This post recaps a session at the SingleStore NOW 2024 Conference, held at the Chase Center on October 3, 2024. To view the entire session, check out the video at the bottom of the blog.
Overview
As a global leader in analytics and AI, SAS has helped hundreds of customers turn data into decisions. Along the way, the company has seen firsthand the challenges and opportunities inherent in scaling AI across many different types of enterprises. Drawing parallels between the complexity of global supply chains and the intricacies of modern data management, speaker Tom Roehm illustrated how organizations can leverage AI and data to drive efficiency, improve decision making and stay ahead of the competition.
About the speaker
As Vice President of Industry and Market Strategy at SAS, Tom Roehm has been at the forefront of helping enterprises transform their operations through analytics and AI. His focus is on enabling organizations to learn faster, optimize processes and make data-driven decisions with the company’s powerful AI platform.
Key takeaways
Tom's presentation highlighted the critical role of speed, scalability and trust in building successful AI solutions for large enterprises:
1. Learning faster with AI. The key to business success is understanding and adapting quickly. AI can help organizations identify trends and risks faster than their competitors. This agility allows companies to mitigate risks, embrace change and maintain a competitive edge in dynamic markets
2. Real-world examples of AI at scale. Tom shared three impactful use cases:
- A government tax authority in Northern Europe saved over £650 million and increased tax revenue by £7 billion using AI-driven fraud detection.
- Georgia Pacific, a leading pulp and paper manufacturer, improved equipment efficiency and reduced unplanned downtime by leveraging AI models across 140 plants.
- HSBC enhanced its lending processes by using SAS's customer intelligence and decision-making capabilities, which resulted in a 500% increase in customer conversions and a 10x reduction in marketing execution time.
3. Partnership with SingleStore. Tom highlighted how the strategic partnership between SAS and SingleStore enables customers to integrate SAS’ AI capabilities with SingleStore's real-time data processing. This combination provides significant advantages, like faster data ingestion, reduced data movement and lower total cost of ownership. An example is Posten, the Norwegian postal service, which saw a 100x improvement in query performance and faster batch job processing after adopting the joint solution.
4. Focus on performance, productivity and trust. Tom outlined three pillars that drive SAS’ approach to AI:
- Performance. Achieving faster time to insights through speed, scalability and reducing costs as algorithms run more efficiently.
- Productivity. Increasing outcomes through automation, seamless integration and collaboration across data teams.
- Trust. Ensuring AI results are ethical, equitable and explainable. Tom stressed the importance of transparency and accuracy, mainly as AI systems make predictions based on past data that may contain inherent biases.
5. SAS Viya® and model as a product. The company’s AI platform, SAS Viya, is at the heart of its offering, providing tools for developers and ready-made solutions for business users. Tom announced new offerings — including models as products — allowing enterprises to integrate specialized AI models directly into their workflows. This allows businesses to build, buy or customize AI models according to their needs.
Take it to the next level
Are you looking to scale AI across your organization? Discover how the combination of SAS and SingleStore can accelerate your AI initiatives by accessing more content from the conference. Start a free SingleStore Helios® trial today to see how real-time data and scalable AI can transform your enterprise.
