This week I attended the inaugural Insurance and Finance SAS User Group conference at the SAS Headquarters in Cary, NC. The two-day conference was well attended by 80 members of our insurance and financial services customer community, and attendees were treated to a variety of presentations focused on these industry
"Bad data does exist," says Sunil Gupta, SAS author and Global Corporate Trainer, Gupta Programming. Gupta is an expert in the pharmaceutical and medical device industry, but he volunteered this week to speak to an audience of SAS users in the insurance and financial services industries about minimizing the impact and
In most of the articles and press pieces that speak of health care fraud, the topic is usually covered in broad terms regarding the type or activity that has taken place: over-billing to Medicare/Medicaid, services billed and not delivered, over subscription of medication (by members or Pharmacies), and the list
Managing the deluge of smart grid data. Responding to the increased demand for customer intelligence. Implementing analytics for grid optimization. These were just a few of the topics covered at this week’s inaugural “Utility Analytics Summit.” Utilities have been grappling with implementation of smart grid devices for several years and
Are you a SAS professional working in the insurance or financial services industry? Are you looking for a place where you can talk with others who work in the those industries? Would you like to get together and network, face-to-face, or share ideas and best practices for using SAS? There is now a SAS Users Group just for you;
During one week in December, two separate transportation agencies within the federal government made two major announcements. First, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) – the government agency responsible for guiding traffic safety initiatives on the nation’s highways announced that crash fatalities had declined to record low rates. Just
~Contributed by Rex Pruitt, IFSUG Chairman One of the newest SAS users groups has settled on a date, time and place for its first formal get-together. IFSUG (Insurance & Finance SAS Users Group) will meet March 4-6 in the new SAS Executive Briefing Center in Cary, NC. The IFSUG Summit will
Sometimes you can't forecast worth a darn because something is just not forecastable. Being "unforecastable" doesn't mean you can't create a forecast, because you can always create a forecast. It just means there is so much instability or randomness in your demand patterns that even sophisticated forecasting methods don't help
This is a question I am often asked: What skills do I need to become a good analyst or data miner? In order to become good data mining practitioner one needs to understand statistical concepts and basic principles of knowledge induction. Knowing inferential stats, t-tests, analysis of variance, regressions, and
Not long ago, one of my colleagues wrote a blog post entitled, How to wake up dormant customers, which discusses the challenges in being customer centric – where you want to treat all customers well, and your best customers better. It made me think about the key tenet of Six Sigma
When discussing fraud and abuse, it often (very often) becomes a philosophical discussion of whether aberrant activities are fraudulent or abusive. The quick difference being that fraudulent is intentional and abuse is not. The distinction quickly becomes an issue of legal and illegal as opposed to right and wrong. What
We'll interrupt the series on Why Forecasts are Wrong, with a report from the inaugural Analytics 2011 conference, held last week in Orlando. A2011 drew over 1025 attendees (from 44 states and over 25 counties). The Analytics conference series features a wide range of topics (including forecasting, optimization, data mining, text
In 27 years at SAS, Keith Collins says his whole career has been about scaling to the enterprise. He wonders, "Why now do we call it big data? What will the next generation call it? Bigger data?" Keith led a panel of business leaders at the Premier Business Leadership Series
The Premier Business Leadership Series in Orlando was the backdrop for a number of news announcements from SAS. Here's a rundown: 1. Big Data research A new survey has found that organizations with formal data management strategies derive more value from data assets and outperform competitors. The survey, Big Data:
Tomorrow I was going to go visit one of our insurance clients. I was really looking forward to the meeting – a chance to share experiences with a strategic analytic team. Unfortunately, I got an e-mail from the team’s administrative assistant: “I’m sorry, but so-and-so needs to cancel. An important
New for this year's Annual Terrorism Financing and Money Laundering Forum, the afternoon sessions were divided into two tracks, anti-money laundering (AML) and fraud, each featuring a topical presentation and a panel discussion. During the AML panel discussion on emerging trends, representatives from several US law enforcement agencies and the
I’ve been hanging out in Canada again, eh? Just last week, I snuck over the border to meet with some of our insurance customers in the Greater Toronto Area (affectionately known as “GTA”). This was my fifth trip this year and I’m pleased to say that not only have I
I recently attended the Medicaid Management Information System (MMIS) Conference in Austin, Texas. The MMIS conference is an annual event for federal and state HHS agencies to share programmatic and technology initiatives in Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Programs (CHIP). While I have attended numerous MMIS conferences in the past, I
Bengt Persson, the Senior Vice President of Quality and Tech Support, presented a session about driving quality across the globe during the 2011 Premier Business Leadership Series in Singapore. Persson told the story of how Volvo Trucks uses analytics and data flow to standardize and optimize warranty claims across Volvo’s
The SAS office in New York City has one of the best views in the city. Sitting on the 47th floor of a skyscraper on 7th Avenue, the Executive Briefing Room overlooks Central Park and it has a highly distracting view – especially on such a nice sunny day. What
As editor of the SAS Business Report, I constantly analyze what’s “clicking” for readers and what’s not. So far in 2011, the following articles have been the biggest hitters: Advanced Analytics for the Modern Business Analyst SAS Placed in Leaders Quadrant for BI Top Five Big Ideas in Analytical Data
In the health care field, the impact of fraud, waste and abuse on payers -- whether insurance companies, government agencies or self-insured employers -- is enormous. Fraud losses weaken a payer’s financial position, with fraud loss estimates rivaling net income. Fraud losses feed the escalating care cost curve, undermining a
A midsize regional health insurer with approximately 3,000 employees across 10 locations in the Western United States created a role for a business continuity manager (BCM) reporting to the chief operating officer. In this organization, the enterprise risk management (ERM) functions, established in 2004, are owned by the chief legal
This is a guest post from Jodi Blomberg, a Principal Technical Architect at SAS. She has over 12 years of experience in data mining and mathematical modeling, and has developed analytic models for many government agencies including child support enforcement, insurance fraud, intelligence led policing, supply chain logistics and adverse
The goal of enterprise risk management (ERM) is to eliminate the siloed approach to identifying, monitoring and managing risk practices throughout an organization. By applying a consistent approach to ERM policies and procedures through a clearly delineated organizational risk hierarchy, organizations can mitigate risk and identify new business opportunities. Insurers
Remember the old Reese’s peanut butter cup advertisement? Two people are walking down the street – one eating peanut butter, the other chocolate – they run into each other and the chocolate and the peanut butter get mixed up. They sample the new concoction and marvel at the wonderful mixture
In this panel discussion, a diverse group of companies from different industries are finding profitable growth opportunities through analytics. We’re joined by: Jim Foreman, Director of Circulation Analytic, Staples Halina Karachuk, VP Innovation, AXA Equitable Life Barb Buettin, Director, CRM – Enterprise Information Management, Chico’s Nelle Schantz, Sr. Marketing Director,
“It is the dawning of the age of the digital, age of the digital!” I couldn’t help humming the 1969 tune after attending Erik Brynjolfsson’s presentation at the SAS Global Forum Executive Conference 2011 in Las Vegas. As Director for the MIT Center for Digital Business, Erik lives and breathes
Yesterday was Media Preview day here at the SAS world headquarters in Cary, NC, during which my PR colleagues from around the world hosted journalists for a sneak peak at the news prior to SAS Global Forum in Las Vegas. Part of the day’s events included a panel of three
We live in a world of digital communications, where social media provides the global population with the opportunity to come together like never before. This has brought a whole new dimension to consumer interaction. It provides instant channels for information exchange, experience and opinion sharing. Social media and multichannel digital
