Time-series Analysis in Tableau and 6 Real-world Success Stories

In this data-driven world, enterprises are dependent on humongous quantities of data that are subsequently analysed to uncover trends previously hidden and to carry out business functions. New tools, techniques, and technologies like those of Business Intelligence, Advanced Analytics, Machine Learning are used to analyse data and devise insights-informed strategies.

Also, they help entrepreneurs by guiding them to plan day-to-day operations, ensure fast and accurate reporting, increase revenue, identify new revenue streams, identify revenue leakage…the list is virtually endless.

Gartner explains Advanced Analytics as an autonomous or semi-autonomous examination of data or content using sophisticated techniques and tools to discover deeper insights, make predictions, or generate recommendations. It uses Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Predictive Analytics, Data Visualisations, and Text Mining to examine large data sets.

In fact, Advanced Analytics is generally comprised of two divisions:

• Predictive Analytics
• Prescriptive Analytics

Predictive Analytics: What might happen in the future

Predictive Analysis is the third and most critical process of Advanced Analytics. It uses techniques like artificial intelligence, data mining, machine learning, modelling, and statistics to make predictions. Predictive modelling helps businesses like healthcare, marketing, sales, supply chain etc. to optimize operations, improve customer satisfaction, manage budgets, identify new markets, anticipate the impact of external events, develop new products and set business, marketing and pricing strategies.

Prescriptive Analytics: What should be done

Prescriptive analytics is a vital tool used in creating data-driven decisions. optimizing operations, growing sales, managing risks formulating strategies, and reaching organizational goals. It uses statistics and modelling to recommend future actions by applying data to the decision-making process.

Advanced Analytics and Business Intelligence Market Size

The Advanced Analytics market is showing continual progress as enterprises embrace these tools to effectively manage complex business processes. Reportlinker.com predicts that the global Advanced Analytics market size may grow from USD 33.8 billion in 2021 to USD 89.8 billion by 2026, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 21.6%.

A similar trend can be noticed in the case of the Business Intelligence market too. To quote Fortune Business Insights, “the Business Intelligence market is set to reach USD 43.03 Billion by 2028 in connection with rapid digitisation and robust demand for data personalisation to foster market development”.

Business Intelligence

Advanced Analytics is all about predicting future strategies, whereas Business Intelligence is focused on past performance, relying on methods such as querying, reporting, and dashboards. It uncovers trends and presents findings through visualization tools. The results show that companies adopt new approaches to increase operational efficiency and improve sales and customer relations through real-time analysis.

Functions of Business Intelligence are listed below:

Data Mining

Data mining is the process of unearthing information and patterns from massive datasets to visualizing in dashboards to generate inferences to assist the decision-making process. By adopting various techniques and procedures, knowledge is extracted to solve business problems to promote sales and marketing.

Process Mining

Powered by Data Mining and Power Analytics, Process Mining extracts insights from the existing data and helps to find the bottlenecks that hinder efficiency and compliance. It ensures a better customer experience, loT process improvement, identifies and analyses supply chain management weak links, optimises procurement and speed-up payment collection.

Complex Event Processing

CEP employs a set of techniques to analyse Big Data for real-time benefits. Opportunities and threats in business operations are identified and monitored to pave the way to success. Companies adopt CEP for fraud prevention and detection, real-time marketing, stock market trading and allied areas.

Business Performance Management

Widely known as Corporate Performance Management (CPM), BPM implies all processes or methodologies that optimise business performance. It also initiates the achievement of business goals like budgeting, planning, and forecasting and helps to improve employee performance. It identifies risks, selection of goals for progressive development, and streamlines financial processes.

Benchmarking

Benchmarking process is evaluating the management practices of one company with its best counterpart. Comparing the organisational processes in relation to the best performances allows companies to evolve by developing plans to improve their tactics.

Top 5 Advanced Analytics Tools

Alteryx: A self-service platform that can help users extract, clean and analyse data through an automated process.

Anaconda: It is an open-source Python and R-focussed platform to analyse and visualise data.

