SAS Blog

You had to be there … well, maybe you didn’t! Major industry events – conventions, trade shows, etc. – are the rock concerts of the corporate world. And similar to rock concerts, attendees get a memorable shared experience while their friends back home get, at best, a decent description or, [...]

What does big data know that you don't? It could be a new source of revenue, a budding consumer trend or . . .something sinister! Find out what big data knows in this funny but telling video spot: Look familiar? Do you know that guy? Share this funny big data [...]

Two years ago, Brad Pitt starred in Moneyball, an Academy Award-nominated story about Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane bringing the power of advanced analytics to the sport. Beane wasn’t the first to use statistical analytics to build a successful team and keep its payroll in check. Baseball and political [...]

Popular SAS blogger Rick Wicklin was recently interviewed by the Portuguese statistics site, estatisti.co about his new book, his background in mathematics, his advice for programmers and his dedication to blogging. Wicklin's answers are conveniently translated into English on the site, so you can read these - and other gems by checking out the full interview. [...]

The value of analytics to solve multiple business problems really makes analytics the ultimate reusable business investment, or as they say in the energy industry, it may be called a renewable resource. As I've commented before, organizations send billions of dollars on storing data, and unless you happen to be a [...]

The Data Visualization Charting 101 series explores different tools to visualize data. Check out other posts to see which data visualization is right for you. Have so much data that your head is spinning? If you have a lot of data that needs to be visualized, a scatter plot, aka [...]

Get ready statistics lovers. As part of my new role, I’ve been researching and discovering all the resources that SAS has for statistics – and I’m eager to share what I’ve found. Here are just a few things I discovered that you might find helpful. A new paper on the [...]

What do you see when you look at the picture to the right? Like you, I see a busy dad with his daughter trying to maneuver a shopping cart full of groceries! But the real question:  is there more? What do you really see? In a business setting, depending on [...]

A few weeks ago, we asked, "What would big data say if it could talk?" Today, we might ask, "What if big data had a mail cart?!" It's a fun metaphor that shows how overwhelming big data can be without a strategy for managing it. Watch the short video below [...]

It seems like only yesterday that the SAS Executive Briefing Center (EBC) parking lot was filled with Craft Services tents, high-end luxury cars, movie cameras and, oh, a few celebrities.  But, it’s been nearly a year since SAS became Stark Industries for a day when parts of Iron Man 3 [...]

It’s one thing to talk about how analytics inspire the kind of business decisions that produce mind-blowing results. It’s another to understand how to turn analytics into action. Most organizations encounter some common hurdles on the path to analytical decision making. First, it takes buy-in from the executive suite to [...]

In the past, I’ve contributed to this blog with posts about the use of analytics and statistics in the education industry. I haven’t written in a while because I’ve been transitioning to a new role as the product marketing manager for statistics. I’ll give you three reasons why I’m excited [...]

Everyone wants to be efficient. Everyone wants to do a good job. And yet, inefficiency abounds. Islands of efficiency are set up when individual goals of a person or location override the efficiency of the whole network. In the "intended island of efficiency" each person or persons, working in their little [...]

Statistics. Should this branch of study call its home with mathematics or the sciences? Mark Bailey is a self-proclaimed science enthusiast, so you can guess which way he leans.  As a full-time instructor with JMP, Mark use statistics in his job to help customers decipher their data. That means a [...]

I’m a geek at heart – I always have been and I always will be.  I love technology and I love math.  I love that my job combines both.  But you know what is even better?  In today’s world of big data and data visualization, it is totally fashionable to [...]

As a boy growing up in the 1970s, I was fascinated in particular by dinosaurs.  I knew all their names, Tyrannosaurus Rex, Diplodocus, Triceratops etc.  And I could also remember in which geological time period they lived, and on which continent; and what they ate, often each other of course! [...]

Aboard a scuba diving boat off the east coast of Tico Island in the Philippines, my eyes kept turning to gaze upon Mount Mayon, reputed to be the world’s most perfectly cone-shaped volcano.  Although I was enjoying diving in the warm tropical water, I was looking forward to climbing Mt [...]

In the late 1990s, Jill Dyché, co-founder of Baseline Consulting, worked on a multi-year engagement to stand up Bell South’s business intelligence and analytics strategy. “This was heavy-duty programming; this was heavy-duty code,” she recalls. “SQL is not necessarily optimized for set data to do this kind of thing, but [...]

Big data might be daunting, but Matthew J. Becker, Senior Director and Global Head of Statistical Programming at inVentive Health Clinical, says the goal remains simple for those in health care and life sciences: cure disease and improve health outcomes. Speaking last week at SAS Global Forum, Becker noted that [...]

When users attend SAS Global Forum, they often look forward to hearing from the big names of SAS. To name a few: CEO Jim Goodnight, VP and CMO Jim Davis, and Co-Founder John Sall. Inside SAS Global Forum caught up with these busy executives on the demo floor to talk about SAS [...]