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Results of an Oracle Utilities survey released this morning show that electric utilities in Canada and the US are only in the early stages of putting smart meter data good use. But they could be doing a better job of using the data they are collecting. The survey was of 151 utility executives in Canada and the United States. The study, Utility Transformations - Big Data, Bigger Opportunities: Plans and Preparedness for the Data Deluge, shows that utilities on both sides of the 49th Parallel are collecting significantly more interval data from smart meters. The frequency at which they are gathering smart meter data is 180 times more than in the past - every four hours compared to once a month. And the vast majority of them are collecting information such as outage and voltage data. Linda Jackman, group VP of industry strategy for Oracle Utilities, tells Canadian Green Tech in an interview that despite the improvement on the data collection front, utilities aren't using the data as effective as they could be. She was surprised to find utilities collecting certain types of data, but then not using that data to inform business decisions. According to the results, 78% of utilities surveyed are collecting outage data with 59% of them using, meaning nearly 20% aren't correlating outage data with customer communications as an example. For voltage data, the levels are 73% and 57%, respectively. "In outage and voltage data, the fact that everybody is not collecting that data, I think is surprising. You've rolled out a smart meter and you're not collecting outage data when it has the ability to talk to you around outage data? Why am I not collecting it? But then only 60% of them are using it once they have collected it, I think is also surprising," says Jackman. "So what we're seeing is that utilities are still in this very early stage and very formative stage of collecting the data but actually don't know what [they're] going to do with

CEO Jill Brown Dean: "What this system really gives us is the precision to plan floor set by floor set, week by week to ensure that each of our big businesses and each of our key categories is appropriately positioned in the preplanning phase and then appropriately reacted to, whether it is promotions, slowing down inventory in the supply chain, moving up inventory, the whole read-and-react thing. So it's giving us a precision around these big top 30 styles, which, as you said, really when we're successful, they're half our business. And it's just giving us a tremendous level of insight and visibility that we have not had." CFO and COO James Bell: "As an organization, we have worked diligently to develop many inventory management disciplines in recent years, but we're lacking adequate tools to fully maximize our inventory investment. This past March, we completed the implementation of a new Oracle-based inventory planning system. The capabilities of this new system are significantly more robust than anything we've used in the past, providing a level of transparency that represents a meaningful opportunity for us to drive more consistent sales and margin improvement over time as we become more proficient with this new capability."...

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group said. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time."

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group said. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time."

The March 2014 edition of Campus Technology includes the following article on how universities use constituent relationship management (CRM) tools to support more organized, timely, and personalized student recruitment and retention. The article highlights Valdosta State University's use of Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition and Oracle Endeca as the user interface for data analysis. The story includes comments from an interview with Andy Clark, vice president for enrollment management, Valdosta State University, who notes that the system helps faculty and staff identify at-risk students. The article also includes comments from an interview with Brian Haugabrook, chief information officer, Valdosta State University, who notes that the university can push important resources to at-risk students through its web portal - and that the school is seeing a resulting spike in tutoring center use earlier rather than later.

The March 2014 edition of Campus Technology includes the following article on how universities use constituent relationship management (CRM) tools to support more organized, timely, and personalized student recruitment and retention. The article highlights Valdosta State University's use of Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition and Oracle Endeca as the user interface for data analysis. The story includes comments from an interview with Andy Clark, vice president for enrollment management, Valdosta State University, who notes that the system helps faculty and staff identify at-risk students. The article also includes comments from an interview with Brian Haugabrook, chief information officer, Valdosta State University, who notes that the university can push important resources to at-risk students through its web portal - and that the school is seeing a resulting spike in tutoring center use earlier rather than later.

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group said. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time.

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group said. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time.

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," said Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time."

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," said Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time."

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," said Sir Philip Green, Owner of Arcadia Group. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time."

"Our brands are committed to delivering an interactive, exciting and efficient shopping experience to all our customers around the world, no matter which channel they choose to use to visit us, from flagship stores to mobile devices," said Sir Philip Green, Owner of Arcadia Group. "Global expansion is a key strategic focus for Arcadia, and to do this successfully, we need to make sure the best merchandise assortment is available in each store and channel. We expect Oracle to help us enhance our merchandising strategies to help ensure that we deliver the best possible customer promise every time."

Mast Mobile launched today with an MVNO service that enables customers to use two numbers -- one for work and another for personal use -- on a single phone. The New York-based company uses Sprint's network and allows customers to port an existing number and get a new one, or launch service with two new numbers.

