SAP announced this week that it would be partnering with Esri, a leading geographic information system (GIS) and location analytics provider, to help customers improve business efficiency and decision-making. To learn more about the technical aspects of the deal and which SAP products it affects, click here. SmartBrief sat down with Marie Goodell, Senior Director, Product Marketing for Enterprise Information Management for SAP at the Esri International User Conference in San Diego to learn more about what the move means for users in the financial services industry.
Goodell on why SAP is partnering with Esri to offer customers more real-time spatial data:
“We are seeing high demand across all our business lines to add location information into the applications. … Customers are coming to us and asking: How can we take advantage of location data and map data to better understand our business and to better understand our customers.”
On what the new technology will offer the insurance industry:
“Each individual insurance adjuster can now use the map, take the data that’s coming from the insurance application and merge it with the geographical data.” Goodell also explained that the technology can be used inside an individual branch or as a tool to assess the performance of a group of branches.
On how banks will be able to use the technology to improve their operations:
Goodell cited a recent example whereby a customer discussed using location analytics to assess how applicants in their loan pipeline responded to comments from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke about the tapering of quantitative easing. The jump in interest rates forced some applicants to drop out of the pipeline, but also spurred others to act fast to secure a loan. “They were talking about the ability to add spatial data to their business application data,” Goodell explained. By using location analytics, the customer could determine which geographic areas would see the increase in activity and could allocate more resources to those areas in order to process the larger volume of loans.