Data quality policing takes on bigger business significance

So says Colin Rickard, managing director of master data management software firm Dataflux. He makes the point that manufacturers have made huge investments in their ERP and CRM systems but now need to invest in their underlying assets – the data. “Why do companies treat buildings, cars, people, cash etc as assets but they don’t invest in their data? They need people, process, technology and a strategy to leverage their data assets. “You have to spend money on your data and keep spending on it or it degrades over time. It’s a great deal more than just training. You need to be able to detect data degradation – a stethoscope to see benchmarked data quality.” He cites firms like Xerox, ST Microelectronics, DSM Nutritional Products and “a large oil company”, all of which, he says, are using his services to considerable advantage. “Xerox, for example, wanted a single view of their supply chain and distribution channels,” he explains. “It’s all SAP-related, part of their project to move from many SAP systems to a single instance – and they’re using our software to clean up the data and to keep it validated at the point of input as they go forward. “Xerox knew it had duplications and that’s important across systems in 16 countries. They’re using data cleaning and validation to drive better terms. We’re coming across this increasingly – it’s part of the route to driving down business costs with a single system.” ST Microelectronics’ pan-European project with Dataflux is an example: although it’s not doing a SAP migration, the company needed to de-dupe and validate its data to gain economies of scale via a single view of customers, distributors and materials supply. And it’s a similar story at DSM Nutritional Products, with data mapped to the E Class product classification [equivalent to UNSPC] standard, while at the large oil company it’s again about a SAP migration but this time involving the HR database. “They have large number of employees on different databases and need to ensure they have a single and current view, not least for security reasons,” explains Rickard. “There will be a real time element with a data policeman so that when employees leave, their security clearance is updated in real time.” His conclusion: your ERP system assumes data accuracy, so that needs to be policed. But he warns against companies that offer master data management solutions for vast amounts of money. “The time is coming for data quality management. We say that’s about common sense – attaching ROI to each of your functional areas and using common technology and methods.” Mind you, it doesn’t come cheap. Rickard gives the example of a £75—100m turnover company: “Initially, its investment would be about £500,000 to £1 million, with ongoing £200,000—300,000 costs per year.” That sounds a lot although he points out that if material spend is £20 million it would be hard not to save at least 5%.