Big data leaders: What makes them tick?

A TCS study called The Emerging Big Returns from Big data, brings to the fore some interesting observations about the use of Big data by enterprises.

The general perception about Big data is that handling the volume and velocity of data is the biggest challenge. Interestingly, the biggest challenge for enterprises using Big data is to get different business units to share information and be able to take business decisions based on the data. The technological challenge only comes after this.

While numerous organizations are implementing Big data analytics, the early adopters are likely to reap in benefits of higher ROI. Satya Ramaswamy, Vice President and Global Head, Mobility and Next Gen Solutions, TCS comments in a company press release " To realize the full potential of Big Data, businesses also need to consider the potential cultural changes within the organization to speed up its adoption." Organizations need to be able to look beyond internal data. It is important to break internal boundaries and look at aligning data from various business units that can drive better business decisions.

What the leaders in big data are doing :

• Leaders in Big Data are doing analysis outside of business units (BUs) - 79 percent of them are using the IT function or a separate Big Data team, with only 21% doing the analysis in BUs. The laggards on the other hand are doing only 68% of their analysis outside of the Business units.
• The leaders are also using more unstructured and semi-structured data (55%), and external data (37%), than the laggards who are using 46% unstructured and semi-structured data, and 26% external data.
• The most marked difference is that leaders spent $24 million in 2012 and expect to spend $26 million by 2015, whereas the laggards spent $7 million in 2012 and expect to spend $13 million by 2015.

Source: TCS Global Trend Report

Organizations that are implementing Big data in the right way are expecting ROI of more than 50 percent from their Big data programs in 2012, while organizations that are not lagging behind in their Big data initiatives can only expect ROI in the range of negative to +25 percent. This makes it clear that its not about using big data, its about using it in the right way.

This article was first published in Globalservicesmedia.com