by Brianna Crandall — September 12, 2016 — ServiceChannel, provider of software-as-a-service (SaaS) service automation for facilities managers (FMs) to source, procure, manage and pay for repair and maintenance services from commercial contractors, recently introduced ServiceChannel Data Direct, a new data management and warehousing solution that gives users on-demand access to FM data that can be easily and seamlessly integrated with other customer-specific data to enable more comprehensive and transparent business intelligence (BI) across the enterprise.
Data Direct data management and warehousing solution gives users on-demand access to FM data that seamlessly integrates with customer-specific data for transparent business intelligence. Click to enlarge.
Data Direct adds to ServiceChannel’s growing analytics and BI portfolio that is providing customers greater transparency and visibility of FM operations in key areas such as spending, vendor compliance and performance, and trend analysis. Data Direct can serve as an on-demand accessible and sharable decision-support platform for enterprises to unify their data. For example, customers can now correlate and analyze ServiceChannel-provided FM data with corporate sales data in order to determine the profitability of locations and stores based on brand compliance, quality of service and contractor performance.
Tom Buiocchi, CEO of ServiceChannel, commented:
Data Direct is a natural extension of our “data-minded” focus to help our customers achieve unprecedented levels of transparency, visibility and efficiency in their operations. It is an acknowledgement that FM data is even more valuable when it’s analyzed as part of an enterprise-wide data management practice using standard methodologies and processes.
ServiceChannel customers have the flexibility to access Data Direct on-demand via different options. Users can access the dedicated and secure platform that ServiceChannel hosts built on the latest generation Amazon Web Services-based server and storage technologies, or they can choose to export Data Direct to their own internal systems for local extraction and aggregation with other data. In either case, Data Direct supports a wide array of BI tools from key suppliers including IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP, and provides users the ability to utilize existing reports, dashboards, charts or create custom ones.
Data management tools such as Data Direct directly address some of the top trends impacting the FM industry today. This includes the need to investigate the relationships between facilities data with other data that companies either capture now or are beginning to collect and analyze. This is particularly important for brands managing many different locations challenged with managing and analyzing data being stored in disparate systems such as foot traffic statistics, advertising and sales to other operational data such as inventory levels, lease information, utility / waste / water management and equipment / asset aging, points out ServiceChannel.
Buiocchi added:
By using advanced database and analytics techniques that Data Direct provides, companies will be able to better understand the impact of facilities on the rest of their business, and vice versa. Unifying the data and data analysis in this manner will open a wealth of new insights that will support improvements in creating new revenue streams while slashing unnecessary costs.
ServiceChannel Data Direct is generally available today to all existing customers. For more information about pricing and service options, visit the ServiceChannel Web site.
