Mine machine data to boost business value

Businesses risk losing their competitive edge if they are unable to drill down into the information captured by machine-generated data, a study from Quocirca has warned.

The Operational Intelligence Maturity Index report found that log data collected by IT administrators for managing servers can be used to drive business value.

"Organisations that fail to make use of the huge volumes of machine data that are generated on a daily basis are missing an invaluable opportunity to improve the way business processes respond to user preferences and demand," the report said.

Quocirca analyst Bob Tarzey said: "In a business making 40,000 transactions a day, if a transaction touches 10 systems, you can end up with hundreds of thousands of machine data records. True operational intelligence uses the data generated by machines to access, tune and improve IT and business processes, identify security threats, highlight performance issues and spot emerging customer trends."

The report, sponsored by Splunk is based on a survey of 380 European companies. Within European businesses, it is IT managers that have the best view of operational intelligence with over half (56%) having a comprehensive view.

But 83% of organisations admit that they would like to improve or are not currently getting real-time business insight from their machine data.

"Advanced IT departments are accustomed to using insights from machine data to streamline processes and resolve issues, and successful security teams also regularly analyse IT data to identify potential threats," said James Murray, vice president and general manager of EMEA, Splunk.

"The real breakthrough comes when organisations use the operational data already being viewed by IT and security to provide wider business insights in real-time, ultimately aiding better decisions."