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ARABIAN GULF UNIVERSITY

COLLEGE OF GRADUATE STUDIES

TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT PROGRAMME

The Role of Business Intelligence (BI) in Enhancing the Competitive Advantages of Organization (Case Study: Batelco Company)

A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE MASTERS DEGREE IN

TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT

(Specializing in Business)
SUBMITTED BY

Ali Mohd Abbas Kamali

B.Sc. Business Information System Bahrain University -2007

SUPERVISED BY
Dr. Yas Alsltanny Associate Professor -Technology Management Program Arabian Gulf University Dr. Hafez Al-Motawa Assistant Professor -Technology Management Program Arabian Gulf University

KINGDOM OF BAHRAIN December 2009 (A.D.) Ze Heja 1430 (A.H.)

ABSTRACT
Most of the decision-makers in large organizations use information technology in their systems in order to improve work performance and increase the level of profitability in the organizations. Additionally, information technology is used to create competitive advantages that distinguish their organization from others in the application of technology, but the problems in many organizations that they do not gain full advantage of the value of systems and data in making decisions as well as in the evaluation of future market risks in view of the complexity of existing systems and the variety and abundance of information stored in a number of databases of different kinds. Intelligent business (BI) systems emerged as the volatility of the balance of the technical solution and give a unique model to optimize the use of data in making appropriate decisions. In this research the focus is on Bahrain telecommunications company (Batelco) in the evaluation of business intelligent systems and their impact on the company's competitive advantage. Batelco was chosen based on several reasons including: It is one of the leading companies in the area of bringing new technologies to run its business, and the company is one of the largest telecommunications companies in the region and faces competition from other telecommunications companies at home after the government of Bahrain changed the market strategy and led them to compete Batelco in order to give customers more choices. The thesis evaluates how Batelco applying the BI concepts and applications within its business framework and the impacts of BI on the companys performance especially since the competition allowed in the telecom market in Bahrain in order to assess the extent of knowledge on business intelligence in the company. The survey was conducted and included three main tiers through questionnaires that relevant to each tier. The groups included senior management, users, including managers of departments and finally some of the staff specialists in the Information Systems who deal with the technical aspect of BI. Another assessment conducted in this research to know how the existing systems work and how they could meet the mission and vision of the company. The evolution over

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the knowledge systems being run assessed in the case study by asking the specialists and staff that contributed in organizational developing projects, they described the whole main steps that conducted by the company to develop its knowledge systems in order to meet the challenges throughout the past years. Furthermore, the SAP system that is used in the finance was selected to be assessed and evaluated to know the extent of the system to bring the improvements to the company compared to its predecessor and legacy systems. The Balanced Scorecard is used as a tool to assess the SAP system because such the tool concentrates on the mission and vision that the company expects to achieve.

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DEDICATION

I dedicate this work to my father and mother.

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ACKNOWLADGMENT
My study at AGU was much more than study or come to school and take a course, and do exam and pass the course. It was a learning process, knowledge development, and life experience. There are many people were, at various times at this faculty from teachers, administration staff, IT professionals, and librarians that had different participations in different levels, either direct or indirect, in helping me to develop my work in the best I could, where without them I couldnt manage to finish my study in this master program. I gratefully acknowledge their contribution, influence and support. I would like to express my sincere appreciation and great respect to my supervisor, Dr. Yas Al-Sultany for his honesty and respect, and useful and faithful guidance in developing this master thesis. As a matter of fact, the work with Dr.Yas is a new academic professional work and life experience, which is more than a supervision and knowledge development. I would like to acknowledge my supervisor in the collage, Dr. Hafedh Al-Mutawa. I am so grateful to all the administration staff of AGU and my collage Technology in particularly especially to Mrs Maheen Al-Bastaki for her honesty and respect, professional way of work and friendly guidance, where she always tries to make things simple and much clear and easier. I would also like to thank all of my colleagues during 2.5 years spent with them at the university and specially my friend A.Rahman Gharama who was so generous in his support at various stages of my study.

Table of Contents
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................. i DEDICATION ........................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLADGMENT ............................................................................................iv Table of Contents ........................................................................................................ v LIST OF TABLES .....................................................................................................ix LIST OF FIGURES....................................................................................................xi LIST OF ABBREVIATION.................................................................................... xiii Chapter 1: Introduction .............................................................................................. 1 1.1 Overview ............................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Problem Statement ............................................................................................... 2 1.3 How does BI work ............................................................................................... 2 1.4 Research Significance .......................................................................................... 3 1.4.1 Scope............................................................................................................. 4 1.5 Objectives ............................................................................................................ 4 1.6 Research Methodology......................................................................................... 5 1.7 Limitations ........................................................................................................... 6 1.8 Thesis Outline ...................................................................................................... 6 Chapter 2: Literature Review ..................................................................................... 8 2.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................... 8 2.2 Defining Intelligence ............................................................................................ 9 2.3 Business Intelligence .......................................................................................... 12 2.3.1 Business Intelligence Concepts .................................................................... 12 2.3.2 More definitions of BI ................................................................................. 16 2.3.3 Evolving of Business Intelligence ................................................................ 17

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2.3.4 BI Functions ................................................................................................ 18 2.4 The Competitiveness Concept ............................................................................ 18 2.4.1. Competitiveness and Productivity Growth .................................................. 19 2.4.2 Competitiveness and Performance ............................................................... 20 2.4.3 Competitive Advantages .............................................................................. 20 2.5 Business Intelligence and Information Technology ............................................ 22 2.5.1 Data Warehouse .......................................................................................... 23 2.5.2 Data Warehouse Design Concept ................................................................. 23 2.5.4 BI Tools ...................................................................................................... 24 2.6 Telecommunications .......................................................................................... 26 Chapter 3: Research Methodology ........................................................................... 27 3.1 Introduction ....................................................................................................... 27 3.2 Execution of Data Gathering, Theoretical Part ................................................... 27 3.3 Choosing of the Method ..................................................................................... 27 3.4 Preliminary Preparations .................................................................................... 28 3.5 Research Method ............................................................................................... 29 3.5.1 Steps in Case Study ..................................................................................... 29 3.6 Research Phases ................................................................................................. 30 3.6.1 Research Questions...................................................................................... 31 3.6.2 Hypotheses .................................................................................................. 31 3.6.3 Units of Analysis ......................................................................................... 32 3.6.4 Constructs.................................................................................................... 32 3.7 Measuring the Value of BI in Batelco................................................................. 32 Chapter 4: State of the Art: Business Intelligence in Batelco .................................. 34 4.1 Introduction ....................................................................................................... 34 4.2 Overview of Batelco .......................................................................................... 34

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4.3 Business Intelligence Practitioners in Batelco. .................................................... 35 4.4 Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 47 Chapter 5: Competitive Advantage at Batelco ......................................................... 49 5.1 Introduction ....................................................................................................... 49 5.2 Bahrain Telecommunications Market ................................................................ 49 5.2.1 Changes Affected Bahrain Telecommunication Market ............................... 50 5.3 Business Strategy at Batelco .............................................................................. 51 5.3.1 Local Strategy ............................................................................................. 51 5.3.3 International Strategy................................................................................... 54 5.4 Batelco Performance after Telecom Liberalization ............................................. 55 5.4.1 Products and Services .................................................................................. 56 5.4.2 Profit ........................................................................................................... 64 5.4.3 Employees ............................................................................................. 65

5.4.4 Equity.......................................................................................................... 67 5.5 Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 68 Chapter 6: Analysis of Business Intelligence at Batelco........................................... 70 6.1 Introduction ....................................................................................................... 70 6.2 BI and KM Data Collection by Interview ........................................................... 70 6.2.1 Organizational Transformation .................................................................... 76 6.3 Evaluation Models ............................................................................................. 77 6.3.1 Evaluation of the Current State of BI at Batelco ........................................... 77 6.3.2 BI value using the SAP System Based on the Balanced Scorecard Tool ....... 83 6.4 Evaluating SAP system within Inventory Management ...................................... 84 6.5 Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 87 Chapter 7: Conclusion and Future Work................................................................ 89 7.1 Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 89

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7.2 Recommendations .............................................................................................. 91 7.3 Future Work....................................................................................................... 92 REFERENCES .......................................................................................................... 93 APPENDIX A ............................................................................................................ 99 APPENDIX B .......................................................................................................... 102 APPENDIX C .......................................................................................................... 103 APPENDIX D .......................................................................................................... 105 ............................................................................................................................

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LIST OF TABLES
Table 2.1: Different views on business Intelligence ..................................................... 16 Table 4.1: Sample profile ............................................................................................ 36 Table 4.2: Respondents distribution according to Q2 ................................................... 38 Table 4.3: Respondents distribution according to Q3 ................................................... 39 Table 4.4: Respondents distribution according to Q4 ................................................... 40 Table 4.5: Respondents distribution according to Q4 ................................................... 41 Table 4.6: Respondents distribution according to Q5 ................................................... 42 Table 4.7: Respondents distribution according to Q6 ................................................... 43 Table 4.8: Respondents distribution according to Q7 ................................................... 45 Table 4.9: Respondents distribution according to Q8 ................................................... 46 Table 4.10: Respondents distribution according to Q9 ................................................. 47 Table 5.1: Major tariff deduction by Batelco ............................................................... 52 Table 5.2: Distinguished services and products provided by Batelco............................ 53 Table 5.3: Batelcos overseas groups ........................................................................... 54 Table 5.4: Batelcos mobile and subscribers data ......................................................... 56 Table 5.5: Batelcos fixed lines data ........................................................................... 58 Table 5.6: Batelcos internet revenue and subscribers .................................................. 60 Table 5.7: Batelcos DC data ....................................................................................... 62 Table 5.8: Batelcos profits data .................................................................................. 64 Table 5.9: Batelcos human resource data .................................................................... 66 Table 5.10: Batelcos equity data ................................................................................ 67 Table 6.1: Phases of organizational changes at Batelco ................................................ 76 Table 6.2: The selected population for the survey ........................................................ 78 Table 6.3: Batelcos users from different business units ............................................... 78 Table 6.4 Batelcos BI Systems that used by Business units ........................................ 79

Table 6.5: The SLT-related survey in Batelco .............................................................. 80 Table 6.7: The IT-related survey in Batelco ................................................................. 82 Table 6.8: Average by levels ...................................................................................... 82 Table 6.9: Basic flow of strategic area within the balanced scorecard .......................... 84 Table 6.10: Balanced scorecard Financial prospective in materials management .......... 85 Table 6.11: Balanced scorecard customer prospective in materials management .......... 85 Table 6.12: Balanced scorecard learning and growth prospective ................................. 86 Table 6.13: Balanced scorecard process prospective .................................................... 87

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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 2.1: The information hierarchy ......................................................................... 11 Figure 2.2: BI Cycle by the novintels process ............................................................. 14 Figure 2. 3: BI cycle by thomas group Inc ................................................................... 15 Figure 2. 4: The microsoft BI cycle ............................................................................. 16 Figure 2. 5: 40 Years of business intelligence development paradigm .......................... 17 Figure 2.6 : Graphical representation of porters five forces .......................................... 21 Figure 2. 7: The pyramid of BI .................................................................................... 22 Figure 2. 8: The roadmap of data warehouse................................................................ 24 Figure 4.1: Respondents distribution according to Q1 ................................................. 37 Figure 4. 2: Respondents distribution according to Q2 ................................................. 38 Figure 4. 3: Respondents distribution of Q3 ................................................................. 39 Figure 4. 4: Respondents distribution according to Q4 ................................................. 41 Figure 4. 5: Respondents distribution according to Q4 ................................................. 42 Figure 4.6: Respondents distribution according to Q5 .................................................. 43 Figure 4.7: Respondents distribution according to Q6 ................................................. 44 Figure 4. 8: Respondents distribution according to Q7 ................................................. 45 Figure 4. 9: Respondents distribution according to Q8 ................................................. 46 Figure 4. 10: Respondents distribution according to Q9 ............................................... 47 Figure 5.1: Market Share of mobile telephony ............................................................. 51 Figure 5.2: Competitive forces in business................................................................... 51 Figure 5.3: Competitive force used by Batelco ............................................................ 52 Figure 5.4: Batelcos business indicators for analysis .................................................. 55 Figure 5.5: Revenue over mobile service in Batelco .................................................... 57 Figure 5.6: Mobile subscribers in Batelco .................................................................... 57

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Figure 5.7: Regression line of mobile service and subscribers in Batelco ..................... 58 Figure 5. 8: Revenue over fixed line ............................................................................ 59 Figure 5.9: Subscibers of fixed line in Batelco ............................................................ 59 Figure 5. 10: Regression line between fixed line and subscribers in Batelco ................ 60 Figure 5.11: Revenue of internet in Batelco ................................................................. 61 Figure 5.12: Subscribers of Internet in Batelco ............................................................ 61 Figure 5.14: Revenue on data communication in Batelco ............................................. 63 Figure 5.15: Regression among five years of data communication in Batelco ............. 64 Figure 5.16: Batelcos profits ...................................................................................... 65 Figure 5.17: Regression line among the trend of profits in Batelco .............................. 65 Figure 5. 18 Batelcos employees ................................................................................ 66 Figure 5. 19: Regression line among the trend of employees in Batelco ....................... 67 Figure 5.20: Batelcos equity ....................................................................................... 68 Figure 5. 21: Regression line among the trend of equity in Batelco .............................. 68 Figure 6. 1: The evolution of BI at Batelco .................................................................. 72 Figure 6. 2: Balanced Scorecard view of measurement of BI at Batelco. ...................... 83

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LIST OF ABBREVIATION
2G/3G AGU Batelco BI BIS BISC BSC C&W CEO CI CIO CRM DSESR DSS E.Mail EBITDA 2nd Generation / 3rd Generation Arabian Gulf University Bahrain telecommunications company Business Intelligence Business Information System Business Intelligence Steering Committee Balanced SCorecard Cable & Wireless Chief Executive Officer Competitive Intelligence Chief Information Officer Customer Relationship Management Decision Support and Enterprise Systems Research Decision Support System Electronic Mail Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization

E-Commerce Electronic Commerce EIS ERP ExRP ETL FASMI GCC GDP Executive Information Systems Enterprise Resource Planning Excess Resource Program Extracted Transformed and Loaded Fast Analysis of Shared Multidimensional Information Gulf Cooperation Council Gross Domestic Product

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GSM HR HRM HRMS ROI ICT IDD IP IS ISO ISP IPVPN IT KM KPI MENA MFP MPLS NGN OD OI OLAP PMC PMR SAP SBU

Global System Mobile Human Resource Human Resource Management Human Resource Management System Return on Investment Information Communication Technology International Direct Dial Internet Protocol Information System International Standardization Organization Internet Service Provider Internet Protocol Virtual Private Network Information Technology Knowledge Management Key Performance Indicator Middle East & North Africa Multi-Factor Productivity Multiprotocol Label Switching New Generation Network Organizational Development Operation Intelligence On Line Analytical Processing Project Management Committee Performance Management Review Systems Applications and Products Senior Business Units

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SCIP SCM SLT SCM SMS TRA TBMS USD VoIP

Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals Supply Chain Management Senior Level Team Supply Chain Management Short Message System Telecom Regulatory Authority Transaction Business Management System United State Dollar Voice over Internet Protocol

Chapter 1: Introduction
1.1 Overview
Under the trend of global competition, most medium and large businesses are now required to contend with local and foreign competitors. The companies need more compelling and complex decision support system mechanism to react such competition. The business intelligence system can make an early detection of environmental changes, a quick response to these changes, and the information provided by this system can help corporate managers to understand the past, present and the future of their company. Business Intelligence (BI) can be seen as an umbrella that covers a whole range of concepts. BI can be approached roughly as being a Data Warehouse, with three layers on top of it: Queries and Reports, OnLine Analytical Processing and Data Mining. Authors and companies adopt this ordering widely. However, other orderings exist as well, with the result that some contradict each other. This is simply because the boundaries between the different components are very vague (www.whatis.com) Today, the organizations business environment is becoming more complex and changes faster than ever before. This generates pressures on the organizations and forces them to respond quickly. To be able to respond to these pressures in an appropriate manner, organizations have to make quick, operational, managerial, and strategic decisions, which can be of a very complex nature and may require timely and relevant information, data, and knowledge (Turban et al., 2007). To be able to improve processes and create additional business value, organizations have started to realize the value of existing information. As a result of the increasing demand, the number of BI vendors and tools has increased substantially in the past years. Using analytical tools and data warehousing, BI is extracting and analyzing relevant information and making it accessible to the right member as a support in decision making processes. In this process, data is gathered from different systems, which leads to large amounts of organizational data. To support decision makers in their decision making process to make more informed decisions this data needs to be analyzed, distributed, and accessed by the right person, at the right time (Turban et al. 2007). The number of implementations and organizations using BI has increased since 2006. BIs major benefit is the ability to access relevant decision support when it is needed.