Mast Mobile launched today with an MVNO service that enables customers to use two numbers -- one for work and another for personal use -- on a single phone. The New York-based company uses Sprint's network and allows customers to port an existing number and get a new one, or launch service with two new numbers.

BJ's recently went through a major upgrade of its XBR system when it served as Oracle's beta site for XBRi, a cloud-based version that uses a front-end analytics and reporting tool called Ingenium. "The new tool has several components that have helped us," says assistant VP of asset protection Brendan Fitzgerald. "It comes with a series of canned reports that we have been able to modify to meet the needs of our business. One thing we're doing is creating subscriptions for our regional asset protection managers to review weekly, which gives them a look at their region and their clubs. We've also been able to use the available functionality of those reports to send a weekly set of reports to our clubs that they can use to investigate activity and identify cases."

"Z Gallerie, a California-based purveyor of furniture and home décor was seeing an increase in traffic to its online site and response to marketing programs. To improve conversion and basket size, Z Gallerie deployed Oracle Commerce. In August 2013, Z Gallerie went live with Oracle Commerce resulting in more relevant content, improved navigation and better ease-of-use regardless of the device customers use to access the site. The full implementation was completed quickly and sales from on-site search have dramatically increased."

"Z Gallerie, a California-based purveyor of furniture and home décor was seeing an increase in traffic to its online site and response to marketing programs. To improve conversion and basket size, Z Gallerie deployed Oracle Commerce. In August 2013, Z Gallerie went live with Oracle Commerce resulting in more relevant content, improved navigation and better ease-of-use regardless of the device customers use to access the site. The full implementation was completed quickly and sales from on-site search have dramatically increased."

Oracle Financial Services has expanded its Oracle Financial Services Enterprise Risk Management suite to include a new model risk management solution, as well as enhanced offerings for regulatory capital management and credit risk management. Oracle's Enterprise Risk Management suite, part of the Oracle Financial Services Analytical Applications family, provides a single, unified platform that helps today's financial institutions meet increasingly complex compliance requirements and performance objectives. The end-to-end platform enables financial services organizations to effectively identify and manage risk to support their risk-adjusted performance objectives, promote a proactive risk management culture and mitigate the costs of compliance. Model Risk Management To meet evolving regulatory mandates, financial institutions require a comprehensive view of risks associated with inaccurate or improperly applied financial and business models. Many firms are struggling to achieve this transparency because they continue to manage their models in siloed environments. Oracle Financial Services Model Risk Management provides a common environment to manage all risks associated with the use of models, including risks arising due to poor data quality, incorrect or inappropriate use, design flaws, incorrect implementation and unauthorized access. The solution delivers a single repository for all model information across the enterprise, includes pre-built dashboards to jump start benefits and provides drill-down capabilities for in-depth insight. This application provides a common environment to manage risks associated with the use of models including risks arising due to data quality, incorrect or inappropriate usage, design flaws, incorrect implementation and unauthorized access. The solution helps firms to improve governance around the use of models through a comprehensive, structured and consistent framework for periodic assessment and validation of models ac

"The new Oracle-based inventory planning system provides inventory visibility that simply was not possible for us in the past," said Jim Bell, executive VP and CFO/COO, Coldwater Creek, Sandpoint, Idaho. "Ultimately, this should lead to further reductions in aged inventory and allow us to increase our full-price selling, making us more productive and profitable."

The September 1 issue of Destination CRM included an article highlighting how colleges and universities are not taking full advantage of CRM technology. The article improving student experience and retaining current students as reasons for deployment, but few schools are using CRM to do this. The article includes comment from Joe Burkhart, Director of Higher Education Solutions, Oracle who notes that schools are looking at taking care of existing students - from the admissions office to financial aid to dining halls. Further, the article discusses the growing use of technologies like live chat and web self-service. Of note, the article discusses how DeVry University uses Oracle's RightNow cloud solutions to provide current and prospective students with fast, accurate answers to their questions. It includes comment from Dave Trafton, DeVry's online student service manager, who notes that Oracle RightNow has helped the school become more responsive to student needs. The article also includes comment from David Richter, U.S. Sales Director for Higher Education Service Automation, Oracle who notes that only a handful of schools currently marry student data with their CRM systems.

David Dorf, senior director of technology strategy for Oracle Retail, says the phrase "big data" first began to gain "buzz" status around five years ago. "It has come to represent the exponential growth of data and the complexity of analyzing it," he says. He starts with what has become the generic definition for big data - volume, variety and velocity. "Retailers have always dealt with big data in the sense that they handle thousands of [products], hundreds of stores and a steady stream of transactions," he says. "What's new is the variety of data. Some of it is highly formatted transactional data, but increasingly it's coming from sources such as a Twitter stream where there is natural language that's hard to understand using systems. The other thing that has changed is the velocity. Data is coming at us at a much faster pace."

