Polk Automotive
Information is power.
This year marks the 131st year of operation
for R. L. Polk & Co., a premier provider of automotive information solution
services to corporations worldwide. A privately held company
founded in 1870, Polk is the oldest consumer marketing information
company in America, and employs approximately 1,400 people in offices
and production facilities throughout the world.
While Polk offers automotive information solutions that can be found nowhere
else, innovations and technical proficiency before anyone else
and diagnostic savvy that is unparalleled in the industry, perhaps the
greatest benefit of operating as a global company is the experience that
it affords - our clients reap the benefits of our global knowledge in the
design of their automotive information systems. We are time-tested,
knowledge rich and adept at delivering a world-class product on time,
and within budget.
Accurate Market Information for Ford
Buying data as a product can be a hit-and-miss affair. In no other industry
would a client purchase a commodity when it was unsure of the
overall quality. After all, we've all been the victim of database mistakes,
and many of us will have bought in sales or marketing data and found it
to be substantially less than accurate.
But data is the basis upon which multi-million pound decisions are
made: Do we open a factory in the Midlands? Will consumers buy this
product? Is there a gap in the market? Should we make this acquisition?
All of this needs evidence - but if this is unreliable, or only represents
a partial view, then the potential for mistakes is greatly increased.
In the automotive industry, information is crucial. The market is highly
competitive, so the failure to spot an opening, react to a trend or incorrect
pricing a car can mean losing
money, sales, and market share.
Put it in gear
Polk is the global leader in providing
information to the automotive industry.
Worldwide it deals essentially
with all the major motor manufacturers.
It provides management and
geographical information systems to
Putting Data in the
driving seat
? Polk Head quarter in Detriot
Case Study
Polk Automotive
Intelligence
Headquarters: Southfield,
Michigan, USA
Core business: Polk is the
global leader in providing
information to the automotive
industry. Worldwide it
deals with all the major
motor manufacturers
Business need: the ability
to add value to incoming
customer information by
verifying and validating
data sets received from clients
and linking disparate
data together
Technology solution: Ascential
Software's
DataStage to move data
around the corporate databases
and store in one central
repository, to allow easy
processing of data from all
European systems
Results:
Facility for more complex
analysis for reporting
High levels of data quality
are maintained
Maximizing use of all corporate
and customer data
Data sets from a variety of
sources are constantly
added to and updated, to
maintain market share.
The Ford Motor Company in 15 European countries, including Britain, France,
Germany, Spain and Italy.
Polk has always maintained market share through the rigorous quality control it
exercises on the information it provides. In order to
create the information systems it offers, however, it
is necessary to constantly update and add to the
data sets it has access to. When you consider that
up to twelve data sets need to be integrated for
some clients, the potential compatibility and quality
concerns become apparent.
Each incoming data set is essentially a 'snapshot'
in time of a transaction database. In the UK, these
operational data sets include, among others, The
Society of Motor Manufacturer and Traders registration information, Driver Vehicle
Licensing Agency data, territory data supplied by Ford and Ford sales data - and
equivalent data sets are provided throughout Europe.
The information provided is mission critical to the organisations that subscribe to
it. Ford would typically use it to support decisions such as how to plan forecourts,
identify how and where to market vehicles, where to open showrooms etc. The increasing
volume and number of information sources that Polk has to deal with,
however, means that data quality is highly variable. Not only does it change between
suppliers of equivalent data sets, but it also varies in time.
The problem that faced Polk essentially revolved around the company's ability to
add value to incoming data by verifying and validating all the records, and linking
disparate data sets together to create a warehouse - which in turn would become
the source for the GIS and MIS systems.
First off the block
Polk first attempted to solve this problem by focusing specifically on the Ford UK
system requirements. Data management and migration specialist, DOT Group,
was chosen as the implementation partner to develop a joint deployment strategy.
DOT was chosen for its ability to ensure the project was delivered on time and on
budget, as well as its commitment to working closely with Polk, as an integrated
part of the team.
The first approach to solving the problem was to design a database to enable the
evaluation of data integrity via the use of constraints and
other relational tools. Normalizing the data in this way allows
many potential errors to be highlighted directly by the
database management system.
Once the schema was established, the next step was to
build 'wrapper programmes'. These are designed for two
main purposes: the first is to effectively move the data into
areas of the database that are optimized for pre-defined
selects. The second to provide centralised controlled
points where new business rules can be added as they are discovered.
The obvious area to look was in the Extract Transformation
Load (ETL) arena. After evaluating several vendors' products
it was decided that DataStage, from Ascential Software,
best met Polk and Ford's requirements.
Using DataStage to provide the 'wrapper' around data
movements enabled the bulk batch processes of Polk's
European systems to be automated. By developing the
front-end in Java, all interfaces could be accessed from
anywhere on the Polk intranet. This also provides the option
to open up various functions and services to clients, if
required in the future.
"The initial aim was to use DataStage to transform and
load incoming data into our normalized databases, which it did very well,"
said James Ricketts of Polk. "As the project progressed, however, more
requirements began to appear which related to reporting on the data. In
order to satisfy the growing demand for this type of information, we devised
a data mart strategy centered on DataStage's ability to extract,
transform and load. This capability gave us the power and flexibility to
build ever more complex analysis and presentation styles for our reporting
- instantly creating what is now a rapidly expanding area of our business."
There's always a risk in integrating new technology into a business, but
Polk's relationship with DOT and Ascential proved adept at ensuring the
smooth training, development and deployment of the system.
"The successful implementation of Ascential's DataStage has enabled us
to consider a whole new dimension in how to deploy and use our data,"
Tony Ward- Polk IT Manager.