iOM BI released in record-time based on agile software development

Subsequent to last month’s announcement in Singapore, iOM Lanka showcased iOM Business Intelligence (iOM BI), a new addition to its range of flagship software solutions.

iOM BI is designed to provide organisations, particularly small and medium enterprises (SMEs), with cost-effective business analytics to give historical, current and predictive views of business operations for strategic planning and informed decision making.

According to AMI-Partners (a leader in Global SMB IT Actionable Market Intelligence), SMEs in the Asia-Pacific region are expected to continue boosting their focus on scalable public cloud applications with investment close to US$ 1.5 billion in Software-as-a-Service (Saas) solutions.

iOM BI which can be run as a cloud-based application is looking to address this growth market.

“An on-demand business analytics system such as iOM BI offers SMEs both flexibility and scalability as they grow their business,” iOM Vice President John Salmon said.

Salmon went on to say that “Users can easily set up their own reports for analysis without requiring technical assistance.

“As a web-based application, iOM BI can also be accessed via hand-held devices such as tablets and smartphones.”

It analyses patterns and trends to assist organisations in decision making. Functionalities include: Analysing sales trends, tracking customer buying habits, managing finances, evaluating sales and marketing campaign effectiveness, predicting market demand, analysing vendor relationships, as well as assessing staffing needs and performances.

These functionalities provide a single source (Data Cube) through which to analyse an enterprise’s information from multiple databases (such as MS SQL, IBM DB2, Oracle) through Data Mining, Warehousing, and Extraction using iOM BI.

The resulting single source offers not only historical but also current views of operations, based on scheduled updates of the Data Cube.

Furthermore, iOM EZ Reports is designed to enable users to set up their own reports on a self-service basis without the need for technical assistance.

Once the Data Cube has been designed and the various data sources linked with the scheduled updates through iOM BI, EZ Reports allows the user to ‘drag-and-drop’ different data elements and create their own reports inclusive of graphical analysis.

The reports also have drill down capability enabling information to be analysed down to transaction level.

Salmon commended the Sri Lankan Development Centre for the speed and agility it showed delivering the product ahead of schedule.  Although iOM BI is marketed internationally and hence R&D focused on regional requirements, it was developed at its Sri Lankan Development Centre using cutting-edge Microsoft Technologies.

The most striking aspect of the development process has been the deployment of Agile software development methodology.

Agile software development is a group of software development methods based on iterative and incremental development, where requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organising, cross-functional teams.

It promotes adaptive planning, evolutionary development and delivery, a time-boxed iterative approach, and encourages rapid and flexible response to change. This focuses on key areas such as customer satisfaction by rapid delivery of useful software, welcome changing requirements, even late in development, and the delivery of working software frequently (weeks rather than months), through the use of self-organising teams.

iOM Lanka is a subsidiary of Singapore based iOM Holdings. iOM (formerly known as EDS) also carries out operations in Malaysia, Dubai and the Philippines with its Development and Support Centre in Colombo.

Since its inception in 1979, iOM have implemented over 500 systems with more than 2,000 modules.

iOMs industry expertise includes manufacturing, retail, distribution, oil and gas, and construction.