David Dorf, senior director of technology strategy for Oracle Retail, says the phrase "big data" first began to gain "buzz" status around five years ago. "It has come to represent the exponential growth of data and the complexity of analyzing it," he says. He starts with what has become the generic definition for big data - volume, variety and velocity. "Retailers have always dealt with big data in the sense that they handle thousands of [products], hundreds of stores and a steady stream of transactions," he says. "What's new is the variety of data. Some of it is highly formatted transactional data, but increasingly it's coming from sources such as a Twitter stream where there is natural language that's hard to understand using systems. The other thing that has changed is the velocity. Data is coming at us at a much faster pace."

SaaS will be the norm. Pretty much all systems are already available in this format and most hotels are very comfortable using them - except for PMS. Sometimes this is for psychological reasons of personal comfort with having the data on premise; sometimes there's a genuine difficulty in obtaining reliable, cost-effective communications links. Nonetheless, I am certain this objection will fade over time. Oracle in particular has announced that it will only sell the new version 9 of Opera on a remotely hosted basis, setting the tone for the rest of the industry. Less customization. The age of expecting major PMS vendors to agree to significant enhancements for individual hotels is over. The smaller vendors will probably continue to do so, but it's not feasible for the larger ones. We don't expect Microsoft or Apple to customize their systems for us when we're ready to buy something new, we just adapt to what they offer. The same's true for Oracle, Infor and the other major PMS vendors; their systems are powerful and flexible enough to be useful in most situations. If you want something very specific you'll always be able to find a vendor who'll customize its system for you, just as you can run your own PC on Linux configured just the way you want it, but mainstream will be good enough for most.

...For Ovation Brands choosing to move the POS to the cloud was a matter of "future-proofing." The company already had experience and a comfort level with the cloud through its back-office system and was ready to move its POS above property with very specific goals in mind. "We were looking for something that had high-speed to value, lower cost of ownership and would save us from the traditional IT intensive POS implementation where you have to administer it and have a staff to support it," Benson says. "Having the POS in the cloud helps us modernize the way we conduct business."

...For Ovation Brands choosing to move the POS to the cloud was a matter of "future-proofing." The company already had experience and a comfort level with the cloud through its back-office system and was ready to move its POS above property with very specific goals in mind. "We were looking for something that had high-speed to value, lower cost of ownership and would save us from the traditional IT intensive POS implementation where you have to administer it and have a staff to support it," Benson says. "Having the POS in the cloud helps us modernize the way we conduct business."

The October 2011 edition of Business Officer includes the following article highlighting the significance and uses of business intelligence (BI) in higher education. The article notes that California State University System uses Oracle Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) to provide more functionality, change the reporting queries and improve the look of its dashboards. The article includes comment by Amir Dabirian, vice president of IT and chief information officer, California State University, Fullerton, noting that the university's goal is to enable the institution to make data-driven decisions, particularly in tough budgetary times. The article also includes comments by Theo Bosnak, director, higher education and academic medical centers, Attain LLC, noting that BI is extremely useful because the solutions can be customized and adapted to the needs of the leader or educational department.

Internet Retailer - "The Oracle Retail solution gives us a blueprint of where the assortment is going to lead us," said Robert Kim, vice president, Planning and Allocation, Forever 21. "Seeing the past performance by segment and looking at color penetration and fashion attributes is in itself a giant step forward, and the data can be sliced and diced in a way that is meaningful for our merchants. Oracle took a very complicated model and made it user-friendly. We expect to gain more insight and deliver an even better product assortment for our customers as we expand our use of the Oracle Retail solution."

The July 2014 edition of University Business includes the following article highlighting that many universities are beginning to implement electronic transcript capabilities to decrease costs and serve students more quickly. The article notes that Arizona State University is using e-transcript data for its Transfer Admission Guarantee program and uses Oracle's PeopleSoft, its student information system, to send automatic updates to community college students each semester to track progress toward an ASU degree.

The July 2014 edition of University Business includes the following article highlighting that many universities are beginning to implement electronic transcript capabilities to decrease costs and serve students more quickly. The article notes that Arizona State University is using e-transcript data for its Transfer Admission Guarantee program and uses Oracle's PeopleSoft, its student information system, to send automatic updates to community college students each semester to track progress toward an ASU degree.