Como una de las editoriales más grandes del mundo, Penguin Random House opera en seis continentes con sede central en Nueva York. La empresa buscaba comprender mejor las preferencias de lectura de sus clientes y decidió actualizar sus capacidades de datos y analítica. En colaboración con Microsoft, desplegamos Microsoft Azure Analysis Services, Azure Cognitive Search y Microsoft Power BI.
Desafío
El modelo de negocio de Penguin Random House podría parecer simple: vender libros. Sin embargo, los datos resultaban sorprendentemente complejos, ya que cada libro tiene su propio número estándar internacional de libro (ISBN) y ese número varía en cada país, lo que dificulta el seguimiento.
Penguin Random House vende sus libros a través de 200 sellos editoriales y cuenta con 1,2 millones de títulos, incluidos los que publica directamente y aquellos cuyos derechos ha adquirido. La editorial utilizaba anteriormente una combinación de aplicaciones de negocio heredadas dispares y distintos tipos de informes, por lo que el seguimiento de ventas, inventario y datos de punto de venta consumía mucho tiempo. Sin embargo, dado el competitivo panorama editorial y el tiempo relativamente largo que puede llevar producir un libro desde la concepción hasta la venta, Penguin Random House necesitaba la capacidad de consultar toda esta información en una vista unificada.
Solución
Penguin Random House creó diversos dashboards a lo largo de 2019 utilizando Microsoft Azure Cognitive Search y Azure Analysis Services. La editorial recibe varios conjuntos de datos sobre sus consumidores y minoristas, además de las ventas de sus propios libros y de minoristas en todo el mercado. Azure Cognitive Search realiza búsquedas basadas en texto a través de Microsoft Power Apps para indexar datos en su base de datos. Mediante una conexión a Power Apps, los datos se visualizan en dashboards de Microsoft Power BI.
La editorial ahora analiza enormes conjuntos de datos —casi 3 mil millones de filas de datos utilizando 55 gigabytes de espacio de almacenamiento tabular— y evalúa datos de ventas por ubicaciones y subsidiarias. Para llevar adelante este proyecto, Penguin Random House colaboró con un arquitecto de soluciones cloud (CSA) de Microsoft en la arquitectura de la solución, y la editorial recibe orientación técnica y experiencia de forma continua. Orion contribuyó en la conexión entre Azure Cognitive Search y Power BI.
Impact
Due to faster, easier reporting capabilities and streamlined development processes, the publisher’s employees now have time for more valuable tasks; analysts can spend more time analyzing data rather than gathering it. “By using the visualizations in Power BI, we can plow through billions of rows of data to quickly find the handful that are meaningful to our business,” says Edward Dulinski, VP, Technology at Penguin Random House. “We no longer download static data, format it in Excel, and then email it to our global colleagues. We can share reports with our global divisions in a highly secure way, making them available anytime, anywhere, on any device with near real-time live interactive data.”
The publisher ensures that employees can easily access reports by using Azure Active Directory to manage and help secure identities. David McLaughlin, VP of Technical Architecture at Penguin Random House, adds, “Being able to rely on our Azure Active Directory service to make this reporting available globally, in relatively little time, is also an incredible value-add to using Azure services.”
James Cush, Director of Business Intelligence at Penguin Random House, adds, “Before, staff spent several days each month downloading and assembling data to show sales reps. With Power BI, we’ve removed the need to manually pull data and freed our staff to focus on more interesting aspects of their jobs than data wrangling.”
Previously, if a department requested a project, the information would remain localized to the application, making it difficult to include in other reports. Now that the IT team is consolidating data, it can develop solutions and create reports much faster and promptly share them with other departments.
And people appreciate the capabilities the team provides—for example, 1,000 unique users regularly access various dashboards and reports. “We combined datasets that traditionally were standalone silos and are now integrated into a single view of our business, so we spend less time on infrastructure and more time on solving business problems,” says Dulinski.
“We have changed the perception of our IT team throughout the entire organization by implementing this blend of Microsoft technologies,” says Josef Richberg, Senior Data Architect at Penguin Random House. “Now we can produce projects for departments in weeks instead of months. We pride ourselves on being an efficient team of application and solution development.”
Continues Richberg, “People can now see data they need in the blink of an eye, thanks to Azure Analysis Services, and their enthusiasm is incredible. We wanted to empower staff to quickly access data and have the best experience possible, which we achieved—no small feat with a dataset of 3 billion records.”
Concludes Cush, “With Azure and Power BI, we can now better see trends coming, and act upon them, which is a competitive advantage.”
Find out more about Penguin Random House on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. By using the visualizations in Power BI, we can plow through billions of rows of data to quickly find the handful that are meaningful to our business.
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