Business Intelligence for SMEs

SOURCE:  PhilStar.com

Countries in the Southeast Asian region have huge communities of small to medium scale enterprises (SMEs), many of whom employ thousands of workers and contribute to their GDP. In fact, most Southeast Asian countries have more SMEs as registered businesses than large enterprises. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) puts the number of SMEs at 96 percent of all enterprises and employing up to 85 percent of overall workforce. SMEs also account for up to 30 percent of exports and contribute around 50 percent of GDP.

But despite their huge numbers and contribution to their respective country’s GDP, SMEs have yet to largely tap information technology (IT) to improve their business. Apart from just using computers to improve operations, businesses can use IT to forecast and even drive growth. Old data that businesses store can be just as valuable in the future as they were in the past. This is the value that business intelligence offers.

Business intelligence or BI refers to an IT-based process of collecting, analyzing and forecasting company performance based on past, raw data. This must come with the collection of all raw data and analyzing these to come up with effective and strategic planning and decision-making. Companies that have sales data, for instance, can collect past reports, factor in their performance for certain seasons, and come up with strategic campaigns. The data they collect in the past should guide them in their future needs.

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