Based on this, it would be interesting to see how decision support and decision-making have changed in organizations after implementing a BI system (Miller and Reinke, 2007). How performing business through BI? How has decision support changed after a BI implementation? How has BI changed the way organizations make decisions? How to make business process faster if BI used? How it affect on business performance and profits in the organization?

1.2 Problem Statement

Since 2004, Bahrain telecommunication company (Batelco) has been trying to improve the whole business aspects within the organization in order to maintain its superiority in the market. One of the most business aspects that has been focused on by the board and senior level management team of Batelco is to improve and enhance the whole process within the business units in the organization. Launching advanced technology such as knowledge and business intelligence systems was considered the first priority for enhancing the organization in different business levels. This study shows the impact of BI in enhancing the competitive advantages of organizations in general and in Batelco as particular. The study will cover the organizations performance since 2004, the year of liberalizing the telecom market by the government of Bahrain. Furthermore, the impact of BI on Batelcos business, as the main topic of this study, will be analyzed to show how the company is gaining benefit from BI throughout all business levels and the advantages that are expected to generate for the company.

1.3 How does BI work

Business intelligence (BI) is a broad category of applications and techniques for gathering, storing, analyzing and providing access to data. It helps enterprise users make better business and strategic decisions. Major applications include the activities of query and reporting, online analytical processing (OLAP), decision support system (DSS), data mining, forecasting and statistical analysis (Nelson, 2007).

Business Intelligence (BI) delivers on a simple promise: to improve business performance by driving had better decision-making throughout the organization. When you are confident that your insight into corporate data is sound, informed, and complete, you can trust that all your decisions will help you create competitive advantage and achieve corporate objectives. To reach BI potential, it must have the flexibility and functionality to extend from the individual through the team to the organization. BI must also be responsive to the different needs of people in the organization and take into account all the information- structured and unstructured, you use to make decisions (www.Microsoft.com). BI can deliver Decision Solutions through three key steps: Provide quality data. Gain deeper insight and facilitate better decision making. Align decisions with corporate goals.

1.4 Research Significance

The purpose of this master thesis is to understand the BI as a concept and to indentify the most advantages of BI in enhancing the competitive advantages in organisations and Batelco in particular. The study will analyse the organisations performance and link it with BI in order to come out with the impact of Business Intelligence on how to be used for enhancing performance in the organisation, and Batelco will be the case which going to be focused in this thesis. When the thinking about the idea goes to management theories: what kind of leading changing theories does the BI-based company use and how have they used these in overall? How does this strategy fit to the structure of the company? Obviously, the most important issue in this master thesis is to explain and understand how organizations deal with business using the BI concepts as a means for better changes. The term strategies reveal changes, improvements and enhancements in the company. It can be small changes or big changes. Therefore, the company such Batelco was

selected because of its continuous improvements and developments beside advanced technology that always considered by its Management. Batelco has an existing BI environment, which means that BI features already installed all information systems currently being used, so the study in this research will concentrate on how the company

is adapting this new technology and to how extent helps to achieve the companys goals. The thesis can be used as a guideline for other organizations to apply BI in their business using Batelco as a benchmark and good example.

1.4.1 Scope
The chosen topics are useful and related to BI, with focus on the competitive advantages aspect. This study covers different aspects of organizations and special concentration will be on the competitive advantages side, and Bahrain telecommunications company (Batelco) is the selected case. Most of information of the selected company are taken from the company annual reports along with some key users who interviewed through both structured and unstructured method to get some information that are not printed in the companys annual report or through their web site.

1.5 Objectives
The main objective is: To measure and evaluate whether Batelco runs its business on the base of BI, taking its business performance, views of different management levels and using some models as the base for the finding results. The sub-objectives are: i. Determine the factors that affect Batelco to stay competitive in the current telecommunication competition market, especially in the current local and globalization environment. ii. Determine the best methods that help to apply BI in full business activities. iii. Business performance will focus on the following business indicators : 1. Revenues of products and services 2. Profits 3. Number of customers 4. Total equity 5. No of employees 6. Mobile subscriptions

1.6 Research Methodology

The methodology used in this study to achieve the objectives as follows: Exploratory study i. Review the studies and researches relating to BI concepts. ii. Identify the most effective points play the core in making BI-based organization. iii. Review business performance of the selected organization. Research variables ( will be used to analyze the business performance of the selected organization during last consecutive five years i.e. the time of changing the telecom market from monopoly to an open market) The following variables will be considered: i. Profit ii. Mobile subscriptions iii. Revenues of products and services iv. Number of lines v. Internet subscriptions Descriptive Study i. Describe the factors and conditions that lead to making the BI-based environment. ii. Describe the impact of BI on the organization business performance. iii. Describe the steps and initiatives that were taken by the company to enhance the knowledge management and business intelligence within the organization. iv. Indicate the effects of BI in the competition market taking in mind all factors already mentioned. v. Analyze in details the business performance of Batelco the strategic methods that the organization is following to expand and catch other telecom market in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Data Collection Methods i. By literature survey. ii. By Questionnaires with some key users, managers and top managers in the selected organization.

iii. By a small workshop with key staff who contributed in projects related to knowledge management in Batelco, using both questionnaires and interviews. iv. Through data collections from the companys annual reports.

1.7 Limitations
Only one company was chosen as a case study, and the selected company will be analyzed and studied in terms of its business performance and the BI tools that being used in the organization. Most information is mainly secondary data taken from the companys annual reports. Not all details could be reached because of privacy.

1.8 Thesis Outline

The thesis divided into seven chapters: Chapter 1 which is an introduction and overview of the problem as a whole and the effects of Business Intelligence on organizations and Batelco in particular, as well as problem discussion, introduction on BI, research significant, the objectives of this study, importance of the study and Limitation of the study. Chapter 2, is for the literature review, included information about the major concepts in the study, business intelligence, competitiveness and its related topics such as Competitive Intelligence (CI), Operation Intelligence (OI), competitive advantages and described at the end the telecommunications technology since the selected company runs its business in the telecommunications field. The chapter covered in details all topics related to this study. Chapter 3 Covered the Research methodology. Clearly mentioned what methodology used in this research to achieve the required data, how it could be achieved and the tools that used to analyze the required data. Chapter 4 Covered the state of the art of BI in Batelco. Give the overall picture on how BI and its main elements are used within current business processes in the company. Chapter 5 Covered the competitive strategy of Batelco business. Focused on the business performance within the last five consecutive years in Batelco, using the data obtained through their annual reports and website, and evaluate the results to figure out and discover the relation between BI and the achieved results.

Chapter 6 Covered the case study of BI at Batelco. Moreover, two models were used in this research to evaluate the different aspects of BI. First model focused on a survey amongst the core three management levels (Top management, Managers and Users, IT People), in order to measure the effectiveness of BI on the companys business and process. Another model used in the chapter is to measure the impact of BI on Batelcos vision using the balanced scorecard tool which leads to judge and measure whether the BI is meeting its intended purpose. Chapter 7 Covered the conclusion, recommendations and future work.

Chapter 2: Literature Review

2.1 Introduction
The significance of information as a strategic resource has been emphasized during the last ten years. Comprehensive and timely information is crucial, e.g. in generating new products and improving business operations. In addition, information plays a central role in operative and strategic decision-making. On the other hand, all the existing information cannot be observed or verbalized, quite apart from how well it can be understood, and thus, organizations have to make decisions without perfect information. Therefore, a competitive edge is gained through the ability to anticipate raw data, to turn it into information, to craft it into knowledge relevant to the business environment and to actually utilize intelligence gained from it. Business intelligence plays a central role in producing up-to-date information for operative and strategic decision-making. In this thesis, the business intelligence concept is understood as an organized and systematic process by which organizations acquire, analyze and disseminate information significant for their business activities and hence business enhancement. However, the term can refer to processes, techniques or tools to support the making of faster and better decisions. In any case, by utilization of business intelligence, organizations learn to anticipate the actions of their customers and competitors as well as different phenomena and trends in their market areas and fields of activity. In addition to external information, organizations have to take advantage efficiently of existing information and knowledge inside organizations (Barnes and Hunt, 2001). There has been no commonly shared conception regarding what business intelligence is; on the contrary each author has promoted his or her own idea of its connotations. Also business intelligence terms and practices have not yet become very well established, and several different terms are employed for the concept. In the real world, business intelligence is often used to refer to both information technology based systems and actual business information management processes (Tyson, 1986). In this chapter the chosen theoretical literature related to all aspects of BI are explained.

To begin this chapter, first the definition for the word intelligence is studied, following and sequentially to define the BI and its related topics. The information were arranged into a harmonic structure, one topic leads to the other. The chapter highlights the major concepts of the study and illustrates the outcomes of the literatures revised, going through Intelligence, Business Intelligence, Competitive Intelligence, Competitiveness and Telecommunications Technology since the selected company runs its business in the telecom field.

2.2 Defining Intelligence

Intelligence is the most vital term used in this study beside the performance, and needs to be defined. It needs to be understood both according to what it consists of and how it is achieved. In the age of information we are bombarded with data and it is more and more difficult to distinguish information. Information leads eventually to knowledge and understanding. The term information anxiety, coined by Wurman, (2001) has an interesting background. Wurman considers information anxiety to be a black hole between data and knowledge. It is the ground between what we understand and what we think we should understand. Intelligence is analyzed or processed information. At the same time it is more than mere information; its relevance and meaning within the decision-making process have been realized. Fuld (1991) stated that understanding the difference between intelligence and information is essential to success. Companies that do not understand the difference do not receive intelligence but instead a flood of data and information. According to Hastedt (1991) no precise and generally agreed upon definition of intelligence exists. Scholars also tend to give definitions with multiple meanings. This can be confusing and lead to several interpretations of intelligence and what it should be capable of. Moreover, under the concept knowledge Hastedt (1991) defined knowledge as what is needed to be known and could be used. Under activity he makes provision for the activities that are needed to produce an intelligence product. Kahaner (1996) defined intelligence in the following way: Information has been filtered, distilled, and analyzed. It has been turned into something that can be acted

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upon. The definition highlights all the various characteristics in BI activities and the intelligence process. Calof (1997) wrote about the big difference between data and intelligence. He includes the saying that until information is analyzed and actionable recommendations are drawn out, you do not have intelligence. Huseman and Goodman (1998) provided an amusing and yet a very descriptive analogy of the difference between information and knowledge: The difference between information and knowledge is like the nutritional difference between bon-bons and broccoli. Abrams (1998) argued for a Data-Information-Knowledge -continuum, where the data flows along the continuum and eventually is transformed /processed into knowledge. He links behavior (action) and decision- making to this continuum and these can be seen as a supporting pillar for decision-making. Shaker et al.(1998) defined intelligence as a compilation and analysis of data and information provided by any and every source, human or otherwise, that has foresight and can render an insightful picture of intentions, capabilities, or activities, as well as their possible implications and consequences. All of these sources agree that any person or electronic or printed items can possess information, which can be used. The definition clearly puts a lot of emphasis on understanding the meaning of the information you posses or have acquired. They provided a model of an information hierarchy, which they arrange in the shape of a pyramid as shown in Figure (2.1).

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Intelligence Information, which is actionable and has foresight Information Analyzed data, value-added foresight Data Public and published, quantities in nature foresight

Figure 1: Figure 2.1: The information hierarchy

In addition to differences between information and knowledge, Hamrefors (1999) wrote in his article that there is also a difference between sharing information and sharing knowledge. When the organization process the information received from customers and interpret it to the meaningful process in this way increase the value of the information. Barclay and Kaye, (2000) defined, the essence of intelligence begins with environmental scanning activities, also known as surveillance. The essence of this process is a transformation of data, information and knowledge into intelligence as a final product. Therefore, and as a result, intelligence must not be confused with information. Warner (2004) in that (he has) to wonder if the difficulty in doing so resides more in the slipperiness of the tools than in the poor skills of the craftsmen or the complexity of the topic. He went on to state that almost each new scholar in the field of intelligence aims to develop a compelling theory of intelligence. It is possible to see intelligence as an activity including actions such as collection and analysis, which is used for decision-making, which follows a specific process and is linked to a specific organization. Furthermore, the definition of intelligence is well known through the above quotes and its in brief the processed information, that the

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organization can work through it to achieve its next steps. i.e. have knowledge means you know what you want to achieve goals in the next step. (Pirolli, Lee and Card, 2004).

2.3 Business Intelligence

There are different basic terms that used for business intelligence (BI), Competitive Intelligence (CI) and Operation Intelligence (OI). There is a slight difference between BI verses CI and OI. Gelb and Zinkhan (1985) related competitive intelligence with the term competitiveness in the business context. West (2000) defined Competitive Intelligence (CI) as a part of Business Intelligence, mentioned when BI is linked with competitiveness and how organizations can manage through using the BI concepts. Regarding operations intelligence (OI) is platform aggregates, relates, and presents operational and business data in real-time. It does so in a manner that is intuitive and useful for every individual who plays a role in delivering business results. It can be applied initially to an individual site, and evolved to include all sites, divisions, regions, and the overall enterprise. (Gilad and Gilad, 1986). Mahesh (2004) referred OI as an important class of information technology that enables better decision-making and improved business performance based on the ready availability of real-time status and performance metrics throughout the organization. The term business intelligence will be used throughout this research to emphasis on its role in overall of business activities, and to keep on the same terminology that is used as the title of this thesis.

2.3.1 Business Intelligence Concepts

Business intelligence has many forms. It can be said that it consists of many different smaller components but at the same time it can be said that these smaller components are totally different forms of business intelligence, which can be practiced as a separate discipline. Different forms of business intelligence include: strategic intelligence, competitor intelligence, market intelligence, customer intelligence, etc. (Hannula and Pirttimaki, 2003).

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Business intelligence as a term is broader and more comprehensive than other terms being used such as competitive intelligence (CI). Nonetheless, both terms basically consist of the same things (Diwitt, 1997). Since 2005 the discipline has entered yet another stage of development. Business intelligence is more seen as a motor for innovation. Risk and possibility analysis have replaced fact and prognosis (Lonnqvist and Pirttimaki, 2006). Here are some findings from the study, which shows the latest trends in business Intelligence: The analysis is becoming more central. Other companies are planning to add resources to the BI. The BI is becoming more systematic. The management is more and more supportive of BI activity. Efficiency and integration are of particular focus. To integrate the BI more closely with business is a priority in development plans. The BI is taking a strategic lead in everything from information gathering to business advantage and innovation. The effective management and leverage of data represent both the greatest opportunity and the most difficult challenge for most enterprises. Chief Information Officer (CIO) survey done by Gartner (2006) showed BI as their highest rating technology issue; as they focus on projects that enable users to positively affect financial and business performance. BI is a set of concepts, methods, and processes to improve business decisions, which use information from multiple sources and apply experience and assumptions to develop an accurate understanding of business dynamics. Gartner (2006) added that its concept is to integrate the analysis of data with decision support system to provide information to people throughout the organization in order to improve strategic and tactical decisions. Buytendijk (2001) concentrated on BI according on its profitable aspect for the organizations and reported that, based on a study from 2001 to 2006, enterprises that apply BI had achieved two to three times return of investment more than those who do not.