Google Cloud Platform: Known to be one of the enormous machine learning stacks, Google Cloud AI offers many products to analyse and manage data in real-time.

Knime: An open-source software that visualises data flows and helps discover new insights with minimal or no programming.

MS Azure: It is a platform (PaaS) that combines data from various sources, then stores and finally transforms it for different purposes.

Top 5 Business Intelligence Tools

Tableau: Tableau supports multiple data sources to easily analyse and visualise data in handy dashboards.

Power BI: This business analytics tool which can be accessed from anywhere helps in identifying real-time trends and delivering reports via real-time dashboards.

Qlik sense: It is a popular and complete Business Intelligence tool with its unique search and conversational analytics platform that discover new observations using natural language.

Micro strategy: It offers high speed and powerful dashboarding, cloud solutions and hyper-intelligence that can be accessed from a laptop or mobile.

IBM Cognos Analytics: Designed to discover even hidden patterns, Cognos Analytics interprets and presents data in a visualised pattern.

Conclusion

Business Intelligence and Advanced Analytics go hand in hand, from assisting business operations to improving customer satisfaction. Yet they are distinct from each other in their own ways. The amalgamation of these two technologies – Advanced Analytics and BI – improves the efficiency of business operations, delivering predictions based on historical and present data and enhancing performance in sales, maintenance, and customer satisfaction.

We are thrilled to recognize Beinex Consulting for being named Alteryx Middle East Partner of the Year!https://t.co/xwmp7HbsMp#TogetherWeSolve pic.twitter.com/4zic9mdlgD

— Alteryx (@alteryx) October 1, 2020

Beinex has achieved a Tier A status under the prestigious Dubai AI Seal, awarded by the Dubai Centre for Artificial Intelligence (DCAI) and Dubai Future Foundation (DFF). This upgrade marks a significant advancement in Beinex's AI journey, reflecting our commitment to building trusted, responsible AI solutions that align with Dubai's vision for ethical and future-ready innovation.

5 Top Ways Blockchain Improves Cloud Computing

Blockchain technology can enhance cloud computing in several ways:

1. Improved Security: Security and privacy are major concerns in cloud computing. Blockchain technology offers enhanced security by enabling data encryption and advanced database protection. The decentralised nature of blockchain ensures that data is not stored in a single location, reducing the risk of unauthorised access or data breaches.
2. Increased Visibility: Transparency and visibility are crucial in cloud computing. Blockchain enables the creation of a decentralised and shared trust model, allowing for increased transparency. Public blockchains provide visibility into every action taken, reducing opacity and enhancing trust in the cloud environment.
3. Data Integrity and Immutability: Once information is recorded on a blockchain, it becomes immutable and cannot be altered by any individual or entity without consensus from the network. This feature ensures the integrity of data stored in the cloud, reducing the risk of unauthorised modifications or tampering.
4. Traceability: Blockchain ensures that data stored on its network remains intact and authentic. The information stored on one device within the blockchain network does not affect the data on other devices, guaranteeing data integrity. Additionally, blockchain enables easy data traceability, allowing users to track where, when, and how it is used.
5. Exclusion of Third Parties: In cloud computing, relying on third-party providers can result in significant data loss if these providers experience failures. In contrast, blockchain is managed by code and does not involve third parties. This makes blockchain integration with cloud computing an attractive option, as it reduces the risk of data loss and dependency on external service providers.

4 Top Benefits of Blockchain in Cloud Computing

Integrating blockchain technology into cloud computing offers many benefits, including enhanced data security, seamless traceability, improved system interoperability, and more. Let's explore how organisations can leverage the power of blockchain in their cloud computing strategies.

Enhanced Data Security

By implementing point-to-point encryption, blockchain ensures data security during transfer and storage. Using blockchain for transaction recording establishes a reliable method for maintaining the integrity and sequence of transactions. Furthermore, the decentralised nature of blockchain, combined with peer-to-peer distribution across cloud computing systems, adds an extra layer of security beyond traditional centralised storage approaches.

