diagnostics

Comments on Article- “Predictive Analytics Showing the Shape of Things to Come”- The Australian June 25, 2013

The Australian newspaper had an interesting article on June 25, 2013 (http://tinyurl.com/mtah9ju) describing a number of successful predictive analytics applications, but also making the point that market penetration has been slow noting “… despite the numerous uses of predictive analytics, uptake is limited. According to Gartner, only 13 per cent of organisations report extensive use, while fewer than 3 per cent use prescriptive capabilities such as decision/mathematical modelling, simulation and optimisation market”. I posted brief summary comments today in response to the article and am pleased to share a complete copy of my comments:

Excellent article and clearly summarizes the challenges we face in educating management on how PA solutions can help companies improve performance and mitigate risk. I am pleased to share the following 3 observations. My comments are based on my position as former CEO of InferX Corporation, a publicly traded predictive analytics company, and serving as adjunct professor teaching MBA strategy courses in the RH Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland.

No. 1   Analytics complements ‘traditional management’

Define your mission; assess external environment and competition using PEST, Porter’s 5 Forces model, other tools; assess internal resources and capabilities; develop detailed value chain analysis; analyze product life cycles; develop cost leader/differentiation global strategies based on product, market, competition and other factors. Analytics can make a major contribution throughout the ‘traditional’ management process. Yet market analysis shows about 85% of the total PA market today addresses the CRM sector. We need to view PA within the context of traditional management rather than a separate ‘big data/analytics’ sector. Integrating PA into traditional management processes is a challenge and the real opportunity with high upside

No. 2   Analytics costs more

True. When the e-commerce revolution emerged years ago, we had major push back from companies who preferred to continue to process orders manually, work with suppliers using ad hoc systems, and avoid ‘costly’ new systems implementation and industry standards. Systems costs did increase, but we created process and performance efficiencies that improved profitability and reduced risk. Today’s analytics solutions demand understanding ROI (and how to measure) and clearly communicating this message.

No. 3    “Analytics Drives Strategy and Strategy Drives Analytics”

Properly executed and integrated into a company’s management processes, I see great opportunity to use analytics to drive strategy, particularly in shaping new product and market innovations to increase ROI. Look at Capital One, an analytics driven competitor reportedly doing 300+ analytic scenarios daily to optimize financial offerings. Or Progressive, capturing motorcycle rider clients using analytics to define a segment with both claims and expense ratios providing strong returns. Amazon, Netflix and many others are using analytics to drive ‘micro-marketing segmentation’ which is where we are heading. And these new strategies create new analytics, enabling analytics- savvy companies such as Amazon to continue to excel.

Clearly all ‘analytics solutions’ providers, a term I prefer to emphasize PA’s broader role, have a challenge ahead- to educate clients, particularly at the ‘C’ level, on the opportunities embracing these solutions and the challenges they will face if they do not. Exciting times lie ahead in the global analytics solutions business for both solutions providers and all companies in all sectors.

Paul B. Silverman

 

Paul B. Silverman writes about entrepreneurship, healthcare, analytics, and strategy management and serves as Advisor, Speaker, Educator, and Managing Partner of the Gemini Business Group, LLC, a new venture development firm, and author of “8 Building Blocks To Launch, Manage, And Grow A Successful Business.” He also serves as Adjunct Professor in the School of Business at George Mason University. See more at Paul B. Silverman Blog and sign up for Entrepreneurship Today! email updates to track latest new venture developments.

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Next Gen Ad Analytics:’Finding the Significant Few Among the Trivial Many’

The online advertising market is estimated at more than $30 billion in 2011  growing at 22 percent annually based on Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) statistics. What we are seeing is explosive growth of predictive-analytics based tools and applications to drive the creation of new targeted ad services.

Look over today’s announcement  http://tinyurl.com/7tmmvsp that predictive analytics firm eBureau is spinning off its online advertising targeting business into a new company called TruSignal(TM) offering targeted advertising using proprietary predictive analytics and other tools.

