Map Intelligence Helps Bell Canada Business Markets Improve Cost Control

Attain Insight delivers streamlined reporting and greater visibility of business network costs through IBM Cognos BI software and Integeo mapping software.

Bell is Canada’s leading provider of information and commu-nications technology solutions. Bell delivers innovative technology platforms, coupled with unparalleled connectivity to address the business communications needs of governments and commercial enterprises alike. With a business sophistication that is unmatched in the industry, Bell designs, builds and operates the critical infra-structures that power many of the largest networked organizations in Canada and around the world.

Challenges Faced

In an increasingly competitive telecommunications marketplace, Bell has remained a leader by helping their enterprise clients unleash the full potential of their network through solutions that employ a convergence of technologies. And with a large number of clients dispersed across a vast geography, a range of incumbent local exchange carriers to deal with, and a wide array of solution details to track, the information Bell maintains on their business clients is extremely complex.

Bell’s Cost Management team within its Business Markets division is responsible for the mammoth task of fi nding ways to reduce the cost of goods sold in this multifaceted business environment.

“Our job is to fi nd ways to reduce costs, as they directly impact our EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) targets,” said Dan Robinson, Associate Director, Bell Business Markets.

The Business Markets Cost Management team is dedicated to looking at costs involved providing national network service to top tier clients in government, banking, health care, law enforcement and more. The services they manage for clients include legacy voice service, IP telephone service, data and security. In order to identify where costs can be reduced, they need to look across all the services, third party costs and networks, taking into account

OVERVIEW

ChallengeThe Bell Business Markets team, in their ongoing effort to reduce costs and meet EBITDA targets, needed a solution that would enable them to graphically represent and better understand the geographical impacts on network costs for their top business clients.

Why Attain Insight?The IBM account manager for Bell Canada brought in Attain Insight because of their experience in successfully implementing IBM Cognos software solutions to solve complex issues for large enterprises like Bell Canada.

The Solution Attain Insight delivered a solution that included IBM Cognos Data Manager to improve the quality and accessibility of Bell’s data mart, IBM Cognos 8 BI with a Web client to streamline reporting and analytics, and a graphical display of cost information through Integeo Map Intelligence software. Together these solutions provide the data access, reporting and visual representation needed to help Bell Canada Business Markets identify new ways to lower costs, while continuing to deliver excellent service to their business clients.

Key Benefi tsBell Canada experienced a range of benefi ts including expanded analytics capabilities that include Web-based user self service, faster response time to requests for new reports, and mapping of account details including network, circuit and cost information. These capabilities will enable Bell to identify millions of dollars in cost savings in a very short period of time.

ATTAIN INSIGHT CASE STUDY BELL CANADA

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multiple factors to determine the best actions to take. For example, they may see a need to negotiate lower costs with a third party vendor or incumbent local exchange carrier, or look at alternative technologies to deliver service to clients. Geography is an important factor in costing, as proximity to a switching center or call center could have a signifi cant impact.

Robinson and his team knew they had a wealth of information between their existing data mining system, along with other data sources from across the Business Markets organization. The problem was getting a complete picture of where their highest expenditures were, and where there were opportunities to save. They needed timely and comprehensive reporting to analyze and address areas of high cost.

Robinson’s team regularly delivers cost reports to a number of groups within their division including sales, fi nance, marketing, and a client delivery team who are focused on profi t and loss objectives for particular groups of customers. Every time these groups needed a report, the Cost Management team had to use a manual process that could often take weeks to produce the result they wanted, according to Robinson. “And if there was a change to a report request, making that change and generating a new report could take an additional day or two.”

In early 2010, the team working on reports had recently been reduced from two to just one. Demand for timely and accurate reports was increasing. And although there was valuable information in their existing database, it was diffi cult to access and to maintain. There were thousands of lines of undocumented and manually operated SQL scripts, which lengthened an already cumbersome reporting process. These challenges, coupled with some requirements for more sophistication in the system, meant was time to replace their old data base and reporting solution.

Strategy Followed

Because Bell’s Business Markets Cost Management team was already using IBM Cognos software for reporting and they were comfortable with it, they approached IBM to update their IBM Cognos BI solution. “The IBM Cognos software was doing what we needed it to do, we just wanted it to do it better,” said Robinson.

Bell also asked IBM to look at their requirements and help with the implementation of a new system that would include a new data mart, an upgrade of their IBM Cognos BI software, a Web client for self service and, if possible, a mapping component.

IBM immediately brought in Attain Insight to address Bell’s requirements and to produce a proof of concept demo to show how they could make much better use of information they had. When Attain Insight was engaged, they began meeting with Bell to discuss how to overhaul the system to make it more manageable.

After gathering requirements, Attain would provide a demo of how Bell could streamline reporting with IBM Cognos 8 BI and view information in a completely new way using integrated mapping for IBM Cognos software.

“� e dividends will be paying o� as we gain a better understanding our costs. � is solution has the potential to identify millions of dollars of cost saving opportunities in a short timeframe.”

— Dan Robinson, Associate Director,

Bell Business Markets

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A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Robinson admits that the mapping component was a nice-to-have item on their requirements list, but when they saw a demonstration of the Integeo Map Intelligence product, they could see the how mapping could deliver even more value than they initially thought.

According to Robninson, “Attain Insight demonstrated the power of what the Integeo product could do. You can graph this information all you want, but a picture is worth a thousand words. With this mapping component, you could see details of each channel and circuit, and go right down to street level with Google maps. This impressed our team and our stakeholders.”

 

 

The Integeo technology integrates with IBM Cognos software to layer cost data onto maps. This lets users see exactly where costs are being incurred. The legend on this screen shows how areas of lower and higher costs are represented on the map, while the charts provide a more detailed cost breakdown.

