SAS Advances Enterprise Intelligence with Significant Software Release

Business Wire, March 17, 2008

SAS 9.2 Makes Industry-Leading Business Intelligence, Analytics, Data Integration More Widespread; Simpler to Deploy and Manage

SAN ANTONIO -- SAS today launched SAS([R]) 9.2, the latest evolution in enterprise software. SAS 9.2 combines market-leading advanced analytics, data visualization and collaborative data management capabilities that go beyond standard query-and-reporting BI solutions.

Organizations are under increasing pressure to leverage data and existing IT investments to drive success. SAS helps organizations meet the challenge with this latest enhancement to the industry's first and most complete Enterprise Intelligence Platform.

"SAS 9.2 is revolutionary and evolutionary," said Jim Davis, Senior Vice President and CMO at SAS. "Businesses burned by technology vendors more interested in stock prices than customers will appreciate SAS' unrelenting focus on innovation and meeting customer needs. SAS 9.2 is non-disruptive innovation. It helps companies gather and analyze data and share intelligence for quicker, more accurate business decisions."

Beginning today with existing SAS customers and continuing throughout 2008, every offering from SAS will become available on SAS 9.2 to transform organizations from report-driven to intelligence-driven.

"With its enhanced analytics and data integration, improved deployment and management, and shared processes that help BI and analytics become even more widespread and useable throughout an organization, SAS 9.2 is a major launch for SAS and its customers," said Henry Morris, Senior Vice President for IDC's Worldwide Software and Services research groups. "The SAS Enterprise Intelligence Platform goes beyond traditional BI in providing a foundation for collaborative data integration, advanced analytics and timely reporting."

What's new in SAS 9.2?

SAS' annual investment of more than 20 percent of revenue in research and development ensures that SAS 9.2 will help customers transform how their businesses work and sustain a culture of fact-based decision-making.

SAS 9.2 is built on a foundation of proven, stable and integrated technologies. Among SAS 9.2's most significant enhancements:

* The best analytics anywhere are even better. SAS 9.2 gives customers the power to analyze data in more ways with new algorithms and procedures for predictive modeling, forecasting and optimization. They can achieve better model performance, explore complex data with visual queries and interactive graphics, and quickly derive value from large and complex data sets. These technologies help companies achieve what author Tom Davenport calls "competing on analytics," and what Stanford's Jeffrey Pfeffer dubs "evidence-based management." SAS 9.2:

* provides easy access to Bayesian methods, an approach for using prior information in statistical analyses. No other software vendor provides such convenient access. Bayesian methods are used, for example, to analyze clinical trials data for medical devices. When good prior information exists (e.g., on similar devices), the Bayesian approach may help companies evaluate device effectiveness through potentially smaller, shorter clinical trials, resulting in quicker regulatory approval.

* offers a new set of optimization procedures that incorporate powerful algebraic modeling and are ideal for analysts in many industries that need to build complex optimization models to produce best outcomes. For example, investment banks can leverage SAS 9.2's versatile optimization capabilities to discover the best possible balance between risk and return, a key competitive advantage.

* includes sophisticated model-selection methods that handle thousands of variables and scale to very large data sets. Variable selection is increasingly important as data volumes grow in size and complexity. With SAS 9.2, organizations can select the best predictors and create precise models that uncover relationships. For example, bank analysts can incorporate thousands of variables from demographic, transactional and account data when creating models to predict customer profitability. SAS 9.2 makes it easier to reduce the set of variables to the essential predictors and create an accurate model that's easy to understand, maintain and deploy.

* BI more readily available enterprisewide. SAS 9.2 helps users become more self sufficient with simpler, role-based interfaces. Embedding analytics into business processes and sharing results more easily enhances productivity and performance.

* SAS 9.2 breaks down data silos through enhanced collaboration in data integration. Components can be reused more easily and users can monitor, communicate and trouble-shoot more efficiently.

* Improved deployment, configuration and administration capabilities, including a new wizard-based interface and adherence to standards for systems management, change management and security, help IT handle growing demands.

Customers See Value

"W.L. Gore & Associates has succeeded for 50 years by providing quality products that meet customer needs. The same can be said of SAS," said Dr. Jose Ramirez, Industrial Statistician at W.L. Gore & Associates. "Our associates rely on SAS because SAS delivers, year in and year out. SAS 9.2, with its new analytical and data integration capabilities and improved implementation and management, demonstrates innovation, a hallmark of both SAS and Gore. We look forward to leveraging SAS 9.2 to improve our processes and deliver quality to our customers."