Permanent Audit Trail

An additional benefit of integrating blockchain technology into cloud computing is creating a permanent audit trail. Blockchains ensure the establishment of a lasting record of transactions. Notably, blockchain technology incorporates a feature known as proof of history (POH), which supports a verifiable delay function. This function timestamps the transactions within the cloud computing network without requiring user validation. By implementing blockchain, organisations can maintain a proper order of transactions and establish a permanent timeframe for transactional data by including the POH function.

Decentralisation

An emerging trend in the technology landscape involves the shift towards edge computing, where data processing occurs at the network's periphery, near the data source. This decentralisation approach offers various advantages. For instance, Internet of Things (IoT) devices no longer need to rely on a centralised server for data processing. Instead, they can handle data independently. Similarly, facial recognition nodes may store encrypted data of authorised users and only require server interaction if a facial match is not detected. These nodes can operate autonomously until an upgrade check is necessary.

Efficient Disaster Recovery

By leveraging blockchain technology, the record of transactions is distributed widely, offering valuable benefits in terms of disaster recovery. The public or shared blockchain among authorised users ensures that a failure within one network node does not impact the remaining blockchain copies. Other nodes within the network continue to operate and update the blockchain even if one node experiences a crash.

With the transactional records embedded within the blockchain, especially those with specific timeframes, any failed network node can easily synchronise with the current state of the blockchain database once it is back online. This capability allows for a swift recovery and ensures that the node can quickly regain access to the most up-to-date version of the blockchain. Consequently, faster disaster recovery is facilitated through the inherent resilience and redundancy of blockchain technology.

Blockchain Technology: An Ultimate Solution to Business Problems

Blockchain technology offers solutions to various business problems across different industries. Let's explore how blockchain can address challenges in specific sectors, starting with healthcare:

Healthcare

In the healthcare industry, sensitive information such as credit card data, patient records, and test results are often stored in centralised systems, which can be prone to data breaches and security risks. By adopting blockchain technology, healthcare establishments can mitigate the risk of data loss. Blockchain enables the creation of a decentralised and tamper-proof log for storing private data. This decentralised approach and unique secure codes enhance data security and privacy, reducing the likelihood of unauthorised access or data leakage.

Supply Chain

Supply chains rely on vast data to ensure smooth operations at each transportation stage. By implementing blockchain technology in logistics management, you can enhance revenue and mitigate security concerns through real-time visibility and control. Furthermore, blockchain solutions improve interoperability, transparent data sharing, and more accurate product tracking within the supply chain ecosystem.

Banking

The current process of international payments often involves numerous verification steps, resulting in a cumbersome procedure. However, blockchain can potentially expedite money transfers while ensuring robust transaction security. This is achieved using distributed ledgers, where payments are processed once the transaction is registered. By leveraging the blockchain in banking, transactions can be streamlined, reducing delays and providing higher security.

Real Estate

Buying and selling real estate properties can be cumbersome and time-consuming, involving extensive paperwork, multiple intermediaries, susceptibility to fraud, and challenges in property search. However, intelligent solutions leveraging blockchain technology can effectively address these significant problems in the real estate industry.

Blockchain in real estate can enhance the due diligence process for property purchases and sales, reducing the reliance on intermediaries and streamlining the transaction process. Using blockchain can reduce the need for traditional agents, offering more direct interactions between buyers and sellers. Additionally, blockchain-powered smart contracts enable secure and seamless transactions, eliminating the need for manual contract handling and reducing the potential for errors or disputes.

How can Beinex Assist You

By leveraging blockchain technology, cloud computing solutions can benefit from enhanced security measures, increased transparency, and the assurance of data integrity. These advantages contribute to a more trustworthy and reliable cloud environment, addressing decentralisation, data privacy, and network security challenges.

Beinex, a pioneer in the Middle East in modern cloud functions and analytics, can change how you see, perceive and analyse cloud data, and take it to a superior, advantageous position.

Nevertheless, despite these challenges, SMBs should take heart in the fact that the global BI market is projected to grow to an impressive $43 billion by 2028. While the current adoption rate of BI among SMBs may be lower than that of larger companies, this simply means that there is plenty of room for growth and innovation in this space. By embracing BI and leveraging its power to make data-driven decisions, SMBs can level the playing field and even gain a competitive edge over their larger rivals. So, let's not lament the obstacles, but rather focus on the opportunities that BI presents for small businesses and startups to achieve success in the digital age.