The solution allows Bell Business Markets to drill into street view images

loaded from Google Earth. This gives users a visual image of the

geographies in question as they analyze cost data.

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Data Complexity Solved

Once Bell’s senior management approved the project, Attain began working with the database, not a small task with 20,000 lines of script to deal with. They integrated data from other sources including fi nancial information from SAP, billing data, order data and vendor invoice data. As they created the data mart and installed and integrated the IBM Cognos and Integeo software, they ensured that key information impacting network costs could be easily incorporated in reports and displayed on maps, including: time, market/sales channel, customer, product, vendor, geographic location and circuit attributes.

Attain Insight was up against some initial technical challenges due to the complexity of the database, a tight timeline, and a set of very high expectations from Bell. They began to work on the project in the fall of 2010, and told Bell they would have it ready to roll out by February 2011.

“They said they would have it ready in February. And they gave us a fi nal demo in mid-February, with the solution in production by the end of February,” said Robinson. “So we were very pleased that they were able to meet the delivery date.”

Bell purchased 20 software licenses. Although they are currently using only six of these, they fully expect to use all 20 licenses within the fi rst month. And because of the early positive response to the new solution, Robinson said, they may soon have to expand beyond the fi rst 20 licenses.

Network Costand Footprint

Analytics

Time

Market/SalesChannel

Customer

Product

Vendor

GeographicLocation

Circuit Attributes

Integeo

Map Server

Anylanguage

Anyformat

Anymode

Anylocation

IBMCognos

GoogleMaps

Commonconsistent

view oftrusted data

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The Result

With the solution in production, Bell Business Markets can now produce a report in minutes instead of weeks. And once they defi ne a report, users can log into the Web client and get the information they need. Users can even run various what-if scenarios to determine the best possible decision for reducing costs on a network.

“Our users can now run different scenarios to help determine the best strategy to follow. For example, they can model different network options based on different investments to determine how to reduce transport costs. Transport costs are the highest, so if you can model the lower cost alternatives for transport, you can have a better understanding before making a large investment,” stated Robinson.

In addition, the Business Markets presales teams working on RFPs can use it to model various solutions and propose lower cost alternatives to potential customers.

Robinson is excited about the opportunities presented by the addition of mapping to their analytics solution. “This will open up different avenues for various groups look at their costs. And when they see the mapping piece they have a better understanding of where cost are incurred. It will open up discussion with other groups, so they can explore more creative ways of reducing costs. The dividends will be paying off as we gain a better understanding our costs. This solution has the potential to identify millions of dollars of cost saving opportunities in a short timeframe.”

One of the users served by the Cost Management team often questioned why the costs were so high for a particular customer. “Now we can show him where the circuits are on a map, and based on the remote geography of this client, we can show him why his costs are higher than in a larger center,” added Robinson.

Robinson said that working with Attain Insight was like working with an extension of his internal team. From the beginning, they explained the solution in a way that everyone could understand, making it easier for Robinson to obtain the support he needed to move the project forward. And as they worked alongside the Bell Canada team, Attain demonstrated a high level of professionalism and commitment.

“The Attain Insight experience has been very positive. Paul and his team have been very dedicated. They gave us a timeline and they stuck to it,” he said.

Next Steps

Attain Insight is providing knowledge transfer to Bell Canada users through instructor-led online training. This will allow them to be self suffi cient as they begin to generate reports, model scenarios and use the mapping capability. And with the addition of embedded training vignettes within the Web tool, users will be able to refresh their knowledge as needed.

Robinson is hopeful that the new analytics and mapping solution will take off beyond its current application. “Later we will be able to serve more groups by layering on margins and revenues. So in the future we hope to add those components.”

“� e Attain Insight experience has been very positive. Paul and his team have been very dedicated. � ey gave us a timeline and they stuck to it.”

— Dan Robinson, Associate Director,

Bell Business Markets

About Attain InsightAttain Insight is an Ottawa, Canada-based Advanced IBM Business Partner specializing in the implementation of Business Analytics (BA) and Performance Management (PM) solutions for government and private sector clients. Attain Insight is the preferred reseller of IBM Cognos software in Canada’s Capital region, and is one of Canada’s top two service providers for IBM Cognos software.

Attain Insight helps clients obtain the highest possible ROI through the delivery of end-to-end IBM Cognos software projects – from planning to implementation to training. They specialize in fi xed price contracts and offer highly-specialized business and technical expertise related to IBM Cognos software. With their strong network of partners, Attain Insight is known for integrating high-value complementary technologies from a number of third-party IBM-certifi ed vendors.

About IBM Business AnalyticsMore than 1,000 fi nancial services institutions worldwide, including seven of the top 10 insurance companies in the United States, use IBM Business Intelligence and Performance Management to build a platform for market growth and operational excellence.

IBM Business Analytics solutions deliver world-leading enterprise planning, consolidation and BI software, support and services to help companies plan, understand and manage fi nancial and operational performance. IBM Business Analytics solutions bring together technology, analytical applications, best practices, and a broad network of partners to give customers an open, adaptive and complete performance solution. Over 23,000 customers in more than 135 countries around the world choose IBM Business Analytics solutions.

About IntegeoIntegeo is a global leader in the converging fi elds of Business and Location Intelligence with its Map Intelligence ‘spatial hub’ bringing mapping visualizations and analytical capabilities to a diverse range of customers who cover all levels of government (Federal, State and local), banking and insurance, transport, police and emergency management and retail.

Attain Insight Solutions Inc.2-2026 Lanthier Dr. • Suite 202, Ottawa, ON • K4A 0N6 Canada

Phone: +1 613.235.0200 • Fax: +1 888.415.8001Info@AttainInsight.com • www.attaininsight.com