iOCO partners with Locstat

Johannesburg, 28 September 2020: Technology solutions leader iOCO has partnered with Locstat, a company specialising in graph-powered AI and event processing for augmented intelligence, to bring clients a cost-effective data analysis and visualisation solution. The partnership will enable iOCO to add this unique solution to its comprehensive data offering, while expanding Locstat’s reach internationally.

Varsha Ramesar, Cluster Executive for Data and Analytics at iOCO, describes Locstat’s unique value proposition as an ideal addition to iOCO’s portfolio. “Locstat solves the complexity, long execution times, and high cost of implementing typical Industry 4.0 solutions. As businesses continue to collect and capture data from an ever-increasing number of sources, sensors and third-party systems, their analytics initiatives will need to evolve to accommodate the growing variety, velocity, volume, and veracity of their data. Locstat allows businesses to gain the benefits of predictive and prescriptive analytics, and visualisation of real-time and static data from multiple sources quickly, easily, and at a competitive cost,” she explains.

“The world is generating vast amounts of data. By some estimates, we are producing around 1.7 megabytes of new information every second for every human being alive, and businesses in every sector and every industry are trying to leverage the data they are generating to become more competitive. However, successfully obtaining and using data-driven insights is easier said than done,” she adds.

According to a four-year study of major analytics initiatives in large companies reported in the Harvard Business Review, less than half of the 36 companies studied reported measurable results. Only a third had met their objectives of widespread adoption. 77% of respondents in a 2019 survey by New Vantage Partners said that ‘business adoption’ of big data and AI initiatives continues to represent a challenge.

To ensure that customer-led data and analytics initiatives are successful, iOCO has created a unique approach that allows organisations to understand what their data means to their business and gain insight from it efficiently and with an increased speed to realising value. The addition of Locstat’s solution set to iOCO’s data and analytics offering helps shield customers from the pain points of traditional two-three year projects, which only see value realised at the end of the project, by which time the questions asked by the customer, as well as the customer needs, have already evolved and changed, Ramesar says.

Specialising in fraud detection and prevention, Locstat uses graph database technology that enables businesses to add more contextual data to their AI/ML models. Locstat’s high volume transaction monitoring and complex event processing, real-time streaming analytics, and event processing for IoT solutions, to name just a few applications of the technology, allow companies to gain actionable insights in real time without the high overheads usually associated with these types of initiatives.

Sanjay Daya, Co-Founder and CMO at Locstat, points out that typical analytics projects have a very high requirement in terms of skills, data collection, processing, model building and analytics. “Companies looking to implement these types of projects would have to put together a skilled team, with implementation taking anywhere from 18 months to 2 years and costing millions. By creating a pre-built solution, we enable an organisation to implement in six to eight weeks at a much lower cost,” he says.

“If Henry Ford had asked his customers what they wanted, they would have said faster horses. Instead, he gave them the car. Similarly, companies looking to gain real-time insights have been investing in BI initiatives that are the equivalent of the horses, while our solution offers the same kind of advances and efficiencies the car brought to transportation. Our Software-as-a-Service offering ensures that organisations of all sizes can gain the benefits of advanced analytics at the right price, efficiently, within three months. With iOCO’s skills and expertise to back our technology, customers can now easily bridge the old world and the new world of data and gain the insights they need to stay ahead.”