In-memory analytics allows organisations to look at information in real-time instead of looking at information that is a day or a week old.
So says Santina Franchi, vice-president for database and technology at SAP, EMEA, who notes that being able to look at up-to-date information and make decisions based on real-time information not only changes business operations, but allows an organisation to redefine its approach to the market.
Citing recent research by the Keller Fay Group, Franchi says about 2.4 billion brand-related conversations happen online every day; 59% of consumers comment about brands online; 79% of digitally connected customers spend at least 50% of total shopping time researching products online; and 53% of socially networked customers abandoned an in-store purchase due to negative online sentiment.
"Internet and mobile have changed the way consumers expect to be served ? with instantaneous responses to their needs," says Franchi. "The business needs the ability to respond proactively to the demand.
"Mobile technology has created an environment where we can have information at our fingertips. This should be no different for businesses, their users and their customers," she adds.
Looking at yesterday's sales data is not so interesting, but looking at sales data as it is right now can be achieved with the real-time capabilities in-memory can provide, she explains.
According to Franchi, data is doubling every 18 months; however, volume is not the only challenge organisations are faced with.
Data also comes in various shapes and formats, for example, structured and unstructured, social data, sensor data, etc, she points out, adding the challenges are linked to the volume, variety, velocity, veracity of the data, and most of all on how to extract value out of it, how to monetise all that data.
It is important to have an infrastructure able to provide a level of intelligence linked to business value, which can make organisations evolve from the hindsight (what happened?), to the insight (why did it happen?), to the foresight (what will happen?), to the full value (how can we make it happen?), she explains.
Franchi states the big data platform from SAP powered by SAP High-Performance Analytic Appliance (HANA) has been built to address those challenges.
"It uses in-memory, but not only that, it is based on a complete redesign of an IT platform that allows the shift to a data-driven infrastructure that reduces the data footprint, and provides higher throughput and full flexibility."
For instance, she explains, providing dynamic, on-the-fly aggregation enables analysis and simulation of organisational changes, and impact analysis is immediately available.
"HANA is making the world of IT massively simpler. Our customers can run simpler, achieving huge business benefits. HANA provides simplification on three levels - technology, infrastructure and business."
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