About Business Analytics…

Business analytics has been in existence for a very long time and has evolved with availability of

newer and better technologies. It has its roots in operations research, which was extensively used during World War II. Operations research was an analytical way to look at data to conduct military operations.

Over a period of time, this technique started getting utilized for business. Here operation’s research evolved into management science. Again, basis for management science remained same as operation research in data, decision making models, etc. As the economies started developing and companies became more and more competitive, management science evolved into business intelligence, decision support systems and into PC software.

Business analytics is a methodology or tool to make a sound commercial decision. Hence it impacts functioning of the whole organization. It is how this information is utilized makes the company competitive. Business analytics combines available data with various well thought models to improve business decisions. It converts available data into valuable information. 

Therefore, business analytics can help improve profitability of the business, increase market share and revenue and provide better return to a shareholder. This information can be presented in any required format, comfortable to the decision maker. It facilitates better understanding of available primary and secondary data, which again affect operational efficiency of several departments. It also provides a competitive advantage to companies. In this digital age flow of information is almost equal to all the players.

Business analytics has a wide range of application and usages. It can be used for descriptive analysis in which data is utilized to understand past and present situation. Business analytics uses data from three sources for construction of the business model. Business analytics is also used for prescriptive analysis, which is utilized to formulate optimization techniques for stronger business performance. 

It is used for predictive analysis, which is typical used to asses’ previous business performance. For example, business analytics is used to determine pricing of various products in a departmental store based past and present set of information. This kind of descriptive analysis is used to asses’ current market position of the company and effectiveness of previous business decision.