LANDMARK BUSINESS ALLIANCE BRINGS TOGETHER WORLD'S LEADING
DATA WAREHOUSE MINDS; CLIENTS WILL HAVE ACCESS TO INDUSTRY'S
MOST COMPREHENSIVE BI RESOURCE, KNOWLEDGE BASE
A landmark business intelligence alliance, uniting seven of the world's leading data warehouse and business intelligence experts, has been formed to fulfill clients' needs for education, consulting, mentoring, on-site resource expertise, and project management.
The BI Alliance (BIA), officially launched at the DCI Data Warehouse Summit March 11 in Atlanta, provides clients with a portal to the products, services and resources of the world's leading BI experts and their firms. The combined data warehousing savvy, knowledge and experience of the BIA's members provides clients with access to an unparalleled business-intelligence resource base. For the first time, in one place, companies can draw upon the knowledge and experience of the masters of data mining, data quality, architecture and design, project management, data warehouse system life cycle services, human infrastructure, enterprise data warehouse systems and incremental architected data marts.
The BIA enables companies to increase their effectiveness and competitive advantage by applying sound principles of managing and exploiting their information, people, and IT resources, transforming them in to true business intelligence.
The alliance has already begun providing its services to Allegheny Power, Western Health Advantage, and RPS. "I have found the members of the alliance to be down-to-earth, highly experienced professionals, with real-world experience, capable of succinctly developing a project, keeping project teams on track and providing valuable mentoring and project management skills," said Jeff McBain of RPS. "Their ability to assist clients in getting a project going quickly and to provide all of the resources and experience these projects demand are of significant value to those of us who are tasked with delivering a viable, sustainable and successful outcome."
"When clients sign on with any one of our members, they are immediately privy to a comprehensive network of business-intelligence professionals," said Doug Hackney, one of the alliance's founding members. "And, because we each have varying skill sets, clients will be able to call upon the strongest skill set of each alliance member."
The services offering of the BIA includes: assessments; reality checks; data warehouse requirements; mentoring of project managers; project planning; individual and team roles and responsibilities; data mining; data quality; meta data strategy; logical modeling; project plans; methodology; design review; turn-key enterprise data warehouses; closed loop decision support; ERP/CRM-to-data warehouse integration systems; fast-track, turn-key architected data marts; expert guidance; tool evaluation assistance; education of business executives and teams; current market-priced salaries and incentives, team recruitment and retention strategies; and consultation on organizational and cultural issues.
Founding members of the BIA are Sid Adelman, Sid Adelman & Associates; J.D. Welch, DataWing Consulting Services, LLC; Herb Edelstein, Two Crows Corporation; Larry English, Information Impact, International, Inc.; David Foote, Cromwell Foote Partners LLC; Douglas Hackney, Enterprise Group, Ltd.; and Neil Raden of Archer Decision Sciences, Inc.
Hackney also explained that the alliance's creation is a hedge against what many believe are tighter times ahead in the data warehousing industry. As a marketing, sales and resource-sharing entity, the alliance benefits its members by "expanding market exposure of, generating sales opportunities for, and providing a context for resource sharing among, the BIA partners."
"The BIA offers its members joint marketing and leverages sales opportunities in a rapidly evolving, consolidating and commoditizing market," said Hackney. "It creates a synergy for us that is essential for business survival."
More information about the BIA is available by phone, at 888.BIA.6899, and on the Web, at http://bialliance.com. The Web site will include a variety of resources, including white papers, articles, and presentations from participating partners.