brand.
Immediate validation of pay rates

Version 8.4 includes a new feature to ensure that the rate of pay being offered to an applicant is in line with the organization’s compensation structure. Hiring managers are notified immediately if they specify a pay rate outside the range for the position.
Personal address validation

Personal address data (city, state, and zip code) can be validated against United States Postal Service postal codes within a hiring workflow. By capturing errors at the source this new feature streamlines background checks and helps prevent errors from making their way into human resource and payroll systems.
Onboarding for salaried positions

Electronic onboarding saves hiring managers time and reduces the error-rates associated with manually completing new-hire paperwork. Workforce Acquisition 8.4 extends this existing capability to salaried recruiting and provides hiring managers and candidates the ability to electronically sign new-hire paperwork. This reduces costs associated with printing and mailing documents such as I-9s, W4s, and other state and customer-specific forms. Four new reports have also been added to help analyze and measure the effectiveness of salaried recruiting within a company.
Availability

Workforce Acquisition 8.4 is available now. Call (800) 355-4547 or visit www.kronos.com for more information.
About Kronos Incorporated

Kronos is the global leader in workforce management solutions that enable organizations to control labor costs, minimize compliance risk, and improve workforce productivity. Tens of thousands of organizations in 60 countries — including more than half of the Fortune 1000® — use Kronos time and attendance, scheduling, absence management, HR and payroll, hiring, and labor analytics applications. To learn how Kronos uniquely delivers complete automation and high-quality information in an easy-to-use solution, visit www.kronos.com.

© 2009 Kronos Incorporated. Kronos and the Kronos logo are registered trademarks and Workforce Acquisition is a trademark of Kronos Incorporated or a related company. All other product and company names mentioned are used for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Source: Kronos

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Catalina Marketing Expands Deployment of MicroStrategy to Deliver Enhanced Reporting Capabilities to its Clients

Mar 04, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence (BI) software, today announced that Catalina Marketing plans to expand its deployment of MicroStrategy, which supports a wide range of business intelligence applications across its organization

McLean, Va. (March 04, 2009) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence (BI) software, today announced that Catalina Marketing plans to expand its deployment of MicroStrategy, which supports a wide range of business intelligence applications across its organization. Catalina Marketing has been a MicroStrategy customer for more than seven years, and is the global leader in behavior-based communications for consumer packaged goods companies, pharmaceutical manufacturers, and grocery, drug, and mass retailers.

Catalina Marketing uses MicroStrategy to run complex analytics against 600-plus billion rows of purchase data stored on multiple petabytes of Netezza data warehouse appliances. By leveraging MicroStrategy’s business intelligence software, Catalina Marketing provides its clients with a portal to access data and insights into purchasing preferences and behaviors. Each month, Catalina Marketing’s clients run more than 10,000 MicroStrategy-based reports and dashboards.

Catalina Marketing is expanding its use of MicroStrategy to offer enhanced BI reporting capabilities for its client portal. The upgraded portal will offer users centralized access to MicroStrategy reports and dashboards, and single sign-on capabilities to streamline the process of obtaining information. In addition, MicroStrategy’s self-service reporting features will allow users to create reports faster and new expressive dashboards will provide key metrics at-a-glance to accelerate decision-making.

“Over the years, MicroStrategy’s high scalability, robust security, intuitive Web interface, and advanced SQL engine have proven to be instrumental in helping us meet our clients’ growing information requirements,” said Eric Williams, Catalina Marketing’s Chief Information Officer. “We expect the client portal enhancements will improve the current user experience, and enable additional users to take advantage of the broad range of reporting and analytical capabilities provided.”

“Catalina Marketing is a long-time MicroStrategy customer and we are delighted that they continue to achieve success with their BI applications,” said MicroStrategy’s COO, Sanju Bansal. “MicroStrategy’s integrated BI platform seamlessly delivers user-friendly reports and dashboards that are valuable tools for identifying key trends and making analytically-based business decisions.”

About Catalina Marketing Corporation
Based in St. Petersburg, Fla. and established in 1983, Catalina Marketing Corporation (www.catalinamarketing.com) was founded on the premise that communications to consumers targeted off actual purchase behavior would generate a more effective response. Today, Catalina Marketing is an international company that powers one of the largest and most advanced media outlets in the world- Pointer Media Network (www.pointermedianetwork.com). Pointer Media enables brand managers, marketers, advertisers, media buyers and media planners to leverage the network’s sophisticated database of 250 million weekly shopping transactions representing buying behavior of nearly 80 percent of American households with direct-to-consumer communication opportunities. This medium provides an extensive infrastructure of 23,000 retail outlets, 25-years of analytical expertise and an average 80 percent readership rate among target audiences.

About MicroStrategy
Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a global leader in business intelligence (BI) technology. MicroStrategy provides integrated reporting, analysis, and monitoring software that helps leading organizations worldwide make better business decisions every day. Companies choose MicroStrategy for its advanced technical capabilities, sophisticated analytics, and superior data and user scalability. More information about MicroStrategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) is available at www.microstrategy.com.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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Information Builders Honored in KMWorld Magazine’s “100 Companies That Matter in Knowledge Management”

Feb 23, 2009 | Computer & Electronics, Computer Software, Internet, Technology | 0 comments

Information Builders Recognized for Customer Service, Innovation, and Commitment to Improvement

NEW YORK, NY (February 23, 2009) –

Information Builders, the independent leader in operational business intelligence (BI) systems, today announced that it has been named in the annual KMWorld magazine “100 Companies That Matter in Knowledge Management” list. Knowledge management practitioners, theorists, analysts, vendors, and their customers and colleagues select the companies included on the list.

“Each company embodies, as part of its culture, agile and limber execution of its mission, embracing a spirit of both adaptability and innovation,” said Hugh McKellar, editor in chief, KMWorld.

In its eighth year, the “100 Companies That Matter in Knowledge Management” list recognizes companies that emphasize their determination to serve customers and demonstrate innovation by operating with visionary insight on the forces that most affect customers. KMWorld defines the true essence of knowledge management as an attitude, a single-minded commitment to improvement.

“In a time when others are consolidating and integrating, we remain focused on providing customer service excellence and driving innovation,” said Gerald Cohen, president and CEO of Information Builders. “Our customers validate that these differentiators are why we remain an IT partner that matters to them.”
About KMWorld

The leading information provider serving the Knowledge, Document and Content Management systems market, KMWorld informs more than 50,000 subscribers about the components and processes – and subsequent success stories – that together offer solutions for improving business performance. KMWorld is a publishing unit of Information Today, Inc.
About Information Builders

Information Builders’ award-winning combination of business intelligence and enterprise integration software has been providing innovative solutions to more than 12,000 customers for the past 30 years. WebFOCUS is the world’s most widely utilized business intelligence platform. It provides the security, scalability and flexibility needed at every level of global extended enterprises. Its simplicity helps create executive, analytical, and operational applications that reach dozens to millions of users. Information Builders’ iWay Software suite provides state of the art, multi-purpose, pre-built integration components that address all SOA, application, data and information management requirements. Its integration adapters have been adopted by the leading software platform providers. Together, these products give Information Builders’ customers the ability to grow and innovate according to their needs.

Information Builders’ customers include most of the Fortune 100 and U.S. federal government agencies. Headquartered in New York City with 90 offices worldwide, the company employs 1,450 people and has more than 350 business partners.

Source: Information Builders

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