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Davis (2002) defined another concept of BI that related to competitive advantages in the industry. That concept helps the industry to develop intelligent decision support systems to gain the competitive advantage. It has been applied to many areas that are related to the enterprise management process, and some of them have formed their own systems with specific characteristics. Typical application scopes include: ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), CRM (Customer Relationship Management), HRM (Human Resource Management), SCM (Supply Chain Management) and SAP (System Application and Products) (Xie , 2001). Keith (2002) defined business intelligence according to its built concept as a fast technology and becoming a strategic differentiator for todays leading organizations. In his own definition he mentioned BI has evolved during the past three years from a niche, departmentally focused solution to a strategic enterprise asset. 2.3.1.1 Business Intelligence Cycles This is a result and work of an international company specializing in providing BI and competitive intelligence services and products. The Novintels process (Viva Business Intelligence Inc., 1998) consists of eight phases: Need Analysis, Observing and Monitoring, Collecting Information, Structuring and Elimination, Analysis,

Communication, Storing, and Utilization and Feedback as shown in Figure (2.2).

Utilization and Feedback Need Analysis

Storing

Observing and Monitoring

Communications

Collecting Information

Analysis

Structuring and Elimination

2 : Figure 2.2: BI Cycle by The Novintels process

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This BI cycle stresses, in particular, the importance in Observing and Monitoring possible information sources, so that correct data sources may be identified for uncovering the true knowledge of the needs in the first phase. The second emphasis is the preprocessing of raw data through structuring and elimination, which is to ensure data validity and soundness, so that meaningful analysis can be carried out with statistical methods. Thomas Group Inc., a strategic intelligence consulting company in US, developed a slightly different version of BI as shown in Figure (2.3), cycle with six phases: Planning and Direction, Data Collection, Information Processing and Storage, Analysis and Production, Dissemination, and Intelligence Users and Decision makers(Thomas, 2001).

Intelligence Users and Decision makers Dissemination

Planning and Direction

Data Collection

Analysis and Production

Information Processing and Storage

gure 3 : Figure 2. 3: BI Cycle by Thomas Group Inc

One feature of this process is the emphasis of the needs driven cycle. The needs are the alternative expressions of business objectives. The second feature of this process is the Dissemination phase, where the emphasis is to interpret results of analysis in terms of business contexts, so that knowledge insights may be revealed. The revealed knowledge must be further translated into clear and understandable business policies/ operations, and it should be distributed, through the application of IT technologies, to a wide range of management levels/positions for implementation.

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Microsofts process is perhaps the simplest BI process ever presented (Vitt, 2002). Microsoft defines a BI cycle as a progression from Analysis to Insight to Action and finally to Measurement as shown in Figure (2.4).
Measurement Analysis

Action

Insight

igure 4 : Figure 2. 4: The Microsoft BI cycle

2.3.2 More definitions of BI

Table 2.1, shows more reviews of existing definitions of Business Intelligence quoted by various authors.

Table 1:Table 2.1:Different views on Business Intelligence

Quotes BI is the processes, technologies, and tools needed to turn data into information, information into knowledge and knowledge into plans that drive profitable business action. BI encompasses data warehousing, business analytics tools and content/knowledge management. BI is involves the use of data from internal and external sources to feed a powerful suite of analytical tools in order to discover strengths and weaknesses within an organization as well as opportunities and threats in the organizations environment. BI is a solution suite that integrates data from multiple enterprise sources and transforms it into key insights that enable executives, managers, and front-line employees to take actions that lead to dramatic improvements in business performance. BI is the process for increasing the competitive advantage of a company by intelligent use of available data in decision-making. BI is a concept of applying a set of technologies to turn data into meaningful information. With Business Intelligence Applications, large amounts of data originating in many different formats (spreadsheets, relationship databases, web logs) can be consolidated and presented to key business analysts.., and armed with timely, intelligent information that is easily understood, and the business analyst is enabled to affect change and develop strategies to drive higher profits. BI is the conscious methodical transformation of data from all sources into new forms to provide information that is business driven and results oriented. Authors Rouach and Santi (2001)

Hoelscher (2002)

Siebel (2005)

Bergerou (2005) Chang, Dillion and Hussain (2006)

Biere (2008)

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2.3.3 Evolving of Business Intelligence

The diagram in Figure (2.5) is the view of the almost 40 years (i.e. 1970 to 2010) of Business Intelligence development as defined by Gordon (1989). He defined that the notion of Business Intelligence has evolved over the last thirty years and is likely to evolve further.
Business Intelligence 40 Years of Business Intelligence Technologies and Applications
Trustworthiness Systems Reputation Systems Semantic Web and Ontology Digital eco-systems and Tech Quality Assessment Sys Risk Management sys Doc & Text mining Data Mining Web Services and Grids Recommendation Sys Autonomous Agents Document Handling etc Information Exchange Knowledge Disc/Sharing OLAP (On-line analytical proc.) JIT Services and Track & Trace Inter-OP Middleware Intelligent Multi-agents Security &Privacy etc

Databases Agreement) Inventory Control DBMS, UIMS, etc Customer Service Account Management etc

Data Warehouse Supply Chain Managemt Decision Support Systems CRM (Customer Relationship Management) ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) Business Modelling KPI (key performance Workflow Management Index), Process Control e-Commerce Quality Standards etc. SLA (Service Level

Time 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

BI through organization external data

BI through organization internal data

Figure 5 : Figure 2. 5: 40 Years of Business Intelligence Development Paradigm Business Intelligence is largely focused on the ideas of Data Mining, Recommender systems and Knowledge Discovery Techniques. These represent very important aspects of Business Intelligence. Once their new dimensions of interactions and knowledge is added, the Business Intelligence now and in the future will include amongst other things, Trust and Reputation systems, Knowledge Sharing, Ontologies and Ontology based search engines and internal and external holistic risk management. This is illustrated by the projected notions of Business Intelligence given in Figure (2.5).

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2.3.4 BI Functions
Hugh, Watson and Winter (2006) defined that the overall intent and function of business intelligence is to deliver analyzed information to clients so that they can make better decisions either in their daily work to improve business performance and in strategic level to enhance the organizations competitiveness. The main energy for BI to function properly and gives the expected results is the Information used within it. Information can be divided in different ways. There are basically two kinds of information available within any organization: internal and external information. Internal information covers all kinds of internal documents (strategy documents, internal reports, development reports, product line introductions, etc.), internal communication on the intranet, the knowledge base of the company (knowledge management systems), and tacit knowledge. External information refers to information from the business environment and it includes the whole range of information from the media and oral information to the key groups and their informants (competitors, clients, subcontractors, retailers, manufacturers, etc.) (Biere, 2003). In addition to official information, there are also unofficial information that can obtain through conversations in lunchrooms, at trade fairs or informal get-togethers, and faceto-face discussions with key persons. It must be strongly emphasized that industrial espionage is not in accordance with ethical intelligence work (Duffy, 2000). Business intelligence can also be divided into systematic and unsystematic intelligence. Systematic intelligence means that it is a structured and an official and established part of a companys functions. Unsystematic intelligence takes place everywhere in daily functions and is often communicated orally or through other unofficial (Moss, 2003). Anneli Pirttil (2000) writes that studies have shown that the efforts engaged for systematic intelligence gathering do not correlate well with the meaning it has for a manager. The amount of unofficial and unsystematic intelligence is much lower but it can be much more valuable to a manager.

2.4 The Competitiveness Concept

Another aspect investigated in the research is the firms competitiveness. Porter (1990) defined competitiveness as at the national level and its based on superior productivity

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performance and the economys ability to shift output to high productivity activities which in turn can generate high levels of real wages. Kitzmantel (1995) defined competitiveness like any other human quality that everybody strives for but is difficult to define and even more difficult to achieve. Another view of competitiveness in some organizations perspective is the ability to persuade customers to choose their offerings over alternatives, while others view competitiveness as the ability to improve continuously process capabilities (Rainer and Kazem, 1994). Boltho (1996) and Frohlich (1989) defined competitiveness as technological leadership or growth rate. The World Economic Forum, for instance, defines a countrys competitiveness as the ability of a national economy to achieve sustained rates of economic growth as measured by the annual changes in per capita Gross Domestic product (GDP) (OECD, 2001). Little (2004) defined competitiveness (from a companys perspective) as its ability to provide products and services more effectively and efficiently than relevant competitors. Rusu (2003) added in a majority of discussions and studies on the subject of competitiveness, the typical approach appears to be focused around the various factors and goals used to measure competitiveness instead of defining the actual concept itself.

2.4.1. Competitiveness and Productivity Growth

Enterprises are competitive when they can achieve sustainable growth in both labour and multi-factor productivity that enable them to beat the costs per unit of output, and the non-cost characteristics, of other firms (IDABC, 2005). The institute added that this is true both on the domestic and on the international level. Productivity is commonly defined as a ratio of a volume measure of output to a volume measure of input use. The most common measure used to compare productivity level and growth between countries is labour productivity, defined as output per unit of labour input most often measured in terms of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per man-hour. However, labour

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productivity growth provides only part of the picture and may actually be misleading. Competitiveness is determined by productivity growth; a competitive economy is one that experiences high and sustained productivity growth leading to an increase in standards of living.

2.4.2 Competitiveness and Performance

Improving competitiveness through performance-measurement systems: An integrated performance-measurement system can improve competitiveness by meshing the organization's long-term goals with its day-to-day clinical and administrative functions. If performance is high the organization then increases their competitiveness in the market and means they are the right track to their set goals. In the last years, performance management is a hot topic for organizations. To stay in business they have to do their work excellently (Nash, 1983). Nash added that traditional performance
management focused mainly on financial measures. It is easy to compare financial numbers, but also non-financial measures are important. The non-financial measures contribute over time

to the financial numbers.

2.4.3 Competitive Advantages

In the global context, this means that countries should identify and develop some sources of competitiveness in one or a few areas of economic activities. However Porter believes that competitiveness is an industry specific phenomenon (Porter, 1990). Leidner (1995) determined the success of competitive advantage through skilled labor, communication infrastructure and local raw material source, along with customers expectation about the product that should be assessed too. Porter (1980) came with new views on the same model and stressed the company to face a threat from the buyer as the buyers in the market can act as a vital force. When the customers are few in number and switching to another companys product are easy for them, and then the customers are considered to be powerful. In this situation the company is always under the threat of buyers specified price and also the possibility of buyer switching to another company. When the company is supposed to design their product according to suppliers demand as the suppliers output is unique then the suppliers are considered to be powerful. If number of suppliers is large, then the

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suppliers become weak as the company have more option. Low switching cost can be one more reason for the supplier to be weak and vice versa. Porters (1998) defined five forces model which has the ability to determine the competitiveness of a market for the organizations. The collective strength of five major forces determines the ultimate profit potential of an industry. But whatever the collective strength is, the strategy should be formulated in such way that the company can defend itself against these forces or influence them in its favor. Porters five forces are, (See Figure 2.6): 1. Barriers of Entry 2. Bargaining Power of customer 3. Bargaining Power of Supplier 4. Available substitutes 5. Level of existing rivalries

Figure 6 : Figure 2.6 : Graphical Representation of Porters Five Forces

.

Storper (1997) emphasized that while entering in a market, it is important to assess the barriers that could create some hinders during the entry. Low entry barriers create high competition in the market and vice versa. If the existing companies have already created a unique brand positioning, then that could be a great barrier for new comers as it will force the new entrant to invest heavily to establish new brand image over the old ones.

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2.5 Business Intelligence and Information Technology

Business intelligence is highly supported by Information System and tools. The effects that the Information System (IS) and Information Technology (IT) use have on BI are prominently highlighted in the literature. Huber (1990) proposed that the use of computer assisted information storage and acquisition technologies leads to organizational intelligence that is more accurate, comprehensive, timely and available. In addition Leidner and Elam (1995) suggest that the use of executive information systems (EIS) is positively associated with faster problem identification. According to Hashmi (2004) the systemization of BI is achieved through the use of facts and factbased systems, such as executive information systems, decision support systems, enterprise information systems, management support systems, on line Analytical Processing (OLAP), and newer technologies such as data mining, data visualization, and geographical information systems. Business Intelligence (BI) can be seen as an umbrella that covers a whole range of concepts. BI can be approached roughly as being a Data Warehouse, with three layers on top of it: Queries and Reports, OnLine Analytical Processing and Data Mining (see Figure 2.7). Authors and companies adopt this ordering widely. However, other orderings exist as well, with the result that some contradict each other. This is simply because the boundaries between the different components are very vague (Lewis, 2001).

OLAP

Queries & Reports Data Warehouse

Figure 7 :

Figure 2. 7: The pyramid of BI

A Data Warehouse consists of one or more copies of transaction and/or non-transaction data that have been transformed in such a way that they are suitable for querying,

Complexity & Bus. Potential

Data Mining Frequency & # users

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reporting and other data analysis. It forms the basis on top of which further analyses can be carried out. Figure (2.7) showed that the first level of analysis is querying and reporting. Query means using a computer language to obtain immediate, online answers to user questions. A level higher is Online Analytical Processing (OLAP). This technology allows users to carry out complex data analyses with the help of a quick and interactive access to the information in data warehouses from different viewpoints. The top layer is Data Mining. A simple definition is: analyzing and finding patterns in large amounts of data in order to support decision making and predict future behavior. In the area of Data Mining especially concepts like Customer Profiling will stay popular, because in the end it will always be rewarding to keep on knowing who your most profitable customers are (Lewis, 2001). The information and knowledge that is dug up by data mining can also be used to provide information about a web site and its visitors: Web Mining. When engaged in ecommerce activities it is the invisible and not-straightforward information that is most valuable, information hidden in the gigabytes of data generated each day that describe actions made by every visitor to the site (Laudon and Laudon, 2000). With BI-tools it is possible to carry out analyses and reports on virtually all thinkable aspects of the underlying business, as long as the data about this business come in large amounts and are stored in a Data Warehouse. Departments that are known to benefit most from Business Intelligence are (Database) Marketing, Sales, Finance, ICT (especially the Web) and the higher Management (Kimball, 2000).

2.5.1 Data Warehouse

Data warehouse is a collection of data, from a variety of sources, organized to provide useful guidance to an organization's decision makers and business intelligence entails the gathering of data from internal and external data sources, as well as the storing and analysis thereof to make it measurable, so as to assist and sustain more efficient and longitudinal decision-making (Kimball, 2002).

2.5.2 Data Warehouse Design Concept

Figure (2.8) is the roadmap for the design of this data warehouse and is based on the data warehouse approach by Kimball and Ross (2002). Data that already exists within

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information system sources are extracted, transformed and loaded (ETL) into a data warehouse that consists out of one or more data marts. From this data warehouse ad hoc queries and longitudinal business measures can be drawn as needed.

Figure 8 :
Source: Loudon, (2007)

Figure 2. 8: The roadmap of data warehouse

A data mart is a small scaled-down version of a data warehouse designed for a strategic business unit (SBU) or a department. Since they contain less information than the data warehouse they provide more rapid response and are more easily navigated than enterprise-wide data warehouses (Dyche, 2000). A data mart is a subset of an organization data warehouse that is usually orientated to a specific purpose of major data subject. (McFadden, Hoffer and Prescott, 1999). According to the EDUCAUSE, Higher Education data warehouse directory (Heise, 2007). Higher Education institutions typically draw data from data marts such as Alumni, Prospective students, modules and facilities.

2.5.4 BI Tools
It is important to move across the different BI tools since they are the key to implement the BI concept in the organization. In this section the key general categories of business intelligence tools are; (Lnnqvist and Pirttimki, 2006).
MS Excel

This is the most common tool used everywhere from personal data storing and classification to a basic organizational tool. Excel sheets are easy to maintain, send through mail and primarily used to display data.

