Service Corporation International (SCI), a leading funeral and cemetery services provider, was facing limitations with its aging data warehouse that could no longer handle the company's growing reporting needs. SCI implemented the Microsoft Analytics Platform System (APS) to gain faster, more accurate insights. With APS, SCI reduced data processing times from hours to minutes, automated analytics, and boosted revenue by up to 35% in some business lines. The new analytics capabilities allow SCI to make more strategic, data-driven decisions to power future growth.
Service Corporation International (SCI), a leading funeral and cemetery services provider, was facing limitations with its aging data warehouse that could no longer handle the company's growing reporting needs. SCI implemented the Microsoft Analytics Platform System (APS) to gain faster, more accurate insights. With APS, SCI reduced data processing times from hours to minutes, automated analytics, and boosted revenue by up to 35% in some business lines. The new analytics capabilities allow SCI to make more strategic, data-driven decisions to power future growth.
Service Corporation International (SCI), a leading funeral and cemetery services provider, was facing limitations with its aging data warehouse that could no longer handle the company's growing reporting needs. SCI implemented the Microsoft Analytics Platform System (APS) to gain faster, more accurate insights. With APS, SCI reduced data processing times from hours to minutes, automated analytics, and boosted revenue by up to 35% in some business lines. The new analytics capabilities allow SCI to make more strategic, data-driven decisions to power future growth.
Service Corporation International (SCI), a leading funeral and cemetery services provider, was facing limitations with its aging data warehouse that could no longer handle the company's growing reporting needs. SCI implemented the Microsoft Analytics Platform System (APS) to gain faster, more accurate insights. With APS, SCI reduced data processing times from hours to minutes, automated analytics, and boosted revenue by up to 35% in some business lines. The new analytics capabilities allow SCI to make more strategic, data-driven decisions to power future growth.
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Rapidly Growing Company Eliminates Business
Barriers, Boosts Revenue with Analytics Platform
“With the insight we gain from the Microsoft Analytics
Platform System, we can really put the money where Customer: Service Corporation International we know we’re going to get the best growth. So from Website: www.sci-corp.com Customer Size: 23,500 employees my perspective, it’s opened the door for us to do Country or Region: United States more.” Industry: Professional services—Personal services Michael Johnson, Managing Director of Strategic Pricing, SCI
Customer Profile Service Corporation International (SCI), a leading provider of
Service Corporation International is the largest funeral and cemetery services funeral and cemetery services, was experiencing rapid growth provider in North America. but faced limitations with a data warehouse that no longer kept Software and Services up with its reporting needs. The company solved that problem Microsoft Server Product Portfolio with the Microsoft Analytics Platform System (APS). With faster, − Microsoft Analytics Platform System Technologies more accurate insight, the company has boosted revenue by up − Microsoft SQL Server Integration to 35 percent in one of its business lines and is making more- Services − Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 strategic decisions about development projects that power Reporting Services future growth. Hardware - HP Converged System 300 for Faces BI bottlenecks driving some best practices from a Microsoft Analytics Platform System Service Corporation International is North strategic standpoint, but we weren’t America’s largest provider of funeral and getting very good information, and we cemetery services, with locations couldn’t leverage data in our old data throughout the United States and Canada. warehouse environment,” says Michael As the business grew rapidly, the company Johnson, Managing Director of Strategic realized that it needed better insight into Pricing at SCI. performance across its expanding network. Data flowed to a central data warehouse Over the last 10 years, the company had from multiple applications, including the made great strides in standardizing company’s primary point-of-sale system processes such as pricing strategies, but its that handles all contracts. Every night, the For more information about other technology hadn’t kept pace with its company ran batch processes to provide Microsoft customer successes, please visit: business acumen. “We had centralized our daily and monthly reports for managers. www.microsoft.com/customers strategic pricing function and started However, running one job after another was time-consuming, and data that should employees. Now, the company can work there’s no longer a question that it’s have been delivered by 6:00 A.M. was often easily