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San Ramon, Calif.- July 14, 2011 – To stay competitive, manufacturing companies have sharpened their use of analytics to help them harness today’s torrents of information, new benchmark research from Ventana Research finds. The research for the first time quantifies the extent to which analytics enable them to operate more efficiently, improve business visibility and support faster, more effective decision-making.

For these businesses the most important categories of metrics are financial (identified by 68% of participants), cost (67%) and operational (57%). However, priorities varied by line of business: Financial metrics rank first among those in Finance or Business, but sales metrics rank highest among those in marketing, sales and product areas. Cost metrics rank the highest across lines of business, while executives are more likely to favor financial and profitability as well as cost metrics.

This new research also shows that more than half of these organizations (63%) use as their only tool to generate analytics spreadsheets, which are time-consuming to use, error-prone and unreliable. In part for this reason, the Ventana Research Maturity Index analysis finds that only 12 percent of all manufacturing companies are functioning at the highest Innovative level of maturity in their use of analytics.

This in-depth benchmark research on manufacturing business analytics, the latest from the leading business technology research firm, analyzed business and IT organizations around the world to assess the maturity and direction of their efforts. Ventana Research undertook this research to acquire real-world information about maturity, trends and best practices in how small and midsized organizations use analytics and key indicators to optimize their business and IT processes and organizations. It explores how they do this now, how teams view the current processes and tools, plans they have to change or improve them, and benefits they hope to gain by doing so.

The findings offer fresh research-based information on these companies' attitudes toward business analytics. They confirm that business and IT organizations use a variety of analytics, but the data indicates manufacturing companies have not yet automated many of the underlying data integration and analytics operations needed to generate metrics. The research also shows that usability and flexible functionality are important criteria in these organizations’ search for the right analytics, that failing to examine timely availability, broad access and efficient handling can obstruct analytics use, and that to improve the maturity of applications usage, spreadsheets should be replaced with more appropriate tools.

"Today, business analytics can give any manufacturing company, regardless of size, a market edge" noted Robert Kugel, SVP of research at Ventana Research. "Whether it’s a result of getting a clearer picture of operations, better insight into market demand, faster alerts when individual products are tracking above or below forecast or some combination of all of these, companies can use analytics enhance their competitiveness. Without a focused approach to business analytics, they simply won’t be able to have the agility to operate in today’s economy or have the kind of understanding needed to optimize performance.

“This research found that the manufacturing organizations that have invested in the right business analytics are most likely to be innovative and achieve increased operational efficiencies,” Kugel added. “This research provides new insights to help advance the science of analytics and help guide a better understanding of best and worst practices, and also to better inform technology suppliers about what matters most to these organizations.”

To view the webinar, visit: http://www.ventanaresearch.com/mawebinar

Those interested in learning more about this benchmark research can find additional information at http://www.ventanaresearch.com/ma. As a part of your registration you will receive insights and education from Ventana Research on using technology effectively in business.

About Ventana Research

Ventana Research is the most authoritative and respected benchmark business technology research and advisory services firm. We provide insight and expert guidance on mainstream and disruptive technologies through a unique set of research-based offerings including benchmark research and technology evaluation assessments, education workshops and our research and advisory services, Ventana OnDemand. Our unparalleled understanding of the role of technology in optimizing business processes and performance and our best practices guidance are rooted in our rigorous research-based benchmarking of people, processes, information and technology across business and IT functions in every industry. This benchmark research plus our market coverage and in-depth knowledge of hundreds of technology providers means we can deliver education and expertise to our clients to increase the value they derive from technology investments while reducing time, cost and risk.

Ventana Research provides the most comprehensive analyst and research coverage in the industry; business and IT professionals worldwide are members of our community and benefit from Ventana Research’s insights, as do highly regarded media and association partners around the globe. Our views and analyses are distributed daily through blogs and social media channels including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Business Week’s Business Exchange.

To learn how Ventana Research advances the maturity of organizations’ use of information and technology through benchmark research, education and advisory services, visit www.ventanaresearch.com.

Media: Copies of benchmark research report and interviews are available upon request.

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Mendeil Bailey 

(925) 242-2412 

marketing@ventanaresearch.com