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Reporting Tools

Its categorized as custom-built reporting tools and commercial reporting tools. The general purposes are to create, schedule, maintain and run reports. Business operation reporting is the common application in this category.
OLAP

Online Analytical Processing tools are used by more complex conditions when the quantity of data is very high and analyzing manually is difficult. These include Hybrid OLAP, Relational OLAP and Multidimensional OLAP and supports in analyzing data in many dimensions.
Data Mining Tools

These are used to extract data like information about consumer by special software that can show some unique pattern or trends in a large amount of data. Classification and clustering are commonly used data mining tools. 2.5.4.1 Enterprise Application Integration tools These are used to consolidate and organizing various data, analyzing methodology, querying for enhancing business performance. Query tools are software that describes a particular pattern and gives details in the data. The above tools are embedded in the latest ERP information systems and used by many organizations and Batelco is one of them: SAP: The original name for SAP was German: Systeme, Anwendungen, Produkte, German for "Systems Applications and Products." The original SAP idea was to provide customers with the ability to interact with a common corporate database for a comprehensive range of applications. CRM: customer relationship management is an information industry term for methodologies, software, and usually Internet capabilities that help an enterprise manage customer relationships in an organized way SCM: supply chain management is the process of planning, implementing, and controlling the operations of the supply chain as efficiently as possible. Supply Chain Management spans all movement and storage of raw materials, work-in-

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process inventory, and finished goods from point-of-origin to point-ofconsumption. Oracle: Oracle is made up of a set of processes running in operating system. These processes manage how data is stored and how it is accessed.

2.6 Telecommunications
The study will focus on Batelco, and it is specialist in the telecommunications field which is known as the fastest to keep pace with evolving technology. According to Newton (1998), the term telecommunications is defined as the art and science of communicating over a distance by telephone, telegraph and radio. It is the transmission, reception and the switching of signals, such as electrical or optical, by wire, fiber, or electromagnetic (i.e. through-the-air) means . Telecommunications is like communications, except that it involves communicating electronically across distances (generally over telephone lines) without any changes occurring to the original message. All forms of information may be sent electronically: voice, text, data, graphics, and video (ONeil and Everett, 1988). Another definition is given to telecommunications technology as the electronic communication of information over distance (Mitchell, Hendricks and Sterry 1993). The telecommunications is broadly defined as the process by which information gets transferred electronically from one place to another (Kooker and Brey, 1991). The word telecommunication is a combination of tele, the Greek word for far or remote and the Latin word communicare, which means to inform someone or exchange information. Telecommunication describes the process of exchanging Information over a long distance without a physical medium such as a letter. Based on this definition, telecommunication started with smoke signals (visual telecommunication) and drums (audio telecommunication), (www.answers.com/topic/telecommunication).

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Chapter 3: Research Methodology

3.1 Introduction
In this chapter the research methods and the actual research process of the study are explained in detail. This thesis is mainly an investigation of business intelligence (BI) awareness within Bahrain Telecommunication Company (Batelco) and how it is applied. This study is of both qualitative and quantitative kinds using collected data to measure and analyze the BIs environment within Batelco. The thesis is included both primary data with personal interviews as well as secondary data such as Internet and Batelcos reports to get information on its business activities and performance. Both inductive and deductive theory methods are attempted in this research.

3.2 Execution of Data Gathering, Theoretical Part

An extensive data- gathering project was started over months, when the subject of the thesis was beginning to take form. Numerous sources have been used to gather articles, books, papers and studies related to the study. The searches at AGU have mostly concentrated on the university databases, the Arabian Gulf University, and through its database systems. At the Universitys Database various external references, full text and books have been used, including ebscohost and Proquest database web sites. Literatures were gathered using the library catalogues of AGU. Moreover, the Internet was used several times as a search tool. Frequently used search engines were Google and the clustering engine, Clusty. A lot of information gathering took place according to the snowball method, meaning that a lot of good sources were always found from the reference lists of particular articles. In addition to that and in order to collect required information from the selected company, using trusted sources that issued from the company itself and contain rich information such as annual reports, which cover all financial and non-financial events over the company.

3.3 Choosing of the Method

Studies are usually either quantitative or qualitative in nature or a mixture of both. As is realized, quantitative means amounts and numbers and qualitative means quality and character (Repstad, 1988). Because the nature of this study was to study how the

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situation is going on in Batelco, and to measure and analyze the results quoted from their official reports and both structured and non structured interviews that conducted to reach to some set results. Moreover, such kind of study requires hearing opinions from the experts about the issues related to the topic from their own perspective. In order to go deeper to understand the qualifications to act as an information or intelligence professional it was realized which way the study needs to go, it was not desired to ask these circumstances from a larger number of participants and go with a quantitative study but it was desired to find out what these respondents think specially who are in decision taking positions. One of the aims of this study was to look into different aspects of BI and to conduct a survey to come out with a result on how the BI system being used in the company and how the employees are dealing with it. Also, a model of BI was selected to indicate how the intelligent function is used, and the SAP system through its logistic part was selected to experiment such the model.

3.4 Preliminary Preparations

The empirical part of the study was performed by obtaining Batelco business results from their annual reports and the website in previous five years in order to analyze and study the results to come out with a conclusion over the businesss results, especially after transferring the telecom market to a competitive market. Furthermore, the results will be used to test the effect of Business Intelligence systems used to maintain and enhance the business outcomes, and measure the impacts on the companys growth and profits. Through using the mentioned methods it could be judged whether the company is running and gaining benefits from business intelligence and then its intended purposes especially in terms of business enhancement and improvements. Both structured and non-structured questionnaires along with some models used to measure the BI within Batelco, the details of the survey are explained in this chapter. However, a small workshop was conducted which involved some key persons to explain how the company handed initiatives on knowledge systems, and used interviews face to face to reach to the information that needed for the case study. Beside that the questionnaire method used to reach to the companys perspective regarding BI used in different management levels and they divided according to the research questions. The

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questions were slightly different for IT in charges than for the staff in operation and senior level team. The source of questions quoted from Monhash University, one of university that specialist in BI blog.

3.5 Research Method

Case study analysis on Batelco is chosen as a method for this research. Because the research included both exploratory and descriptive, this is the most suitable method according to Yin (2003). The second reason for selecting Batelco as a case study is to measure how the company could keep and boost its competitive advantage using BI features even after the changes made to the telecom market in the kingdom of Bahrain.

3.5.1 Steps in Case Study

The steps taken while conducting a case study are:. (a) Preparation for Data Collection There are three steps should be prepared before collect the data in case studies. Those steps are: i. ii. iii. Prior skill of investigators. Develop a case study protocol. Conduct a study case.

(b) Data Collection Technique Six sources of data collection used for this case study: i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. Documentation. Workshop Archival records. Internet, interviews. Direct observations. Participant-observation.

In order to apply high-quality case study three principles of data collection were used: Multiple sources of evidence (Experts people) A case study based on the evidence Maintained a chain of evidence.

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(c) Analyzing Case Study Evidence This last step used to analyze the case study and is a core part to reach to the required information. (d) Composing the Case Study Report The reporting of the case study takes written or oral forms. The steps followed in the compositional process:
i. Identifying the audience for report, ii. Developing the compositional structure, iii. Following certain procedures.

3.6 Research Phases

Four main phases followed in the research: i. Design ii. Data Collection iii. Analysis iv. Reporting The Design and Data Collection phases were started immediately after the idea and proposal of the thesis was approved. The main axis of the thesis to collect data about business intelligence and latest studies conducted over it, and then to obtain how BI is dealt with at Batelco prior to evaluate the current BI environment in the company. Also, analysis on business performance in Batelco during last five consecutive years are presented in chapter five to evaluate, to how extent the BI affects on the companys business progress. The design of the research consists of four components: Research questions Propositions (hypothesis) Unit of analysis Logic linking of the data to the propositions (constructs)

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The following subsections discuss each component:

3.6.1 Research Questions

The questions are concentrated in Business activities and Business intelligence aspects as detail in the following part: 1. What is the definitions and state of art in Business Intelligence? 2. What is the meaning of Intelligence? 3. Relation between BI and Competitiveness? 4. What is Competitive Intelligence (CI)? 5. What values can Business intelligence add to organization? 6. How can Telecommunications organizations be defined and classified? 7. What does mean by telecommunication and its primary process in organizations look like? 8. How is the state of the art of Business Intelligence in Batelco? 9. What does the case of Business Intelligence systems in telecommunications look like? ( Batelco Case ) 10. Do the results of the last five consecutive years on Batelcos performance reflect growth of the company? 11. Does Batelco implement BI concepts properly in its current business? 12. Does Batelco need to catch experience from others regarding BI? 13. Which Business Intelligence tools are used in Batelco? 14. What is the Business Intelligence maturity of telecommunications organizations and in Batelco? 15. How Business Intelligence enhance Competitive Intelligence in organizations and Batelco in particular? 16. To what extent is Business Intelligence used in telecom industry? 17. To what extent will trends in the current telecom industry influence the business intelligence maturity and use?

3.6.2 Hypotheses
There are some core hypotheses for this research, these are:

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H1: Business Intelligence is playing an important role to enhance business of Batelco and then to increase its competitive advantage? H2: Business Intelligence mostly used by top level rather than used in tactics and operation. H3: Business Intelligence is mainly used for reports and analyses. H4: The changes in the telecom market did not change on Batelco business performance. H5: Batelco is already running its business within the BI environment.

3.6.3 Units of Analysis

The research was done in Batelco as a telecom operator. The analysis will focus on departments that BI should be considered crucial for their duties. To get a good case study of the organizations, it is necessary to speak with the right people. Therefore both structured and unstructured questions set for the senior level team (SLT) members, IT-employee, Mangers and end users.

3.6.4 Constructs
In order to analyze the interviews and questionnaires in a constructive way constructs are set up. A construct is a dimension of BI and knowledge in general within the organization. Also different levels and measurements to determine the levels are linked to the construct. After the analysis phase with the constructs these constructs are combined to see relationships between them. In this guideline one can see that the voice of the SLT members, Managers and ITemployee count more than the voice of the end users. This can be explained by the fact that the SLT members, managers and IT-employee look from a wider perspective than end users. Of course sometimes the end users will be right; in that case the level is determined on basis of the statements of the end users. When this situation occurs, it is mentioned and a reasonable explanation, based on valid arguments, is given.

3.7 Measuring the Value of BI in Batelco

The value of BI at Batelco was covered in chapter six, it is necessary to consider the concept of value. Namely, the first question is: Value for whom? The perceived value

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varies depending on the subjective appreciation and need of the person to whom the question is addressed. In this thesis, value is viewed from the point of view of an organization using BI (e.g. enhancing its competitive advantages, improving business performance and improving profits.etc) or the user ( employee) of the intelligence (perceived usefulness). In addition to the questionnaire model that is used to measure state of the art of business intelligence, the balanced scorecard method is also considered a valuable method that can be used to identify and measure the factors that related to the companys vision, at the same time, it defines the components to be used to determine performance. First, performance measures are chosen based on the organizations vision and strategy. Second, success factors are chosen from several perspectives (e.g. Figures indicate the Business performance) in order to provide a balanced and holistic view of the organization and other factors contributing to its success. Third, measurement is focused on a limited number of critical success factors. Fourth, the measurement system is designed in such a way that there are causal relationships between the success factors. Fifth, the measurement system can be used as a tool in communicating and implementing strategy.

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Chapter 4: State of the Art: Business Intelligence in Batelco

4.1 Introduction
The state of the art of Business Intelligence at Batelco designed to provide a better understanding of how Business intelligence practitioners of Batelco are working in the field of the companys business today. Over time the results of this survey will provide a basis for understanding trends, changes, and consistency in business intelligence practice at Batelco. This chapter will help us to come out with initial pictures on the overall business intelligence at Batelco, and to develop an understanding of how business intelligence supports the organizational environment and business activities of Batelco.

4.2 Overview of Batelco

Bahrain telecommunications company (Batelco) was established in 1981 as a shareholding company and is 37 percent government-owned. Cable & Wireless (C&W) of the U.K. owns 20 percent and the remaining 43 percent is held by investors on the Bahrain Stock Exchange. Batelco has an authorized paid-up capital of USD 265 million. Annual profit growth averaged 16 percent, reaching USD 127.6 million in 1999. C&W has supplied much of the organizations current management. Batelco has equity in the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization (Intelsat), which provides telecommunications services between countries across the world, and participated in the SEA-ME-WE international fiber optic cable project linking Asian countries with Europe via the Middle East. Batelco also provides Internet service in Saudi Arabia (www.batelco.com). The company serves both the corporate, consumer markets in the most liberalized, and competitive environment in the Middle East, and remains committed to delivering cutting-edge telecommunications to its customers in Bahrain and the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region. The Companys management and staff are driven by an enthusiasm for delivering the best customer experience based on innovation, affordability and reliability of products and services.

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Batelcos specialized services cover the full spectrum of telecommunications solutions for residential and business customers and span a comprehensive range of mobile services, international roaming, high-speed Internet connections, satellite services, WiFi, MPLS IP-VPN network provisioning and management, Datacoms services over fixed, wireless and internet platforms, managed services, systems integration and enterprise solutions. Batelco used to be the only telecom company in the kingdom for several years and thus was able to dominate on the market as a unique monopolist. Furthermore, the company is now seemed a fully Bahrain-based shareholding company engaged in providing telecommunications and information solutions. The Company caters individual and corporate customers through its home, mobile and business products and services. It offers its services through two divisions: Personal and Business. Its Personal services include mobile services, which offer pay as you go, messaging and other related services; fixed services, which offers national and international telephony services, calling cards, and other related services. The Business division offers such products as data services; Internet services, which includes Internet access, messaging, and Ecommerce & Hosting, and mobile services geared towards business users, which offers pay as you go, messaging and other services (www.ameinfo.com).

4.3 Business Intelligence Practitioners in Batelco.

Business Intelligence is a relatively small functions funded and supported in varying degree by other departments throughout the organization. BI can be located in different parts of the business, but often operates either as a separate BI or business intelligence department, or part of marketing or market research. Most BI units support several types of business activities, using an assortment of competitive intelligence tools and techniques, and supply intelligence to multiple levels of management through a variety of BI deliverables. Moving forward through

identifying the current trends and best practice of business intelligence, processes, technologies and resources, it will help to reach to the level of BI maturity through the practitioners response in the company. The survey conducted among BI practitioners who are seemed most experienced with business intelligence in Batelco. Furthermore, a structured questionnaire was conducted

36

using the online survey tool with twelve practitioners (with one reject) working in 4 main business units, the participants that took part in this survey is shown in Table (4.1). The sample was selected based on their experience with BI and they are the most individuals who use BI in the company. The suggested questions, names and positions of the respondents are mentioned in Appendix A. The questions concentrated on the following main BI points which are suggested by the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SCIP) (www.scip.org).

i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix.

Time spent on BI Primary BI functions Business Activities supported by BI BI Primary and Secondary Sources BI dissemination and deliverables BI delivery methods Technologies used to support BI activities Changes that improve BI activities over the next years Methods used to assess BI effectiveness Table 2 : Table 4.1 : Sample Profile Business Units Sample Size Sample Proportions Marketing Sales Logistic IT Total 3 3 3 3 12 25% 25% 25% 25% 100%

The following are the key findings achieved through the survey: The answer for the question one is open end, but for the remaining questions is fixed.

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Q1: How many hours do you spend on BI in your day to day jobs? (Open Answer) The time spent by each selected business unit on BI in Business Intelligence is a parttime function according to the most respondents of the survey that was applied in Batelco as shown in Figure (4.1).
Hours of works

Business Units

Fi 9 : Figure 4.1: Respondents distribution according to Q1

The results indicated that the Marketing unit spends 75% of their working times on BI for research and analysis over customers, markets and products and services. The Sales unit came in the second rank by spending 44% of their times on BI, and its use mainly concentrated on customers statistics and reports. The time spent by IT unit is 25%, and BI in IT department is used for internal reports and as data mining. Logistic spend only 25% of their time on BI, and the reporting feature is the major element of BI used both logistic and IT. Q2: What are the primary functions of business intelligence used by your department? Answer selections: Data Mining Reports Analytical Alerts

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Business Intelligence is most often a stand-alone department in Batelco in order to provide the BI-related services to other departments. However, most business units using it as a major part for their daily business function. In the survey, four main BI functions were given to the selected sample to select the one that is the most used by their department, so that to reach to the ranking level between them. Data mining, Reports, Analytical tool and Alerts are the main BI functions used in most business units and the result that was reached is shown in both Table (4.2) and Figure (4.2). Table
Table 3: Table 4.2 : Respondents distribution according to Q2

BI Primary Functions Responses Responses in Percentage Analytical Reports Data Mining Alerts Total 5 4 2 1 12 42% 33% 17% 8% 100%

Figure 10 : Figure 4. 2: Respondents distribution according to Q2 The result showed the analytical function take highest rank, where five of them think that Analytical function is the main function that needed for their role and this represented 42%. Four of them think that reports that are generated through BI is the most important intelligent element for their role and it represents 33%. Two of the participants think that the data mining function is the most important which represents 17%. Only one thinks that the Alert function is the most important and represents 8%.