with large volumes of data and correct. Now field leadership and executive delayed by three hours or more. The end- provide near-real-time insight to management know that what they’re of-month general ledger (GL) closing management teams and field personnel, seeing is true and can make a better process was a particularly big bottleneck, who no longer have to wait for IT to create decision.” taking up to five hours to complete while reports. The result is a more proactive other workloads waited. workforce. Johnson says, “We can push a Transforms business management set of analytics out to field managers that Taking a closer look at performance But the slow extraction transform and load capture trends, allowing them to identify metrics underscores the business gains. (ETL) process wasn’t the only barrier to and mitigate profit leaks, and to maximize “One of the things we’re very excited accessing data. “Because we had revenue based on strategic pricing about is the improvements in our GL close performance issues and because we had to decisions.” process,” says John Thokala, BI Solution monitor the databases appropriately, we and Data Architecture Manager at SCI. “We never had the opportunity to provide tools Fuels revenue with insight reduced hours of reporting time to less to end users so that they could do their own With the Microsoft Analytics Platform than five minutes. And in another example, analysis and reporting,” says Divek Passi, System, SCI has gained faster, more a query that used to run for almost 18 Managing Director of IT Applications and accurate insight into large volumes of hours now produces data in 12 minutes.” Integration at SCI. “We wanted to make sure complex data. As a result, it is significantly that the reports were running correctly, so boosting revenue and making strategic Today, SCI is fueling future business we did it for them.” decisions that support future growth. growth with its new analytics capabilities. “Making data-oriented decisions releases Gains better analytics Boosts revenue 35 percent with BI the shackles,” says Johnson. “With the It was time to upgrade to a better business SCI has gained unprecedented analytics insight we gain from the Microsoft intelligence (BI) solution, and SCI knew that capabilities, which in turn, have improved Analytics Platform System, we can really a traditional database environment wouldn’t its bottom line. For example, it runs a large put the money where we know we’re suffice. The company looked at multiple construction operation that includes up to going to get the best growth. So from my products, including HANA from SAP, before 400 large projects each year. In the past, perspective, it’s opened the door for us to choosing the Microsoft Analytics Platform the company was unable to get the BI it do more.” System. “Microsoft APS fit our overall wanted because queries took too long to approach, and the affordability and run. That changed with the new analytics With more-detailed analytics, SCI can fine- capabilities as an appliance made sense for platform. “With APS, we began pulling in tune regional development across North us,” says Passi. “Also, I’ve been keeping my transaction-level data that we’ve never had America. “For example, it’s enabled me to eye on the progress of Microsoft in the BI before,” says Johnson. “We’ve completely make a case for cemetery development world, especially with tools like Power View, automated analytics for our construction projects, and we’ve increased our capital and I thought that having the appliance operations, from pro forma evaluation and investment by 85 percent over the last might help us move in that direction.” through post-construction monitoring. As two-and-a-half years since we’ve moved to a result, over the last two years we’ve seen this data-driven environment,” explains The Microsoft Analytics Platform System, significant revenue improvement of up to Johnson. “We used to manage projects includes preinstalled hardware, software, 35 percent.” based on the company’s overall metrics, and networking components that deliver but now we manage all of our projects high levels of scalability and performance. Improves accuracy and decisions based on location-specific datasets and As a result, SCI can run multiple workloads With the new analytics platform, SCI is not numbers. That obviously gives us a much simultaneously, even while data is loading. only processing data faster, it is also higher probability for success.” improving accuracy and efficiency with Working with SQL Server Integration more automated processes. “The big Services, SCI can pull together large benefit is that it can all happen much more volumes of information from multiple quickly with APS,” says Johnson. “And we sources and load transaction-level datasets. have the ability to add tables, cleanse data SCI is also using Power View, a feature of errors, and create queries that are SQL Server Reporting Services, to create consistent across departments. We have dashboards that can be launched by remote much better control and data quality, so
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