Iowa Utility Using Altair's New Product
Troy-based Altair Engineering Inc. said Thursday that an Iowa utility had used one of its newest products to quickly analyze 10 years of customer care and billing data.
Altair is now reselling HiQube data analytics software from Novi-based Digital Commerce Technologies Inc.
Iowa's Cedar Falls Utilities is using HiQube to give it far deeper insight into consumer pricing, purchasing and trends across all utility service offerings.
"HiQube, with its agility in processing large data sets, versatile user interface and superior modeling capabilities, provides customers a powerful medium to harness the full potential of data analytics," said DCTI president Siva Raju. "HiQube offers speed of deployment and reduced burden of implementation and maintenance that enables customers to quickly realize ROI, gain operational efficiencies, manage risk and respond to market demands. The elegance of HiQube is in its ability to integrate seamlessly with third-party software tools on virtually any platform providing customers a rapid, cost-effective solution for their business intelligence needs."
HiQube combines three data management methodologies, hierarchical, relational and multi-dimensional, within a single unified database architecture. This enables users to perform self-directed drill-down, drill-through, and ad hoc queries as well as "what-if" analyses. As a result, users can explore a multitude of key performance indicators and create relevant and personalized reports quickly, in real time.
CFU, a provider of electricity, water, gas and cable services to more than 17,000 customers in Iowa, was looking for an efficient solution to process 56 million records from the past ten years. With HiQube, CFU was able to break down and analyze the data into 17,000 customer accounts, 110 different services, 73,600 meters/service points, 76 rate schedules and 160 routes.
"HiQube opened us up to analysis of our data at extreme levels of granularity, something we couldn't achieve within our timeframe and budget using traditional business intelligence tools," said Mark Meier, manager of information systems and meter reading at Cedar Falls Utilities. "We were able to drill down the data into months and then break down months by account, by rate schedule, by usage, by service route, by meter reader and by customer. Additionally, we incorporated rate scenarios by usage to determine the outcomes of 'what-if' scenarios and then compared the data. This gives us greater predictability and accuracy of business decisions than our current processes."
Said Altair regional marketing director Ravi Kunju: "The utilities market is under increasing pressure from government regulators to implement smart technologies for improved energy efficiency while meeting customer demand for reduced costs, and HiQube's what-if analyses and simulation helps them achieve this. Altair selected DCTI as its first reseller for HiQube in the Americas because of its expertise in the utilities market, which was proven in its success at Cedar Falls Utilities. Additionally, DCTI's extensive experience with traditional ERP applications enables them to seamlessly integrate HiQube into a customer's current IT infrastructure for superior business analytics."
For more information about HiQube's business offerings for the utilities industry, join the Altair Webinar series, which will be held on Tuesday, Dec. 14. Registration is complimentary and can be completed by visiting www.hiqube.com/utilities.
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