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Q3: What are the main business activities that are supported by BI in your department? Answer selections: Business Decision Forecasting Business Development Others business Activities

Business Intelligence is used to support different business activities in order to achieve its intended and final goals. BI supports four main activities in each department as shown in Table (4.3) and Figure (4.3).

Table 4 Table 4.3: Respondents distribution according to Q3 Business Activity Responses Responses in Percentage Business Decision Forecasting Business Development Other Business Activities Total 6 3 2 1 12 50% 25% 17% 8% 100%

Figure 11 :

Figure 4. 3: Respondents distribution of Q3

Six of participants think that the supporting business decision is the ultimate goal by using BI in their business activities which represented 50% among other activities. Three of the participants think that they use BI for business forecasting, and this figure

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represents 25% of the total people contributed in the survey. Two of the participants use BI for business development and it forms 17%. Only one individual thinks that BI is used for other activates and it represents 8%. Q4: Please specify the main primary and secondary sources used for BI in your department? Answer selections: Customers Employee Supplier Consultants

Business Intelligence leverages a variety of primary and secondary sources. In the survey, both primary and secondary sources are important to their BI practitioners. Different BI primary sources are used by the departments in Batelco as shown in Table (4.4) and Figure (4.4).

5 Table 4.4: Respondents distribution according to Q4 BI Primary Source Responses Responses in Percentage Customer Employee Supplier Consultants Total 6 3 2 1 12 50% 25% 17% 8% 100%

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Fige 12 : Figure 4. 4: Respondents distribution according to Q4 Customers views are priority as primary source and agreed by half of respondents that represented 50% of the total primary sources. Employees are also playing a very important source, 25% of the respondents think it comes in the second rank. Suppliers came in the third rank by 17%, and mainly its used by logistic department. Consultants also participated by their views and represented 8% in the survey based on their expertise in the market. The respondents to the BI secondary sources that are used by departments in Batelco distributed as shown in Figure Table (4.5) and (4.5).

6 Table 4.5: Respondents distribution according to Q4 BI Secondary Source Responses Responses in Percentage Internal Database Publications Web Conference Total 6 3 2 1 12 50% 25% 17% 8% 100%

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Figure 13 :

Figure 4. 5: Respondents distribution according to Q4

Six of respondents think that Internal Database takes the main source as secondary BI source. And consequently, external sources such as publications, Web and Business conferences represented other secondary sources by 25%, 17% and 8% according to the respondents. Q5: The main internal group being addressed by BI through your department? Answer selections: Top Management Managers Others

Business Intelligence deliverables go to a wide and diverse internal audience. By its nature BI often contributes to more than one internal group, and the survey applied indicated the main internal audiences as shown in Table (4.6) and Figure (4.6).

Table 7 Table 4.6: Respondents distribution according to Q5 Internal Group Responses Responses in Percentage Top management Managers Other Departments Total 6 4 2 12 50% 30% 20% 100%

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Figure 14 :

Figure 4.6: Respondents distribution according to Q5

Top management is the main audience and represents the main target according to 50% of the total participants. Weekly and monthly reports and analysis quoted through BI are sent to them for final decisions. Managers came in the second rank by 30%. Reports and forecasting are the two main elements that are delivered to managers by their subordinates. Reports sent between departments are represented 20% of BI deliverable. Q6: What the BI methods used by your department? Answer selections: Email Intranet Newsletters

The main methods used by Batelco are Email, Intranet and newsletter. The respondents asked to rank between them to come out with which one is the most used as a means of BI. The result is shown in Table (4.7) and Figure (4.7).

le 8 Table 4.7: Respondents distribution according to Q6 BI Methods Responses Responses in Percentage Email Intranet Newsletter Total 7 3 2 12 58% 25% 17% 100%

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15 Figure 4.7: Respondents distribution according to Q6 E.Mail in Batelco is the most common way to deliver information and analysis. Seven participants who represent 58% think its the common method used in the company. The email service is available with different level of staff in the company either through their desktop and Blackberry. The Intranet service represents 25% as the second method used. Newsletters that published by each department represented 17%.

Q7: What the software used to support BI in your department? Answer selections: ERP CRM SCM MS Office

A variety of technologies helps collect information and report intelligence. Most technologies on the market today support business intelligence for collecting information. The survey, as indicated in Table (4.8) and Figure (4.8), shows the main technologies used by departments in Batelco.

45

e 9 Table 4.8: Respondents distribution according to Q7 BI Software Responses Responses in Percentage ERP CRM SCM MS Office Total 4 4 2 2 12 33% 33% 17% 17% 100%

Figure 16 :

Figure 4. 8: Respondents distribution according to Q7

Enterprise Resource Planning Software (ERP) and Customer Relation management Software (CRM) came in priority by 33% of the total respondents. The ERP system in Batelco included the SAP system which runs in the finance unit. The Supply chain management and MS office (specially excel) represented 17% in the applied survey. Q8: What methods do your recommend to improve BI in future? Answer selections: Awareness Training Sharing Information

BI is an ongoing process which means that different methods should be used to improve it so that to meet its intended purpose. There are three different methods recommended to improve BI activities as shown in Table (4.9) and Figure (4.9).

46

Table 10Table 4.9: Respondents distribution according to Q8 Methods for BI Improvement Responses Responses in Percentage
Awareness Training Sharing Information Total 6 5 1 12 50% 42% 8% 100%

Figure 17 :

Figure 4. 9: Respondents distribution according to Q8

Half of respondents think that BI can be improved through continuous awareness sessions. Five of them think that BI can be improved through training, and it represents 42%. Only one participant thinks that sharing information is the way to improve BI, and it represents 8% of the total percentage. Q9: What methods do you use to evaluate effectiveness of BI in your department? Answer selections: Meet the companys vision Cost Saving Customer Satisfaction

Many organizations assess the effectiveness and value of their BI activities through different methods. Batelco is also has its own criteria to assess the effectiveness of the BI systems, more details on this topic is covered in chapter six. However, a brief

47

indication in this chapter about the main methods that are used to assess BI activities is shown in Table (4.10) and Figure (4.10).

le 11 Table 4.10: Respondents distribution according to Q9 Methods for BI Evolution Responses Responses in Percentage
Meet the companys vision Cost Saving Customer Satisfaction Total 6 3 3 12 50% 25% 25% 100%

Figure 18 :

Figure 4. 10: Respondents distribution according to Q9

There are three different methods used to assess the effectiveness of BI by the selected departments. Half of participants think that if BI meets the vision of the company it means that the system met to its intended objectives. Cost saving in departments and achieving to customers requirements are also the criteria that can be used to assess the effectiveness of BI, each one represented 25% in the survey according to the participants thoughts.

4.4 Conclusion
This chapter described the state of the art of business intelligence in Batelco through concentrating on the most important aspects and functionalities of BI as recommended by SCIP. The survey applied to the participants who were (14), two of them rejected to respond on the questionnaires. The participants are working in four departments: Marketing

48

Sales Logistic IT

The results showed that BI is considered a very important item in running and managing business activities. The BI is utilized by marketing and sales more than others and this seems that the BI system is being invested correctly and logically based on its intelligent options and feature that could be used for analysis and future views. The questionnaire indicated that marketing takes up more times in the use of intelligence work by 75% of work time and this indicates the importance of BI in their role. The survey gave the sign that the BI analytical function is the most function used by the participants. The questionnaire was also pointed out that BI is used mostly in Business decision, and most participants believe that the accuracy of decisions could reach through the business intelligence system. Customers used as the main primary source whereas internal database is the main secondary BI source in Batelco. The survey was also pointed out that senior managers are the main internal group that are addressed through BI, and all analysis and conclusions generated by BI are delivered to them to take the appropriate decisions for the company. The email is one of the most important method and means used with BI in Batelco, and most staff in the company has email both in their desktop and mobile phone. Furthermore, ERP & CRM are considered the most important software used to support BI in the Batelco. The awareness sessions was selected as the most important method that may help to improve the BI future in the firm. Finally, the survey pointed out that the most important method used to measure the effectiveness of BI in Batelco is its ability to meet the objectives related to the company's vision.

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Chapter 5: Competitive Advantage at Batelco

5.1 Introduction
This chapter will analyze the business performance of Batelco, especially after transferring the telecom industry from Monopoly system to open market from 2004 to 2008. The analysis will cover business activities and achievements during the competition periods, and hence review the competitive advantage and how the company could manage its business with the new environment. Moreover, the chapter will focus on the strategy that Batelco followed in local and overseas market. The chapter includes empirical data that was quoted from different sources, specially the annual reports which contained details over all business-related figures.

5.2 Bahrain Telecommunications Market

The telecommunications market in the kingdom of Bahrain was gradually deregulated during the 2000s and formally liberalized in 2004. Being an early starter, the Bahraini government had to develop a new regulatory framework on its own and established a formal body that looks after telecom regulatory affairs in the kingdom. The organization named Telecom Regulatory Authority (www.tra.com). The Kingdom of Bahrain has embarked upon a process of further liberalization within several sectors of the economy by ceasing the de facto monopoly by Batelco and creates a free market environment that will be attractive to new private sector entrants to the telecommunications sector. The TRA is independent, and responsible to grant and issue licenses to operate, and use spectrum, through transparent procedures (www.tra.com). The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of the Kingdom of Bahrain (TRA Bahrain) considers that the encouragement of sharing in the telecommunications sector and the cooperation of market players in this regard is an important regulatory principle. Such sharing and cooperation could deliver specific benefits which include:

i. Substantial cost savings for the operators involved, potentially resulting in more extensive development of networks, provision of services at more affordable prices as well as increasing likelihood of investments in some costly but extremely important

50

telecommunications projects, such as international (in particular, submarine) fiber optic cables; ii. Faster deployment of networks, in particular when elements of existing infrastructure are used for the deployment of new networks; iii. Positive environmental (including visual) impact, in particular by reducing the number of mobile masts and towers; iv. Reduced disturbance to normal use of roads (including reduced impact to road traffic and better ability to maintain quality of roads because of less frequent need to open them) and land of other use, in particular when ducts are shared; v. Positive impact on town and country planning. The deployment of new networks, in particular new fiber optic networks requiring extensive duct infrastructure which is similar to new wireless networks which required towers and masts. That will increases the need for appropriate commercial and regulatory strategies to be implemented, which could help to reduce network deployment costs specially the construction and land use costs which constitute a substantial proportion of total costs of network build. (www.tra.com).

5.2.1 Changes Affected Bahrain Telecommunication Market

Bahrain Telecommunications Company (Batelco) used to be the only player in the market until 2004. Most of its shares were owned by the government which got right to appoint the chairman of board. Batelco had an overwhelmingly dominant market position from 1981 to 2003, with market shares for domestic nation calls, international calls, Data and mobile communications at 100 percent respectively. Starting from 2004, the market share for Mobile phone is getting decrease gradually which is now at 70%, and the rest 30% is dominating by Zain Telecom, the only competitor in the current market. The Authority allowed the competitor (Zain) to start its business in Mobile telephony only since 2004, but recently permitted the company the Internet service as well. Figure (5.1) is the current market share of Mobile Services which are divided between Batelco 70% and Zain 30% (www.tra.com).

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Mobile Market Share

30 Batelco Zain 70

Figure 19 : Figure 5.1: Market Share of mobile telephony

5.3 Business Strategy at Batelco

This section will cover both local and overseas strategy at Batelco. The focus will be on latest achievements and developments on the strategy scope over the long-term and short term.

5.3.1 Local Strategy

Most telecommunications companies in the world follow the strategy that suggested by Porter (1985), that taking advantage over competitors gained by offering customers greater value, either by means of lower prices or by providing greater benefits and service that justifies higher prices. The two basic types of competitive advantage combined with the scope of activities for which a firm seeks to achieve them lead to three generic strategies for achieving aboveaverage performance in an industry: cost leadership, differentiation, and focus. The focus strategy has two variants, cost focus and differentiation focus (See Figure 5.2).

High
Degree of Product differentiation

Differentiation Forces

Differentiation

Cost Focused

Cost Leadership

Low Narrow Broad

Scope of Business Activates

Figure 20 : Figure 5.2: Competitive forces in business

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Each of the generic strategies involves a fundamentally different route to competitive advantage, combining a choice about the type of competitive advantage sought with the scope of the strategic target in which competitive advantage is to be achieved. The cost leadership and differentiation strategies seek competitive advantage in a broad range of industry segments, while focus strategies aim at cost advantage (cost focus) or differentiation (differentiation focus) in a narrow segment. In Bahrains telecommunication market the current situation falling in Cost Leadership level, especially in Mobile services as indicated in Figure (5.4).

Low

Cost Leadership

Broad

Figure 21 :

Figure 5.3: Competitive force used by Batelco

The current competition in Bahrains market falling in mobile services only between Batelco and Zain, and both companies has broad business activities. However, the degree of product differentiation is low since both got almost the same technology. The cost of phone services is continuously getting decreased by Batelco so that to make sure that their superiority in the market will persist. Table (5.1) shows the major tariff deductions made by Batelco during 2004 to 2008 as the strategy that being implemented to keep on its customers and to attract more customers to its service. Table 12 : Table 5.1: Major Tariff deduction by Batelco Services Rate Deduction Broadband Business and Education Internet packages. Inet Dedicated Access ( IDD) International Direct Dial call rates to Gulf Cooperation Council countries International Calls
(Source: www.Batelco.com )

50% 50% Dropped 100 fils - Used to be 160fils 50%

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Batelco could achieve many differentiations in terms of its services and products as shown in Table (5.2), and such policy helped the company to maintain its position in the new market.

Te 13 : Table 5.2: Distinguished services and products provided by Batelco Services and Products Features Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) IDD (International Direct Dial) calls to worldwide destinations with up to 91% reduction on IDD charges free of charge Choosing a new number through Batelcos website, free of charge Mobile broadband solution capable of throughputs up to 14.4Mbit/s New Technology that is not provided by others operators.

Batelco World Freedom 3888 Range of new mobile numbers 2G/3G Indoor coverage solution Enable to make and receive calls in any part of the complex including the car park. The New Generation Transports all information and services (voice, Network (NGN) technology. data, and all sorts of media such as video) by encapsulating these into packets, like it is on the Internet.
(Source: www.Batelco.com)

Table (5.2) shows the latest products and services in the telecommunications market: Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) is known as Internet Voice, is a technology that allows a customer to make a telephone call using a broadband Internet connection, instead of a regular (or analog) phone line. Batelco World Freedom used for frequently travelling customers introduced by Batelco World Freedom, the service that enables customers to receive calls and Short Message system (SMS) free of charge while roaming in 21 countries. The generic term for the next generation of mobile communications networks is 2G/3G. These technologies are commonly described as graceful enhancements to the GSM cellular standards; the GSM networks are intended to be upgraded to 3G networks without service interruption. New generation network (NGN) is the transmission of voice, data, video and any other form of information in packets over the same network.

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5.3.3 International Strategy

Batelco has started its overseas business since 2004 to expand its business out of the kingdom of Bahrain as a new strategy and to grow overseas. The first time has establishing a presence outside the country through its investment in Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Table (5.3) shows the Batelco groups that have been established along with other relevant details. Batelcos overseas operations contributed 33% of gross revenues and 19% of EBITDA (Earnings before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization) in 2008 with all the overseas operations being profitable and each delivering double digit net profit growth. While Batelcos operation in Bahrain will remain most critical to the Groups future success, its strategy will continue to focus on growth and diversification in new overseas markets. Table 14 : Group Name Table 5.3: Batelcos overseas groups Location Batelcos Services shares
Umniah Jordan 96% Managed data services IPVPNMPLS. Data communications links and over 300 Internet leased lines. Leading ISP with over 19,000 broadband customers. Provides the Data Communications and Internet Services industry. Managed international private lines service and a global Internet access service. GSM mobile operator in Yemen Wire/Wireless services. Voice telephone communications. Data Services. Internet telephony services. Broadband Internet via WiMax technology. Fixed telephone lines. Optical fibers to homes and businesses. Video services.

