Vosloo spotted red flags in the data right away, and the full extent of the scheme was apparent after just a few days of investigation. How then did the company – a large, well established firm with many subsidiaries – miss something like this?

“It was a situation you see all too often,” explains Vosloo. “The company had been staring at the same report for well over a decade and never fully grasped the implications of the data. Then, suddenly, when the data was presented in a visual way, instead of being buried in long-winded auditor’s reports, they could see, finally, what had always been there.”

Paper trail in emerging markets

Vosloo says visual analytics can have a particularly powerful impact in emerging markets. “The opportunity of what the visual experience can be for a customer is pretty amazing, because inside Africa, and in other emerging markets, a lot of people are running their businesses on paper-based trails or simple spreadsheets. When a company can access their data in a way that they can see what their information means visually, it’s very powerful and can bring enormous benefit to their business.”

Vosloo admits he’s biased – BI in the Box is a certified SAP partner, and Vosloo himself is an SAP mentor; nonetheless, he says, “I just love SAP BI OnDemand!”

Next page: This case is just the tip of iceberg

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