All companies are interested in finding what we call the ‘significant few among the trivial many’ – I foresee many exciting developments and issues emerging here as we pursue this goal:

  • Expect other online advertising companies to create separate, specialized analytics driven service entities – analytics technology is driving this trend, is highly specialized, and this is moving very quickly
  • Different skills sets are needed as ad business moves to even more advanced analytics and visualization technologies- think of the implications for the online advertising sector looking for creative and ‘analytics-savvy’ candidates – new skill sets are needed now to secure and retain industry leadership
  • Expect to see more analytics spin-offs in other sectors- the same model is occurring in the health care, financial services and others

Always important to look at how major companies respond to these changes (think response of Barnes & Noble vs Borders to the e-book revolution). How does a major ad firm, well entrenched in traditional print, TV, radio media, address these new trends- most are obviously committed to the social media revolution but new predictive analytics tools are changing the rules of the game, helping ‘find the significant few among the trivial many’ in ways not possible today.

As these services accelerate, and they will, I expect to see major firms ramp up internal efforts to develop competitive analytics services organically. These powerful services are evolving very quickly and I expect to see major industry leaders seeking alliances with creative innovation leaders in the predictive analytics market.

 

Paul B. Silverman is a Lecturer in the Robert H. Smith School of Business in the University of Maryland. He also serves as CEO of Sante Corporation, an early stage personal health care management company, and Managing Partner of Gemini Business Group, a new venture development and advisory services firm. He can be reached at paul@paulbsilverman.com or via Twitter at @globalbizmentor

 

Paul B. Silverman writes about entrepreneurship, healthcare, analytics, and strategy management and serves as Advisor, Speaker, Educator, and Managing Partner of the Gemini Business Group, LLC, a new venture development firm, and author of “8 Building Blocks To Launch, Manage, And Grow A Successful Business.” He also serves as Adjunct Professor in the School of Business at George Mason University. See more at Paul B. Silverman Blog and sign up for Entrepreneurship Today! email updates to track latest new venture developments.

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Understanding ‘Unknown- Unknown’ Information Drivers Addresses ‘Sea of Data’ Issues and Creates Opportunities

Understanding The ‘Unknown- Unknown’ Information Drivers Addresses ‘Sea of Data’ Issues and Creates Opportunities

I posted comments on Fast Company article discussing ‘Sea of Data’ issues Fast Company Article “Avoiding Short-Term Thinking In A World of Big Data”   http://tinyurl.com/7gaepbl

I shared my vision that predictive analytics is ‘raising the bar’ in how we manage the ‘sea of data’,  and offered comments on new directions I see in manufacturing and health care. Here is a copy of my comments posted on the Fast Company site:

The article makes the point that “…in a sea of data, how can we make sure that we’re not just reacting to the information in front of our face, but rather analyzing every possible input.”

One solution to the problem, not mentioned in the article, is the need to develop new analytics to identify key drivers which create the data ‘outcomes’. Predictive analytics enable us to identify these ‘unknown-unknown’ drivers that can only be found by analyzing data, looking for relationships and new rules that emerge developed by analyzing the data. Contrast this to today’s ‘deductive’ approach using expert opinion and well-defined rules.

This ‘data-driven’ analysis to create new rules is an inductive (rather than deductive ‘expert opinion’ based approach) and from my perspective holds great promise to radically change current business processes, improve productivity and improve our quality of life.

This may sound bold, but as the former CEO of an early stage predictive analytics company and also looking at new opportunities in analytics, I see exciting potential here.

Some possibilities:

Look at manufacturing. If a “supplier’s supplier” has a problem, supply chain management ensures quick notification, before it impacts the assembly line. Predictive analytics engines ‘raise the bar’ here by analyzing historical performance and risk data, often real time, defining future risk and performance drivers, and enabling management to optimize performance and mitigate risk.