Qualitynet

Kuwait

44%

Batelco Egypt Communications (S.A.E.) Sabafon Etihad Atheeb Telecom - Saudi Arabia

Egypt

100%

Yemen Saudi Arabia

26% 40%

(Source: Batelco Annual Report)

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5.4 Batelco Performance after Telecom Liberalization

In this section the business performance of Batelco is reviewed taking into consideration the years after transferring the market in the kingdom i.e. 2004 to 2008, and then evaluated and analyzed the findings according to the new business environment and whether it will affect on the companys business or opposite. Since Batelco dependents on its business on information systems and business intelligent in particular, so its performance through this analysis will be a pointer to the effectiveness of BI in the development and then increase the profits of the company through the last five consecutive years. This section divided into two parts; one part is designated for data that were collected from various sources such as Batelco annual reports, TRA official website and Batelcos Intranet. The second part is formed to analyze the collected data using some statistical techniques such as bar chart and regression methods to examine the trends in order to evaluate the result within the last five years based on the statistical methods. Figure (5.4) shows the Batelcos business indicators for analysis:
Products and Services

Profits

Employee s

Equity

Internet

Mobile Revenue from Groups

Data Comm.

Fixed Lines

Figure 22 : Figure 5.4: Batelcos business indicators for analysis The data in this section indicated the business performance of Batelco in the last five years, the data gathered from the company annual reports and the TRA website. Linear Regression is used to measure the relationship between two values of variables to describe the straight line, which is the simplest and most commonly used form. The formula o linear regression is:

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Y = a + bX (in geometry we said Y = mx + b where m was slope and b was y-int). Where Y is the dependent variable, measured in units of the dependent variable, X is the independent variable, measured in units of the independent variable, and a and b are constants defining the nature of the relationship between the variables X and Y.

5.4.1 Products and Services

The following four products and services will be analyzed: i. Mobile Service Table (5.4) shows the data related to mobile service and its subscribers during 2004 to 2008. The table also included the percentage changes in both revenue and subscribers in each year.

Table 15 : 5.4: Batelcos mobile and subscribers data Years Revenue Revenue rate of Subscribers Subscriber rate of BD000 change change 95375 649764 2004 98172 3% 767103 2005 18% 113815 16% 907433 2006 18.3% 149118 31% 1115979 2007 23% 163209 9% 1440782 2008 29% Data Analysis: Revenue over mobile service seems increased firmly since 2004 through 2007, but came down in 2008 according to the change of percentage due to increase in over standing bills as indicated in Figure (5.5).

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Revenues BD

Rate of Change

Year

Figure 23 :

Figure 5.5: Revenue over mobile service in Batelco

The situation with Mobiles subscribers shows solid increased in number of customers since 2004 as shown in Figure (5.6), and this due to different facilities that were added to mobile service and the strategy of tariff reduction that was followed by the company in recent years.
Subscribers Rate of Change

Year

Figure 24 : Figure 5.6: Mobile subscribers in Batelco Comparing the revenues gained with the number of subscribers the correlation between them revealed curving towards the positive trend according to the regression line shown in Figure (5.7).

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e 25 : Figure 5.7: Regression line of mobile service and subscribers in Batelco The differentiation and cost leader strategy that used by Batelco helped the company to sustainably increase its revenue. As the graph shows that revenues gained from mobile service is a result of increasing number of subscribers by launching new features to attract more customers to its service, besides reducing the tariff. ii. Fixed Line Fixed line is the line that works through connected cables in both residential and business premises. Table 5.5 shows the revenues and number of subscribers of the fixed lines. Table 16 : Table 5.5: Batelcos Fixed Lines Data Revenue Revenue rate of Subscribers Subscriber rate of BD000 change change 48656 191553 52708 9% 193520 1% 44382 -16% 194196 0% 39202 -12% 202469 4% 38833 -1% 206301 2%

Years 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 Data Analysis:

As shown in Figure (5.8) revenues over fixed line service getting down from 2006 to 2008 and this is because of decreasing in demands on such the service. However, comparing to the change in percentage the revenues gradually increased and this due to the reduced costs strategy used since 2006.

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Revenue

Rate of Change

Year

Figure 26:

Figure 5. 8: Revenue over fixed line

Table (5.9) shows the subscribers in term of number from 2004 to 2008. There were slight changes up and down in term of percentage, while the number is steadily getting increased since 2006.
Subscriber s Rate of Change

Year

Figure 27 :

Figure 5.9: Subscibers of fixed line in Batelco

Fixed line service is completely dominating by Batelco and yet its competitor not allowed selling this service to customers. However, the company faced decreased in its revenue as already explained because of the costs reducing strategy used since 2006 which resulted a negative in trend as shown in Figure (5.10).

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ure 28 : Figure 5. 10: Regression line between fixed line and subscribers in Batelco

iii. Internet Batelco one of companies that initiated the internet services in the region. Table 5.6 shows both revenues and number of subscribers during 2004 to 2008. Table 17 : Table 5.6: Batelcos Internet Revenue and Subscribers Years Revenue Revenue rate of Subscribers Subscriber rate of BD000 change change 26494 50621 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 Data Analysis: Internet service used to be dominated by Batelco until 2007, then the other company (Zain) was allowed to sell the same service in the local market. However, the revenue of this service has been steadily increased, as shown in Figure (5.11), because of continuous improvement and adding values on the service done by the company. However, revenues in term of percentage were not stable and this because of special offers being provided by the competitor. 28579 34557 36910 40285 8% 21% 7% 9% 50299 60094 79988 114502 -1% 19% 33% 43%

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Revenue BD

Rate of change

Year

re 29 : Figure 5.11: Revenue of internet in Batelco

However, the number of customers getting increased since 2006 as shown in Figure (5.12), and this because of special price that being offered to customers by Batelco along with adding new technology to the internet service.

Subscribers

Rate of change

Year

Figure 30 :

Figure 5.12: Subscribers of Internet in Batelco

Batelco is giving high attention to the internet service since it represents a core source of revenue. Therefore, the company is using Broadband service and continuously expanding it geographically. Moreover, and in order to be in line with the latest technologies, Batelco has already completed its Next Generation Network (NGN) migration ahead of target, backed by a BD22 million investment. The company also

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rolled out across the Kingdom the 3.5G wireless technology being one of the first countries in the world with national, high speed wireless broadband access. The result of revenue comparing to the number of customers is satisfied according to the positive trend shown in Figure (5.13).

31 :

Figure 5.13: Regression line among Internets revenue and subscribers in Batelco

iv. Data Communication Equipment Data Communication equipment is the devices and connections of a communications network that connect the communication circuit between the data source and destination. Table (5.7) shows the revenue that gained by Batelco in last consecutive five years with the change from year to year. 18 : Table 5.7: Batelcos DC Data Years Revenue BD000 21342 2004 27508 2005 30268 2006 34147 2007 45619 2008 Rate of change 29% 10% 13% 34%

Data Analysis: Data communications service is one of the important services provided by Batelco to businesses. Data Communications concerns the transmission of digital messages to

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devices external to the message source. The company is doing well through this service and revenues increased since 2004 as shown in Figure (5.14).

Revenue

Rate of change

Year

Figure 32 : Figure 5.14: Revenue on data communication in Batelco Data communication is becoming more important in Batelcos business strategy specially after launching the new technology Next Generation Network (NGN). NGN is a broad term to describe some key architectural evolutions in telecommunication core and access networks that will be deployed over the next 5-10 years. The NGN is a new technology that transports all information and services (voice, data, and all sorts of media such as video) by encapsulating these into packets, like it is on the Internet. NGNs are commonly built around the Internet Protocol, and therefore the term "all-IP" is also sometimes used to describe the transformation towards NGN. Data communications customers are getting growing during five years because each company wants to adopt the latest technology for their business. Figure (5.15) showed the positive trend which is a result of increasing the number to double in 2008, and its expected to increase more because of increase investments by International companies in the kingdom of Bahrain. Batelco got a significant deal with the Huawei company to get their full services relating to the network expansion, and thus established a strong working relationship through their collaboration in completing Batelcos Next Generation Network (NGN).

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Year

e 33 : Figure 5.15: Regression among five years of data communication in Batelco

5.4.2 Profit
Profits figures extracted from the companys annual reports along with the revenues that was gained through the overseas groups.

Table 19 : Years 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Table 5.8: Batelcos profits data Profit

BD000

Rate of change 4% 5% 15% 4%

83782 86916 90835 104099 107901

Profits during five years getting increased and can be noticed through the Figure (5.16). The company has been able to pass beyond BD 100 millions in 2007 and 2008 and expected to continue curve up in the first quarter of 2009. The overseas strategy played a very important part to increase the profits and firmly increased since 2004.

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BD

Rate of change

Year

Figure 34 :

Figure 5.16: Batelcos profits

The overseas business is the new strategy as acknowledged by Chief Executive of Batelco. Batelco is determining to remain the leading telecommunications operator in Bahrain and extending its business across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The international expansion is most often carried out by using acquisitions, mergers, joint ventures and other forms of strategic alliances and partnerships. The trend is continuously going toward positive as indicated in Figure (5.17).

Year

ure 35 :

Figure 5.17: Regression line among the trend of profits in Batelco

5.4.3 Employees
Table (5.9) shows the number of employees in Batelco during the last five consecutive years and the change of percentage from year to another.

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le 20 :

Table 5.9: Batelcos human resource data Years No of Staff 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 1923 1,997 2,486 2,579 2,428 Rate of change 4% 2.4% 4% -6%

Data Analysis: Figure (5.18) shows that the workforce in Batelco had been increased constantly from 2004 to 2007 as a result of the business expansion in both local and overseas market. However, in 2008 the workforce get reduced comparing to 2007 because of the Excess Resource Program, the program is set to reduce excess staff by providing them a special package. The program is still in force and is not compulsory anyway, it depends however on each business units to take the decision upon the number of workforce needed to run the unit and must be agreed with both the staff and HR unit.
No. of Employees Rate of change

Year

Figure 36 : Figure 5. 18 Batelcos employees The Human resource trend is almost in positive way as in Figure (5.19), and expected to continue on the same trend because of expanding of strategy that is followed by the company in next year.

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Year

Figure 37 : Figure 5. 19: Regression Line among the trend of Employees in Batelco

5.4.4 Equity
An accounting term used to describe the net investment of owners or stockholders in a business. Table (5.10) shows the number of equity of Batelco in the last consecutive years. ble 21 : Table 5.10: Batelcos equity data Years 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 Equity 305926 341,984 371,164 416,806 439,592 Rate of change 12% 9% 12% 5%

Data Analysis: Batelco is one of the organisations that are well-trusted by different investors and the constant increasing of its equity is an evidence that company is still the safe and profitable track in shareholders perspective as shown through Figure (5.20 ).

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No of Equity

Rate of change

Figure 38 :

Figure 5.20: Batelcos equity

Year

The positive trend of Batelcos equity as indicated in Figure (5.21), and this will encourage investors to invest more in the companys shares which will strength the companys position in the local market.

Year

F 39 :

Figure 5. 21: Regression line among the trend of equity in Batelco

5.5 Conclusion
The chapter concentrated on the overall business performance at Batelco during the last five years i.e. during the competitive period. The focus was on both local and overseas strategy that has been followed by the company to increase its positions in both local and overseas markets. Furthermore, the threats of new entrants (New competitors) has made some effects on Batelcos business especially in the mobile service. The revenues over the products that sold through the company remarkably increased, except the fixed

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lines service which decreased gradually due to declining of demands on the cable wire services. The company could achieve its target in profits point of view by reaching the profits in last two years to more than one 100 millions Bahraini dinars, and this means that they applying the plans to face the new environment in the telecom market. Furthermore, increasing in profits means that the changes in the market did not affect on the companys business performance but on contrary motivated them to perform better than before. The number of employees increased gradually due to expansion of Batelcos business, but decreased in 2008 because of the Excess Resource Program strategy that used for staff reduction. And the companys Equity was the final item analyzed in this chapter and noticed its constant increase during the last five years, which means that the company is still in a strong position in terms of its value in the market. The overall results of the companys performance showed that the management is going through the right strategy plan to improve the business, and this of course connected with the latest IT technology that the company is always considering the core to keep them to be in advance. The progress in the company's performance that was discovered through the analysis reveals that different factors are used by Batelco to keep its business advancing in the current telecommunications environment, and the core factor that needs to invest in order to achieve to the set target is to obtain the latest business systems and technology. The technology and the knowledge systems thought the base of success in any organization, and the knowledge systems and BI seems the core success factors in this regards. The evolution on BI in Batelco which will be covered in chapter six will make clear to know the extent of BI in advancing the competitive advantages of the company and the role that BI plays to obtain and achieve the companys planned vision. Undoubtedly, by using business intelligence the company will use its organizational knowledge even better, and consequently they will become even more successful.

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Chapter 6: Analysis of Business Intelligence at Batelco

6.1 Introduction
The purpose of this chapter is to analyze the Business Intelligence environment within Batelco and try to measure its value and maturity, and how its role in improving and enhancing the business activities of the company. Moreover, the chapter includes the case study, which focuses on the Business Intelligence concepts and tools along with overall Knowledge Management Systems that have been considered in last 15 years by different Management levels. The present case study is based on interviews with some concerned staff who involved in BI and KM projects in Batelco. Questionnaires and Interviews used to measure the BIs capability through the models that thought by most BI experts the most measurement techniques. The chapter also reviews the competitive advantage based on the current capability of BI used, and the analysis will be conducted through different methods as explained in the methodology part.

6.2 BI and KM Data Collection by Interview

Business intelligence and knowledge management systems are the base that Batelco the company depends on in developing and advancing its business and performance. The story of BI at Batelco started in 1995 as the case study explained in this section, and still takes the high attention by top management levels in the company. The information and details reached through the company annual reports, Batelco profile along with interviews that conducted through a small workshop with some decision makers who contributed in organizational development projects. These interviews were recorded and systemically analyzed in order to measure the BI and KMs capability in Batelco. (The questions raised during the workshop in appendix B). i. BI Started in 1995 The history of BIs concept started in 1995 through using knowledge management with a cultural change towards customer-centered organization. Since that time, Batelco has undertaken various knowledge management initiatives. However, many of those initiatives were not integrated and did not involve formal action plans extending across

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the corporation. Nevertheless, almost all senior and other managers who participated in the study agreed on the merits of the knowledge management concept and its applications and expressed their interest in the concept, acknowledging its value and importance for their business. ii. Organizational Development Projects In 1996 Batelco obtained an International Standards Organization (ISO) 9002 certificate and launched a major programmed for organizational transformation known as Organization Development (OD). The human resources management department undertook the project, which was chiefly concerned with reengineering business processes and improving organizational performance. The initiatives taken in this regard are summarized and set on a time line as shown in Figure (6.1)

(www.batelco.com.bh/profile.htm).

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CRM Culture/ organizational change (OD3 project) DW Project: Vendor selection->phase 1 - increase business Value -> ->phase 2 Expansion & Growth HRMS Vendor selection->phase 1 increase business Value ->phase 2 Expansion & Growth Culture/ organizational change (OD12project)

Culture/ organizational change (OD1 project)

BI (DW & CRM)

SAP

Culture/ organizational change (OD4 project) ERP& Legacy systems, SAP R/3, intranet, Lotus Notes, Integrated document system New CE was appointed and telecom market liberated in the kingdom. The company started its business abroad as groups.

