Everyone likes a bit of crystal ball-gazing, don’t they? Looking into the future and trying to predict what will happen over the next few months or years is more or less a global pastime. However, in business it really matters. Get your predictions right, and you ride a wave of success, but the alternative is a lot less appealing.     It follows that analysing trends and predicting the future is big business. The Big Four consulting firms have built extensive practices around this. However, smaller firms may have a very different but no less valid view from their interactions with customers. Their choices for investment and focus therefore tell us a lot about both existing practice and future strategies.    Developing strategic focus    Chetan Jain is the Managing Director and Co-Promoter at SAS partner Inspira Enterprises, in India. Inspira Enterprise, a global provider of cybersecurity, data analytics, and AI services, operates in North America, ASEAN, the Middle East, India, and Africa, employing over 1,500 people. The focus of the partnership between Inspira and SAS is largely risk and analytics, where both companies have considerable strengths.    Chetan has identified some key areas that Inspira is looking to target to increase its market share in the future. The first three will probably be familiar to anyone who has been using analytics over the last few years.    “We all know about the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, and that’s something that we are really focusing on. We play a central role in transforming data into actionable insights, and it’s really important that we help our customers in this area. Another linked area is augmented analytics, and particularly automating the process so that customers don’t have to do the mundane work to detect patterns in their data. Customers are particularly excited about this, because they can really see the possible returns on investment in that area.”     Chetan adds that edge computing is another area of focus. This is associated with sensors linked to the Internet of Things, and is about supporting real-time analytics and insight generation. The key advantage to edge analytics is getting insights faster, because the analytics are happening at source.     Responding to regulations    The other two areas of interest to Inspira touch on issues of regulation. Chetan notes that data privacy is an important underlying concern for many organisations.    “I think the fourth area is data democratisation, and especially the privacy side of that. Our customers are looking at how to ensure employees are making data-driven decisions, because this is so critical today, but without affecting customers’ privacy and data protection.”     This issue is underpinned by organisations’ use of data, and particularly how it is treated. There is growing awareness that data-driven decision-making is crucial, which means that data must be made accessible to everyone in the organisation. However, this must be done in a way that respects both confidentiality and regulatory requirements. This is an important area for both SAS and Inspira, especially with the rise of OpenAI, and the expansion of the use of anonymised personal data to train new models. Chetan agrees that proper governance is crucial, and this is the final area of focus.     “The last area, which is closely linked to the data democratisation issue, is data ethics. There is a lot of new regulation coming up in this area, and this is an important piece in the whole regulatory framework.”    Compliance with regulations is of course essential. However, it is not always sufficient for customers’ needs. Proper governance is essential to mitigate the risk of data breaches.     A place for collaboration    Chetan comments that a key focus for further work, especially in partnership with SAS, is collaborative work in two main areas.    “Customer focus is always important, and I’d like to see us doing more joint customer engagement, perhaps through customised training programs on the newer and upcoming SAS tools. I’d also like to explore some co-creation of industry-specific analytics solutions. We’ve done some already, especially in banking and oil and gas, but there’s room for more. These solutions help customers to see that we have really considered their needs, and that they will achieve the outcomes that are most important in their industry. It’s all about building trust among customers. We could even involve some customers in the process, to create even more relevance!”      ... View more