Cognos customer ENECO Energie wins Ventana Research Performance Management Leadership Award

Award winners and finalists were recognized at Connections 2007, the Ventana Research BI and Performance Management conference, in San Francisco.

The Ventana Research Performance Management Leadership Awards recognize organizations that have demonstrated leadership in orchestrating people, process, information and technology for optimum business impact.

The Operational Leadership Award is presented to an organization that has notably improved its operational processes and systems in the areas of sales and marketing, supply chain, and manufacturing or customer operations such as call centers and field service organizations.

Based in the Netherlands, ENECO Energie's Cognos performance management platform is based on the Balanced Scorecard methodology and has helped the company decrease its accounts receivable balance by approximately €10 million. The company also gained higher process efficiencies in its customer contact center and billing department resulting in a savings of approximately € 2.5 million. By raising conversion rates on marketing campaigns and gaining insights into customer segments for direct mailings, ENECO has saved approximately €1 million.

"We are extremely pleased to be recognized with this award for Operational Performance Leadership which highlights our work in customer operations," said Ton van den Dungen, manager of the Business Intelligence Center of Excellence, ENECO Energie. "With Cognos, we have the ability to manage performance and customer interactions based on top-quality and timely performance information. We are able to make decisions and take action that drive tangible results for the entire organization."

In addition to ENECO Energie, the following Cognos customers were recognized as finalists for excellence in their respective categories:

• arvato services for Operational Performance Management Leadership in Supply Chain. With Cognos Business Intelligence solutions, arvato's retailers have seen a 90% improvement in stock availability, a 95% improvement in on-time delivery, an increase of 20% in sales per square metre and a decrease of 15% in returns.

• Best Buy for Finance Performance Leadership. With Cognos Planning, Best Buy automated many manual tasks and simplified financial processes which let its financial analysts spend more time focused on the business versus chasing data. Best Buy was also able to cut the time for its month end close in half.

• Compassion International for Information Technology Leadership in Business Intelligence. With Cognos Now! for operational business intelligence, Compassion International has been able to dramatically decrease the number of manually processed donations in its system. This has enabled more of the 10,000 plus donations that it processes every day to go quickly and directly to the children who need it, instead of lingering in its system awaiting manual processing.

"Performance Management is the next big wave of adoption in organizations," said Mark Smith, CEO and EVP Research, Ventana Research. "These awards showcase world-class innovators who are balancing strategies, plans, and initiatives with performance management solutions to maximize both the financial and operational performance of the business."

"All our customers are improving decision-making across their organizations through performance management solutions," said Derek Morrison, Regional General Manager, Cognos Middle East.

"These award winners are all innovative organizations that are driving improvements to decision-making through performance management initiatives. Their success with Cognos showcases the visibility and control that is achievable through our performance management solutions."