ISO9002

1996

1998

2000

2002

2004

2006

2008

2010

Initiatives conducted under the name of Knowledge Management (KM) & BI strategy

Figure 40 : Figure 6. 1: The evolution of BI at Batelco

Source: (www.batelco.com/profile)

As a result of its customer-centered strategy, OD projects and knowledge management strategic vision, Batelco continued to develop its information systems, which serve different business functions including finance, human resources management, and marketing and customer services. Also, enterprise application integration was performed with a view to integration of existing systems. Moreover, investment in and implementation of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system worth more than USD 1 million, namely, SAP R/3, resulted in internal efficiency and quality of information throughout Batelco. Today, SAP R/3 supports

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financial, material and project management functional areas. It provides timely, highquality management information and contributes to the achievement of knowledge sharing and application. Enhanced external customer support systems in particular have a positive impact on all services provided. iii. Business Intelligence Systems Some of the information systems aim to manage knowledge and go one step beyond information processing to analysis, categorization, distribution and application of knowledge in supporting of the business strategy. These systems are: (a) Human resources management system (HRMS-Oracle). This system was completed in 2002. The system integrates previous human resources management systems (known as legacy systems, which include payroll and training management) and includes a competency dictionary as a base for performance management review. It enables employees to assess their competencies, Performance Management Review (PMR), from their own terminals and their line managers then reassess this assessment. The knowledge map that PMR creates makes it possible to identify gaps between required and existing knowledge and is used as a repository of knowledge for making human resources management decisions related to yearly salary incremental, promotion, transfer, rotation, training and recruitment. Another component of human resources management systems, namely, employee self-service, allows employees access to their own information, such as training programs completed during the preceding two years and applications for loans. (b) Business intelligence and data warehousing. In 1998-1999, Batelco demonstrated foresight when it realized that knowledge was crucial to the establishment of long-term customer relationships. In early 2000, the company decided to manage this knowledge and implement the first formal knowledge management initiative, namely, a data warehouse that was coupled in 2003 with a customer relationship management system (CRM). The data warehouse is a repository of data derived from operational legacy systems, namely, customer care, billing (including the three customer profiles, namely, IT GSM, and fixed line billing), finance, accounts receivable and other systems. The company continuously improves its Data Warehouse to meet its business which has been expanded since 2004. The existing Data Warehouse being used is Teradata

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Enterprise Data Warehouse (Batelcos BI Manager). This type of Data Warehouse offers a totally integrated solution optimized to provide the company for an enterprise data warehouse and its operational expansion as an active data warehouse in the realtime enterprise. (c) SAP. Batelcos Financial and Logistics systems provide the underlying support for Batelcos day-to-day financial accounting, procurement, administrative and resource management functions. The system aims to identify and implement an integrated information system solution suite of Finance and Logistics applications that have failed to provide the desired level of functionality and management information. objectives. (Batelcos SAP Project Team). (d) Customer relationship management. This initiative combines business processes and technology in order to gain a better understanding of customer lifetime value and thus competitively differentiate company products and services. This system is continuously developed in order to meet new business processes, and together with the data warehouse which is formally addressed as a BI initiative. The objective of customer relationship management system is to enable the exploitation of knowledge at operational and analytical levels. The analytical level includes online processing of data for back-end marketing activities, such as campaigns, sales management and customer satisfaction surveys. (e) Integrated document management system. This system provides document management and workflow, allowing documents to be moved from one place to another, for example when approval is required. At present, the integrated document management system is used, and mainly used trough SAP for logistics and in human resources management for performance management review (PMR), but it is planned to extend its use to other areas within the company. Batelcos corporate objective is to

improve efficiency, whilst delivering collateral benefits in support of the other corporate

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iv. Other Knowledge Management Initiatives Batelco has other knowledge management initiatives in place, some of which focus on cultural and organizational procedures while others are more dependent on ICTs. A number of these initiatives are described below. i. A policy was established as part of corporate strategy to document all procedures as far as possible and, by doing so, make knowledge explicit and available and facilitate the transfer of tasks to new personnel. ii. Change Management Programs, which include training and other initiatives to facilitate change of roles or responsibilities, in addition to advisory groups, which designate mentors and advisers, and constitute initiatives for the transfer of managerial and strategic knowledge. ii. Initiatives aimed at capturing knowledge from customers include the use of suggestion boxes, face-to-face interviews and call centre scripting. Acquired customer feedback is subsequently documented and distributed to other departments. iii. In addition to exchanging documents, employees make heavy use of Lotus Notes for e-mail (replaced recently with office outlook), calendars, contacts and memorandums to organize meetings, events and deadlines in their quest for collaboration. Moreover, most employees have a blackberry device whereby they can be online 24 hours to exchange the documents. iv. Other initiatives aim at the creation of a collaborative environment. A highly successful pilot initiative is project portals, where every project at Batelco opens a session and permits linkage to the financial department, project manager and all members of a project, allowing documents to be shared and e-mails to be exchanged. v. Two methods are used in order to transfer knowledge from experts to trainees in the case of the temporary or permanent absence of employees. Knowledge can be transferred directly through training and coaching or, alternatively through knowledge gatherings, at which people involved in similar activities, meet and learn from one another.

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6.2.1 Organizational Transformation

Organizational transformation as an initiative is having a huge impact in the development of knowledge management, in part because organizational structure acts as an enabler for knowledge management. Table (6.1) described the phases of organizational development changes:

Table 22 : Table 6.1: Phases of organizational changes at Batelco Year Project 1996 OD1 Reasons To transform the system of management from a bureaucratic, control-oriented top-down structure to a democratic one based on employee empowerment. The emergence of powerful organizational intervention techniques triggered OD1, including business process reengineering and total quality management. To address a number of shortcomings found in OD1. Principal objective of better confronting business competition. Entitled Get Ready for competition. Developed more or less in parallel with the data warehousing system. New CEO Appointed. New strategy to meet new competitive market. To be prepared for new expansion through groups in MENA.

1999 2002

OD2 OD3

2004

OD4

Special attention was given to cultural change and barriers to it in the implementation of organizational transformation. i. Cultural change It had been the case since the 1980s that knowledge sharing was not prevalent at Batelco. The human resources manager recalled, for example, that the human resources manual had been confidential. Batelco is prepared for knowledge sharing; you see that most people are very positive about sharing and exchanging what they know with others. But you can also say that there are some people with lack of confidence who fear sharing in case they lose their power or lose their knowledge or position, or somebody becomes better than them.

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Another obstacle in their culture is Managers who taking responsibility of their departments are empowered to select or reject any staff for a new vacancy without any involvement of HR. ii. Barriers The main barrier reported at Batelco is resistance to change, which is manifest in the reluctance of individuals to start talking to one another within departments and sections. The consequence of certain drawbacks in the culture is that regardless of how much information is disseminated; employees tend to be suspicious that a hidden agenda exists. Moreover, according to one manager, it is difficult to capture certain types of knowledge such as skills, despite the best efforts of employees to pass these on to colleagues. Other barriers include the following: (a) Use of the system can be difficult. (b) Training raises particular issues. (c) Customer knowledge poses certain difficulties. (d) Conflict frequently arises between short and long-term objectives.

6.3 Evaluation Models

The evaluation of the BI consists from two models these are:

6.3.1 Evaluation of the Current State of BI at Batelco

This section discusses the ways in which Batelco understands the core concept of Business Management which is thought the main role of BI in enhancing the companys competitiveness advantages. Averages comprise values between 1 and 5 on the Likert scale through the survey that sent to each selected group. The source of questions obtained from the center of decision support and enterprise systems research (DSESR) in Monhash University Business Intelligence Blog.

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i. User Types Three types of users were selected for the survey as indicated in Table (6.2). The Names and positions of the selected staff are described in (appendix C).

Table 23 : TTable 6.2: The selected population for the survey Strategic ( SLT ) Users ( Managers / Staff ) IT Department 5 15 5

Five general managers represented senior level team (SLT) were selected and surveyed about the points related to BI use in the top level. Fifteen Managers and staff from different business units were selected to answer questions related to BI in tactical and operational level. IT department was separated from the two to get point of view respecting Business Intelligences technical parts, and hence five of the staff were selected to answer the questions related to BIs technical issues. Users were selected from six units which thought they used the BIS heavily either in day to day business activities or as analytical tools to improve and increase their business process / profits. Most staff were selected from Marketing department since they are expected to use BI facilities more in terms of analytical and forecasting purposes than others. Sales almost got the same roles thus it came in number two regarding the number of staff selected for the survey as indicated in Table (6.3). Other units are mainly doing the back office jobs and their BI use lie with their internal issues.

Table 24 : Table 6.3: Batelcos users from different business units Business Units Marketing Engineering Logistic Network Human Resource Business Risk Selected users 1 2 6 2 1 3

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ii. Business Intelligence Systems used by the Selected Units The survey showed that all the selected units are using SAP & HRMS i.e. both of them are used 100% by all Business units. CRM is used by Sales, Marketing and Network. Some special system such as Billing and GSM system are used by sales only. Furthermore, as indicated in Table (6.4) that Microsoft applications and Excel in particular is one of the application, which is used by all users, especially for analysis and monthly statistics purposes. Table 25 : Table 6.4 Batelcos BI Systems that used by Business units Systems SAP CRM HRMS Billing GSM MS Excel
Business Unit

Marketing Sales Logistic Network Human Resource Business Risk Total

1 1 5

iii. Batelcos BI value Based on the Selected Perspectives Tables (6.5, 6.6 and 6.7) are assigned for a specific level (i.e. Top Level, Users, IT). The left hand side column includes survey questions while the other five columns assigned for the likert scores. The last column is to calculate the average (score reached out of 5 for each question). i. Top Level ( SLT ) The average obtained on questions touched to the (5) influencers in the top level at the company. The seven questions were mainly concentrated on the impacts of BI on the organization in terms of Vision, Mission, enhancing the competitive advantage of Batelco and overall strategies related to BI. The score reached was 4.45. (i.e.31.2/7 = 4.45). The results are interpreted in Table (6.5).

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ble 26 : Table 6.5: The SLT-related survey in Batelco

Score Questions Q1: There is strong commitment from Top Level for implementing BI in the company. Q2: Continuous support from top level for utilizing and improving BI. Q3: Do you think the current management style regarding the BI supports the organization to enhance its business? Q4: BI is able to achieve the organizations mission and vision and enhance the companys competitive advantages in the market. Q5: BI is playing importing roles to increase the companys revenue. Q6: BI is able to make future plans unambiguous. Q7: BI has created an easy life between the company and its customers. 1 Strongly disagree 2 Disagree 3 Undecided 4 Agree 5 Strongly agree Average Score

4.6/5 (92%)

4.6/5 (92%)

4.6/5 (92%)

4.2/5 (84%)

4/ 5 (80%) 4.6 / 5 (92%) 4.6 / 5 (92%)

Total

31.2 /7 = 4.45

ii. Users / Managers The average obtained on (11) questions related to tactical and operational level, which is basically handled to (15) users and managers. The score reached was 3.5 (i.e. 38 /11=3.5). The results are interpreted in Table (6.6).

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27 : Table 6.6: The Users-related survey in Batelco

Score

Questions

1 Strongly disagree
1

2 Disagree

3 Undecided

4 Agree

5 Strongly agree
2

Average Score

Q1: Transaction cycle is run in shortest time. Q2: BI used for new, better, more timely information. Q3: BI used for critical info to be quickly and easily manipulated into a useful form. Q4: Current priorities for the use of BI software within the department are acceptable. Q5: BI used for improved daily transactions within the department. Q6: BI initiative will support the business most effectively. Q7: The current BI systems play the important role to forecast for future business. Q8: BI is used to improve the flow of critical information to executives. Q9: There is resistance to change in your department. Q10: The current BI has No value added over manual process. Q11: BI is able to collaborate between the parties.

3.33 / 5 (66.6%) 3 3 6

3.47 / 5 (69.4%)

3.33 / 5 (66.6%)

3.53 / 5 (70.6%) 0 4 3 4 4

3.40 / 5 (68%)

3.67 / 5 (73.4%)

3.40 / 5 (68%)

3.60 / 5 (72%) 0 4 2 5 4

3.40 / 5 (68%) 1 3 2 7 2

3.53 / 5 (70.6%) 0 4 3 4 4

3.33 / 5 (66.6%) 1 3 3 6 2

Total

38/11= 3.5

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iii. IT The average obtained on (6) questions related to technical aspects of BI, which is basically handled to (5) experts in IT department. The score reached was 3.7 (i.e. 22.2/6= 3.7). The results are interpreted in Table (6.7).

Table 28 : Table 6.7: The IT-related survey in Batelco

Score Questions Q1: BI used to integrate information from diverse and heterogeneous sources. Q2: The rate of the BI technology being used by the company is highly appropriate. Q3: The current BI system incompatibility with users cognitive styles. Q4: People in all departments within Batelco receive the right level of training and development for their effective participation in knowledge-based initiatives. Q5: BI Software is continuously up gradated to meet the new business environment. Q6: BI support team is highly trained that have ability to face any technical problems. 1 Strongly disagree
0

2 Disagree

3 Undecided

4 Agree

5 Strongly agree
2

Average Score

4.2 / 5 (84%) 4.2 / 5 (84%) 1.4 / 5 (28%) 4/5 (80%)

4.2 / 5 (84%) 4.2 / 5 (84%)

Total

22.2/6 = 3.7

Total averages factor The questions were analyzed here in terms of the levels. Table (6.8) shows that responses to this factor were almost higher than the average.

Table 29 : Table 6.8: Average by levels Levels Average ( Mean ) Top Level ( SLT ) Users / Manager IT Total Global Average 4.45 3.5 3.7 11.7 3.9

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The result shows that total average reached to (3.9) which almost considered very good in terms of BIs aspects in achieving the companys current and future goals, and has become one of the most important tool to keep a company in a high rank level and thus competent in the market.

6.3.2 BI value using the SAP System Based on the Balanced Scorecard Tool
As mentioned in the research methodology that there are various methods to evaluate and value BI performance. In the previous section the selected three different management levels as the BIs perspectives to measure and evaluate the BI based on Means scores. This section will measure the main four elements whereby the organization are expecting to achieve its set vision from implementing business intelligence systems, and the best tool that helps to get to that point is the balance scorecard tool ( BSC). BSC is used to measure the business intelligence systems, and the SAP system was selected as a model in order to evaluate its functionality and how it could meet the companys vision. The four main elements of BCS are chosen as a mechanism to value the SAP in this regards. Figure (6.2) illustrates the BSC and its four elements that are relevant to the SAP functions.
Financial Resources / Cost-BI ROI Reduce Inventory Costs Reduce departments costs Growth revenue within the department Customer Resources / Time Satisfaction and Quality Usage Coverage Reduce delivery time

Batelcos Vision To enrich our customers lifestyle and enable businesses to excel Aims of the BI Function Efficiency, Enhance Business performance, reasonable coverage and user satisfaction

BI Process Resources / Time Outputs Accuracy

Short life

cycle

Learning and Growth Development of BI over time Easy to learn and use Better decision-making

Figure 41 : Figure 6. 2: Balanced Scorecard view of measurement of BI at Batelco.

Source: www.ebalancedscorecard.org/

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Figure (6.2) shows Batelcos vision and the BI functions targets are in the centre and they have a direct affect on the four chosen measurement focus areas; financial, BI process, learning and growth and customer. The most important issue in measuring Batelcos BI is the input-output ratio and progress in key performance indicators that the SAP system is performing. BI measurement is implemented by a three-phased process: measuring persons (Users) and system activities, establishing systematic information gathering as a base for measuring and through efficient communication and analyzing between the BI parties. In general balanced scorecard is usually used as an indicator to follow up the following four elements in stakeholders perspective, and the reason to invest money in acquiring the SAP system was to meet the objectives as shown in Table (6.9).

Table 30 : Table 6.9 : Basic flow of strategic area within the Balanced Scorecard

Shareholder Value
Financial Customer Processes Learning
(Source: www.ebalancedscorecard.org)

Revenue Growth More Customers Service Programs Support Systems & Personnel

6.4 Evaluating SAP system within Inventory Management

The four common elements of the balanced scorecard tool are applied on inventory management through measuring them before and after launching the SAP system in the department. The reasons for using inventory management is the required information are available through the inventory management department on their intranet site.: i. Financial perspective: The financial perspective addresses the question how shareholders view the firm and which financial goals are desired from shareholders perspective. Table (6.10) shows how the inventory management department in Batelco looks financially and how BI maximizes income and reduce costs (Through the SAP system) could add value to the company.

