As advanced analytics permeated nearly every industry in 2018, FICO’s thought leaders continued to push it into new areas. Here were the top 5 posts in the Analytics & Optimization category last year. Advancing the Field of Prescriptive Analytics Mathematical optimization, or prescriptive analytics, applies robust science to decision strategies in order to reach the best outcome. Horia Tipi noted a breakthrough for operations researchers and data scientists worldwide: Last week we announced that FICO Xpress Mosel, the leading optimization modeling, analytic orchestration, and programming language is now open and available to everyone free of charge. From the boardroom to the classroom, anyone can now create optimization models to solve problems more efficiently and make better business decisions based on data. FICO Xpress Mosel is available by downloading the FICO Xpress Community License. With FICO Xpress Mosel, organizations can create optimization models that can solve bigger problems more efficiently, design solutions faster, and make better decisions in virtually any business scenario. In addition to its modelling, solving and programming features, FICO Xpress Mosel also supports the orchestration and execution of analytic models built in virtually any tool. Whether a problem needs solving in milliseconds, requires a vast array of cloud computing resources, or has to solve for hundreds of millions of decision variables, Mosel is there to meet the challenge. For example, Southwest Airlines have been using FICO Xpress, including Xpress Mosel, for years to handle some of their biggest, most critical business problems. Read the full pos The Financial Industry’s Digital Transformation How are analytics helping banks accelerate their digital transformation, while keeping the customers at the center of their strategies? Manish Pathak explored a roadmap for success. Financial institutions understand the need to tailor experiences to individual needs and personalize their interactions. In fact, more than half (55%) of bankers plan to increase spending on customer experience initiatives [CSI], and nearly 80% consider it important to deliver guidance to customers in real-time [The Financial Brand]. Currently, though, only about 20% of financial institutions are delivering more than basic personalization [Digital Banking Report/Everage]; clearly, there is still a significant gap to fill. We’ve identified three key imperatives financial institutions need to address to deliver personalized, real-time experiences. #1 Focus on Data Gathering and Consolidation All of these multichannel, “always on” interactions that we’ve referenced generate large amounts of data, which is typically captured in various sources such as CRM applications, transactional data stores, disparate account management data stores, etc. Each data source provides a fragmented image of a consumer—a glimpse into one of the personas. Financial institutions need to bring these data sources together to create a comprehensive profile of a consumer, rather than a series of disconnected account holders across platforms and lines of business. By connecting the digital clues and gaining a single customer view, it’s then possible to interpret and anticipate future needs. Currently, according to Forrester only 0.5% of all generated data is analyzed. Richard Joyce, a Senior Analyst at Forrester says, “Just a 10% increase in data accessibility will result in more than $65 million additional net income for a typical Fortune 1000 company.” These stats are simply overwhelming and identify a clear-cut target for which the industry must aim. #2 Build Powerful Analytic Engines that Predict and Prescribe Personalization is not a matter of simply gathering data, but also acting on that data. And the hard truth is that anticipating customer needs requires powerful analytics engines that were once thought of as “nice-to-have.” However, only about 55% of organizations were expected to in