Going beyond traditional data mining, these new predictive analytics tools analyze industry reports, government filings, trade press, and other sources to assess supplier “health,” pending regulations, and other “unstructured” data sources. Seamlessly integrating with other data, we can use these to more accurately gauge supplier and production line risk and improve performance.Driving new rules,  providing real time early warning signs that impact future supplier and business performance are the new management tools to harness ‘the sea of data’.

Look at health care, my primary focus, where PA techniques hold great promise to help our current health care system. Consider the benefits of these new capabilities which are only a small sample of what lies ahead here:

•    Tracking  Medical Diagnoses, Treatments, Medications, Outcomes, Costs,Reimbursements, and Relationships

ICD or International Classification of Disease Codes , classifies diseases on health records.CPT or Current Procedural Terminology codes developed by the AMA describe services provided by medical practitioners. Medicare employs a similar system, using ‘HCPCS’. Tracking and examining relationships among these metrics, looking at patient data, identifying processes, and key cost and patient health drivers, you can develop ‘best practices’ to improve the health
care process.

•    Identifying Adverse Drug Analyses – assessing underlying drivers to more effectively identify “at risk” patients

•    Optimizing clinical trials (candidate selection and monitoring) – predicting higher risk clinical trial candidates and assessing the key risk drivers

•    Developing directional indicators to predict the underlying drivers for treatment of chronic disease to understand how medication protocols impact treatment plans and patient outcomes

The new predictive analytic-based tools now emerging in all sectors are helping companies cope with the sea of data problem, and  “raising the bar” in how leading firms optimize business performance in today’s  dynamic global markets.

Paul B. Silverman

Paul B. Silverman writes about entrepreneurship, healthcare, analytics, and strategy management and serves as Advisor, Speaker, Educator, and Managing Partner of the Gemini Business Group, LLC, a new venture development firm, and author of “8 Building Blocks To Launch, Manage, And Grow A Successful Business.” He also serves as Adjunct Professor in the School of Business at George Mason University. See more at Paul B. Silverman Blog and sign up for Entrepreneurship Today! email updates to track latest new venture developments.

Email:      paul@paulbsilverman.com
blogs:       http://paulbsilverman.com/blog/
Linked in:  Paul Silverman
Twitter:     globalbizmentor

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Entrepreneurship in the Health Care Sector and Syndicated National Radio Interview – Entrepreneurship- New Directions

Upcoming – TV Interview :Entrepreneurship in the Health Care Sector and Syndicated National Radio Interview: Entrepreneurship- New Directions

I have agreed to do a one hour TV interview on entrepreneurship in the health care sector. The interview will be scheduled for early January and follows my recent live TV interview discussing entrepreneurship on the weekly Upside Business Show on November 21st- the program was well received – copy of broadcast now available at http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/18671440 (click on Nov.21st show if needed)

While we see enormous challenges in today’s health care market, positive developments are emerging. One perspective, which I shared in my recent book ( Amazon at http://tinyurl.com/84texaf), is the pharmaceutical market includes two primary sectors—therapeutics (i.e., drugs) and diagnostics. Therapeutics is the pharmaceutical firms’ traditional business, reported to be about a $400 to $450 billion market.

Compare that to the diagnostics business, which includes several hundred companies, including many early stage entrepreneurial companies. Revenue estimates vary, but total diagnostic sector revenues are estimated at less than $30 billion, or less than 10 percent of a major pharmas traditional business. But diagnostics reduces health care costs and improves patient care, and many exciting developments are emerging providing the tools needed to improve early disease detection and wellness. Most important, we see entrepreneurial firms creating real excitement here. In the upcoming interview, I will share my vision on new directions I foresee and also invite one or more industry representatives to also share their insights.

I also accepted an invitation for an interview on a nationally syndicated NYC radio show to discuss new entrepreneurship directions and policies.

Stay tuned for dates and times – schedules to be firmed up shortly.

 

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