According to market research company IDC, the amount of new and replicated data generated annually will grow to 163 ZB by 2025 – a tenfold increase compared with the volume in 2016.
For companies, the ability to analyze and act on the data they've collected has become increasingly important to their business model. Although many of them have amassed significant amounts of data for enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer relationship management (CRM) and other purposes, few companies know how to put it to better use.
In 2013, IDC predicted that firms would continue to waste 80% of customer data they collected due to poor internal data processing systems. "Many firms have been obsessed with collecting more data from the internet, but have ignored the fact that their internal data have the greatest value," said DataHunter CEO Cheng Kaizheng.
A serial entrepreneur with 17 years of experience in the IT industry, Cheng saw the opportunity this insufficiently used data represented. He founded data visualization startup DataHunter with a mission: help enterprise clients gain a competitive advantage through better data manipulation.
The startup’s first-generation products were launched in 2016. Since then, DataHunter has employed advanced exploratory analysis techniques to provide enterprises with easy-to-use data visualization and analysis tools, which has helped them digitally transform their businesses.
Ingest and analyze your data
Business Intelligence – a combination of tools, processes and skills that help turn vast amounts of data into usable information – requires data from a variety of sources, in different types and formats, e.g., images, text, video and Excel/CSV files. DataHunter's Data Analytics product takes a task that used to be highly difficult - preparing data for analysis - and makes it easy.
Traditional BI tools adopt a confirmatory analysis approach, using traditional statistical tools to quantify the extent to which deviations from a predefined data model are expected to occur by chance or, to put it more simply, using highly complicated statistical tools to evaluate the data.
Such a process usually takes weeks, or even months, and requires regular IT support. Confirmatory analysis is not a useful tool for managers who want to glean information from data quickly to keep up in the fast-changing business environment.
To eliminate enterprise clients' heavy dependence on IT, DataHunter's Data Analytics instead uses exploratory analysis, which presents data patterns visually. Analyzing data via exploratory analysis doesn't require IT skills. "With our Data Analytics, business personnel can now easily prepare, screen and analyze data on their own," said Cheng.
A data analysis and visualization platform, Data Analytics takes in all forms of data from enterprise business systems, third-party providers and open data sources and transforms the mess into easily understandable graphs. Data Analytics can process 1 PB (1,000,000 GB) of data within seconds. Decision makers can not only draw immediate insights from the analysis, but can also keep up to date with the latest developments in their businesses and make or adjust decisions accordingly.
To illustrate the value added to companies by Data Analytics, imagine a hypothetical DataHunter retailer client. Data Analytics can perform correlation analysis on customer profiles, retail outlets, products, prices and other factors to show the retailer's managers a clear picture of consumers' shopping preferences, purchase frequency and behavior under different scenarios. Armed with this information, managers can adjust product offerings, prices or even the shopping environment to increase the company’s conversion and repurchase rates.
Visualize your data
DataHunter has also introduced Data MAX – a large-screen display with data visualization modules that takes in data from systems like ERP and CRM and presents them in real time. If businessmen and women want to impress the board or clients, they can use Data MAX's visualization design components to customize the way their data are presented with just a few drag and drops.
Shanxi Electric Power Corporation bought a Data MAX screen that can display the operations of its power transmission and distribution networks in addition to key performance indicators. If, for instance, a failure occurs somewhere, the company's managers can spot the problem quickly and make immediate moves to fix the power grid.
DataHunter's ability to offer a link between data and usable insights with its easy-to-use tools has attracted a growing number of clients, including People's Daily, Wanda Group and China Mobile.
This startup's edge is its recognition of the value of a high-quality user experience. "In the future, we will gradually invite clients to be part of our R&D process. Better products originate from real-world business scenarios and user demands," said CTO Ma Ke.