The Solution: BI Tools

To overcome the challenges, SMBs can turn to technology and budget as more surmountable obstacles. While many businesses today utilize SaaS-driven technology to automate processes such as:

1. Creating Invoices
2. Sending Messages
3. Tracking Time
4. Running Marketing Campaigns

The data generated from these operations can be overwhelming and expensive to collect. This is where business intelligence (BI) tools come into play. SMBs that have undergone digital transformation are already generating data related to their business operations, and with the right BI features, they can derive valuable insights to meet their business objectives. With BI, small business owners can analyze consumer behaviour, estimate market trends, forecast sales, and improve customer experience - capabilities that were previously thought to be exclusive to enterprise companies. By leveraging BI, SMBs can level the playing field and gain a competitive edge.

Business Intelligence (BI) is a set of tools, techniques, and technologies that help businesses collect, analyze, and interpret data to make better decisions. BI is an essential tool for large enterprises, but its benefits are not limited to big organizations. Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) can also benefit from BI in many ways.

Top Benefits of BI for SMBs

The primary benefit of BI is improved decision-making. BI helps SMBs to make informed decisions by providing them with the necessary data and insights. By analyzing data from various sources, such as sales, customer feedback, and market trends, SMBs can make data-driven decisions that lead to better outcomes. For instance, if an SMB is looking to expand its business, BI can help it identify the best markets to target and the products or services that are likely to perform well in those markets.

BI can help SMBs to increase their efficiency by automating repetitive tasks and reducing manual errors. With BI, businesses can automate tasks like report generation and data analysis, which saves time and reduces the likelihood of errors. By freeing up time, SMBs can focus on more critical tasks like developing new products, improving customer service, and expanding their business.

BI can help SMBs to understand their customers better and improve their experience. By analyzing customer data, SMBs can identify customer needs and preferences, which enables them to offer more personalized products and services. For instance, if an SMB analyzes customer data and identifies that most of its customers prefer a particular type of product, it can focus on producing more of that product.

BI can give SMBs a competitive advantage by providing them with insights that their competitors don't have. By analyzing data from various sources, SMBs can identify new market opportunities, develop better products, and improve their services. With this information, SMBs can stay ahead of their competitors and respond quickly to changes in the market.

BI can help SMBs to improve their financial performance by identifying areas where they can cut costs and increase revenue. By analyzing financial data, SMBs can identify areas where they are overspending and find ways to reduce costs. Additionally, by analyzing sales data, SMBs can identify products that are not performing well and focus on developing or promoting products that are more profitable.

BI can help SMBs to manage their inventory more effectively by providing real-time information on inventory levels and demand. By analyzing sales data, SMBs can identify which products are selling well and ensure that they have enough inventory to meet customer demand. By having the right inventory levels, SMBs can avoid stockouts and lost sales.

BI can help SMBs to improve their operational efficiency by providing real-time data on key performance indicators (KPIs). By tracking KPIs like sales, inventory levels, and customer satisfaction, SMBs can identify areas where they need to improve and take action to address those areas. With this information, SMBs can make continuous improvements to their operations, which leads to better outcomes and increased profitability.

Summing Up

BI is a valuable tool for SMBs that want to improve their decision-making, increase efficiency, and gain a competitive advantage. By analyzing data from various sources, SMBs can make informed decisions that lead to better outcomes, improve their operational efficiency, and improve their financial performance. With the benefits of BI, SMBs can stay ahead of their competitors, improve their customer experience, and grow their business.
Business Intelligence services extended by Beinex deliver solutions to all your business questions. At-a-glance analysis facilitated by cutting-edge BI tools does wonder to every industry. Analysing enormous and complex data couldn’t be mind-boggling for you anymore with BI tools. With Beinex, you can interact with an agile and intuitive system to validate your data, navigate your vision, and execute it in a data-driven way to tap into potent entrepreneurial potential.