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le 31 : Table 6.10: Balanced Scorecard Financial prospective in materials management Before BI Objective After BI KPI Resources Reduce Inventory Costs Reduce departments costs (e.g. Stationary ) Growth revenue within the department
(Source: Logistic Intranet in Batelco)

30 staff BD5m BD 1000 Monthly Discounts

15 staff BD2 million BD 500 Monthly. i.e. Paperless system on orders

Reduced 50% Reduced BD3 millions Reduced BD 500 Not fixed

Table (6.10) indicated how the material management department gained advantages after launching the SAP system, which is considered a core part of business intelligence. Number of resource (Staff) was reduced to half and 3 million in the last five years reduced total costs of inventory. Moreover, a stationary cost was reduced because the SAP system is working as a paperless system. Growth of revenue within the department gained advantages through discounts on orders. ii. Customer perspective: The customer perspective addresses the question of how the firm is viewed by its customers and how well the firm is serving its targeted customers in order to meet the financial objectives. Strategically, customers view used to excel in servicing internal customers. Moreover, customers view the firm in terms of time, quality, performance, and cost. Most customer objectives fall into one of those categories. Table (6.11) shows how customer perspective looks within the inventory management department in Batelco after using the SAP system in the last five years e 32 : Table 6.11: Balanced Scorecard Customer prospective in materials management Objective Before BI After BI KPI Performance Time to meet customer demands Usage Delivery Time 10 Minutes in one transition 1 to 2 days Manual One day 5 Minutes in one transition Same day Automation Same day Reduced 50% Reduced 100% Easy to use..eliminate paper works (costs ) Reduced 100%

(Source: Logistic Intranet in Batelco)

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The overall results as reported were satisfied and met the targets. Table (6.11) shows that, all objectives within customer perspective get reduced by using the SAP system. The performance Efficiency increased by half when the time of performing a transaction reduced from 10 minute to 5 minute. Customer demands are met in the same day after it was done after one to two days before using the SAP system. The SAP system is a fully automated system, so no need to papers and hence increases in costs. Furthermore, the time of delivery reduced by 100% and all delivery and goods receive notes raised in the system at the same day of delivery. However, In order to make sure more about the customers view over the changes made by the SAP system and the roles that they system played to make things easy in the work environment. iii. Learning and Growth perspective: Learning and Growth metrics address the question of how the firm must learn, improve, and innovate in order to meet its objectives. In its strategic point of view, the learning and growth element used to onsite professional development. Table (6.12) shows the progress gained in learning and growth perspective during the SAP period in material management department. ble 33 : Table 6.12: Balanced Scorecard learning and growth prospective
Before BI Not able to develop Complicated and difficult to adapt it Without Intelligence functions After BI Easy to develop and add any new function or query User friendly Working intelligently KPI Easy to meet job requirements Less training costs Better decisions that help to increase revenue and reduce costs

Objective Development of BI over time Easy to learn and use Better decisionmaking

(Source: Logistic Intranet in Batelco)

As mentioned in the literature review that the mission of SAP Business Intelligence (in SAP or other ERP/ BI) is to create a container in which all the data necessary for making good decisions is stored, analyzed, and served up to the right people at the right time. In the ideal situation, when a decision needs to be made, the relevant, organized, timely information is available in an easy-to-use form. Table (6.12) described how the SAP system could play the important roles in terms of easy to develop the system to meet any new job requirement, easy to learn and coach others and how it works

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intelligently for future prospective. Please refer to Appendix (D) shows how the analytical model in the SAP system which is used by users for business analysis.

iv. Process perspective: Business process objectives address the question of which process are most critical for satisfying customers and shareholders. This BSCs element used as strategical tool to measure how the system faster responses to business. Table (6.13) shows the role of the SAP system to gain benefit for Batelco through the materials management department.

34 : Table 6.13: Balanced Scorecard process prospective Objective Before After BI KPI BI Outputs Limited Unlimited Unlimited output output transactions with less cost. Accuracy Huge Prcised Adequacy in errors with lack of business errors decisions Short life Not Integrated Performing cycle integrated and assignments system collaborated through system shortest life cycle.
(Source: Logistic Intranet portal)

Table (6.13) indicated clearly how the business process perspective progressed with the SAP system which business intelligent forms its main feature. Transaction outputs that generate by the system are unlimited and with less costs comparing with the systems that used to be use before. And the SAP system works through more accuracy way and method along with short life cycle for each transaction made through it.

6.5 Conclusion
The chapter covered in detail the case study of Batelco. The case focused on different aspects of business intelligence and knowledge management, going through their history and ending to the current status of BI run in the company. In addition, the chapter covered different BI tools used by the company and how they are adding value to the current business especially when they started to make changes in 1996.

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Organizational Development (OD1) was the first Knowledge-related project conducted by the company to meet the developing situations in the telecom market. The similar projects were implemented in different periods since that time to keep and maintain the companys position in the market even though there was no competitor for Batelco before 2004 in the kingdom of Bahrain. Furthermore, new technologies and systems were acquired to make its business processes run smoothly and speedily. Business Intelligence system was one of the main technology that Batelco depended on during the last 15 years, various BI systems procured by the company for each business units and all of them showed their effectively to keep them advance in the local market. In order to value the BI capability in the company two models were used to measure how the BI is perceived by Batelco. The first model concentrated on some questionnaires and scoped the main three groups that deal with BI (Top Management Level, Users, IT experts), the survey helped to obtain their view on different BI points which are related to each respective group in the company. The criteria of measuring the effectiveness of BI was the average score that resulted from each questionnaire directed to each group and then summing up the score of each questionnaire and divided it on the number of questionnaires in each level. The result revealed the importance of business intelligence in the company for all management levels and is the one of the fundamentals to improve the business at Batelco. Another model used as a measurement tool was Balanced Scorecard. The tool is well known and used to compare the four standards perspectives with the companys vision and mission. BSC consists of four elements (Financial, Process BI, Customer and Growth and learning) to evaluate the existing SAP BI system that being used by the materials management department. The Key Performance Indicator (KPI) findings indicated the existence of distinct improvements and costs reductions after the use of the SAP system, which works on the basis of business intelligence.

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Chapter 7: Conclusion and Future Work

7.1 Conclusion
In this chapter, the conclusions concerning the relationship between the BI and competitive advantages, and how the current state of business intelligence in Batelco assisted the company to keep its business strong even with existence of other competitor. In addition, recommendations to face future challenges and opportunities in the field are discussed. Several business intelligence concepts were presented. However, it is unclear how and for what purposes the different process models are intended to be used. Furthermore, very less studies on how the actual business intelligence processes are applied in Bahrain companies, or on how well the business intelligence processes support business activities and their development. In this research both qualitative and quantitative methods were used in explaining business intelligence, and the literatures included rich and dependable studies and theories as well as practical experiences throughout the previous years. The thesis also explained extensively the competitive advantage in companies, particularly in the Batelco with the company's performance figures listed in the competitive phase and look to the firm-level productivity and their ability to adapt and an era of competition after it was the only company in the dominant telecommunications market in Bahrain, the analysis showed that the company was able to be more powerful than ever before and its profits exceeded 100 million is an indication to its strong position in the current telecommunications market. In order to ascertain the ability of business intelligence roles and its powerful position in running the business in the company two models were conducted in this study, and concluded that BI is considered a must for the company to challenge the new telecommunications market which opened the door to other companies to compete Batelco locally. The results that achieved through the case study showed that the knowledge systems are the main priority for different management levels since 1996.

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Batelco applied different knowledge systems throughout its business units and still considering upgrading them and working through the same strategy in order to able to face the business expansion outside the country. Furthermore, all three management level that included in the survey agreed the importance of BI in their respective levels. In the second model the results showed that the company could effectively achieve its goals when the productivity of the SAP system tested and compared to the legacy system and found how the KPI could meet the companys vision. The major findings of this research work are two folds: First, Batelco is sustaining improving and growing its business as one of the strong telecommunications industry in the kingdom even after librating the market to other telecom companies. Moreover, Batelco has expanded its business out of the kingdom by operating many groups in the MENA, and these indicators showed that the management is working hard to make the company recognized globally based on their long years experience in the telecom industry and the capability that the organization poses to face out other competitors beyond the border. Secondly, the concept of BI as knowledge is strongly recognized and supported by the managements since 1996. Moreover, the plans conducted during the last fourteen years indicated that BI and Knowledge Management were the core elements to keep the company ahead. Although the average score that came out through the survey indicated the company is dealing with BI successfully, and the BI is able to meet the companys set vision as mentioned however, Batelco still needs to set an aggressive strategy for more accelerating the benefits of BI so that to give the real value to the existing systems. This point rose because there are many users still not understanding the real value of BI and its impact on improving the current business. The balanced scorecard model that is used to measure the effectiveness of BI indicated that the company is able to achieve its intended goal, and the KPI progress from the SAP revealed that the system could target the four BSC elements and tremendous change witnessed in the materials management department that the SAP system is used in.

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7.2 Recommendations
The outcome recommendations of the study are: i. BI should be utilized as critical success sectors in Batelco In view of the findings of the case study and survey conducted, five interrelated critical success factors can be used as recommendations to improve the BI concepts at the company namely: Knowledge strategy, Project management, Infrastructural technologies, Source-data quality, Knowledge sharing culture.

Knowledge strategy Formulate an organization-wide formal knowledge management strategy and programs for learning best practices and developing new knowledge management projects. Project management Business concerns should drive the implementation of knowledge management projects whereas IT should enable such projects. For this reason, business managers to be considered the best champions of such projects. Infrastructural technologies It is a critical success factor to make appropriate integration in order to maintain equilibrium between systems requirements and functionality on the one hand, and the flow of business processes on the other. Source-data quality It is important to manage the expectations of users by communicating the real limitations and benefits of the system and get rid of accumulated data that are no more useable. Knowledge sharing culture A tremendous amount of effort and persistence is required in order to bring about real change in the people culture of an organization. This increases the visibility of knowledge management projects and generates enthusiasm and motivation.

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ii. Organizational Structure

As mentioned in this chapter that BI is handled by staff not categorized in the management level and that policy really making the value of BI get reduced. The organizational structure should reflect the needs for better knowledge management. Therefore, BI should be structurally handled by high rank management to increase its value.

7.3 Future Work

This thesis is by no means exhaustive. Further work will be required as listed below: The study reveals that it is recommended to further investigation and verify, in details, the new information technologies that are supporting and influencing the business sector in the kingdom of Bahrain. The IT department in Batelco needs also to import BI-related ideas from the experts in this field, and focus on organizations that are matured in this technology will keep the company to be updated with any new emerging technology occurs in future. A series of expert group meetings and brainstorming sessions should be arranged between different business sectors in the kingdom to discuss on the latest information technology that could help the country to prosper its economy. Since Technologies are rapidly and continuously changing and developing, the above studies should regularly updated. Its recommended to carry out the above studies in different organizations and companies in the kingdom in order to increase their business competitiveness and processes.

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APPENDIX A
Questionnaire Schedule
A.1: A list of the key persons that selected to answer on the questionnaires No Date Name and Position Department Comment 1 August 2009 Aisha Foladh Marketing Accept Product Marketing Manager 2 August 2009 Fadhel Nasheet Marketing Accept Product Marketing Manager 3 August 2009 Rana A.Jabbar Marketing Accept Product Marketing Manager 4 August 2009 Mohd Jamal Marketing Reject Product Marketing Manager 5 August 2009 Amal Dhaif Sales Accept Manager Retail Operation 6 August 2009 Abdulla Haddad Sales Accept Retail Shop Manager 7 August 2009 Faisal AlAfoo Sales Reject Retail Shop Manager 8 August 2009 Faisal AlKamel Sales Accept Retail Shop Manager 9 August 2009 Hassan Ebrahim Logistic Accept Manager Inventory Management 10 August 2009 Sameer Kazerooni Logistic Accept Manager Contracts and Legal 11 August 2009 Ebrahim Sandi Logistic Accept Manager Procurement 12 Sep 2009 Haifa Almahal IT Accept Manager Enterprise System 13 Sep 2009 Mario Ferreira IT Accept Manager Production Service 14 Sep 2009 Najla Alwan IT Accept Finance and Admin System manager

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A.2: A list of questions that included in the questionnaires: Q1: How many hours do you spend on BI in your day to day jobs? Q2: What are the primary functions of business intelligence used by your department? Answer selections: Data Mining Reports Analytical Alerts

Q3: What are the main business activities that are supported by BI in your department? Answer selections: Business Decision Forecasting Business Development Others business Activities

Q4: Please specify the main primary and secondary sources used for BI in your department? Answer selections: Customers Employee Supplier Consultants

Q5: The main internal group being addressed by BI through your department? Answer selections: Top Management Managers Others

Q6: What the BI methods used by your department? Answer selections: Email

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Intranet Newsletters

Q7: What the technology methods used to support BI in your department? Answer selections: ERP CRM SCM MS Office

Q8: What methods do your recommend to improve BI in future? Answer selections: Awareness Training Sharing Information

Q9: What methods do you use to evaluate effectiveness of BI in your department? Answer selections: Meet the companys vision Cost Saving Customer Satisfaction

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APPENDIX B
Interviews Schedule through a small workshop
B.1: A list of the key persons who contributed in the organizational developments projects that have been interviewed is shown below: No 1 2 3 Date Name and Position Comment

July 2009 Ebrahim Zainal Accept General Manager, Network July 2009 Adel Daylami Accept General Manager, Products and Services July 2009 Ali Janahi Accept General Manager, Major Enterprises

B.2: The following questions were directed to the interviewees: Q1: Giving general overview on the organizational developments projects that have taken place since it started in 1996. Q2: The main steps that have been taken by Batelco to develop the BI concepts. Q3: Why Batelco did focus on developing the knowledge management systems though the company used to run solely the telecom market in Bahrain. Q4: What the technologies (systems) that have been used to implement the business intelligence system in Batelco. Q5: How much the new technologies cost the company. Q6: Details and purposes on each BI system that implemented in the company. Q7: The current Data Warehouse being used and to how extent meets the companys goals. Q8: Details on any knowledge management initiatives conducted by the company. Q9: How Batelco could implement the organizational transformation plans. Q10: How you evaluate the OD projects took place so far in Batelco.

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APPENDIX C Questionnaire Schedule

A list of the key persons that selected to answer on the questionnaires No 1 Date August 2009 August 2009 August 2009 August 2009 July 2009 July 2009 August 2009 August 2009 August 2009 July 2009 August 2009 July 2009 July 2009 July 2009 July 2009 July 2009 July 2009 July 2009 Name and Position Adel Daylami General Manager, Products and Service Abdulla Al-Thawadi, General Manager, Major Accounts Mohd Mukhtar Senior Manager, Network Manager Suad Alkaabi, Senior Manager, Business Quality Sameer Kazerooni Senior Manager, Procurment Abdulla Haddad Retail Shop Manager Faisal AlAfoo Retail Shop Manager Faisal AlKamel Retail Shop Manager Hassan Ebrahim Manager Inventory Management Maki Al-Aswad Procurement Manager Ebrahim Sandi Manager Procurement Sumaya A.Qader Officer, HR Adel Hazeem Engineer Adel Ghuloom Engineer Adel A.Rahman CRM Executive Fadhel Saffar Manager, Access Network Saeed Madan Manager Access Network Zuhair AlMaskati Categories Top Management Top Management Top Management Top Management Top Management User User User User User User User User User User User User User Comment Accept

Accept

Accept

Accept

5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept

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19 20 21 22 23

July 2009 July 2009 Sep 2009 Sep 2009 Sep 2009

24 25

Sep 2009 Sep 2009

Manager, Business Continuity Isa Janahi Risk Management Analysis Maha Ali Manager, Insurance Haifa Almahal Manager Enterprise System Mario Ferreira Manager Production Service Najla Alwan Finance and Admin System manager Nooran, BI specialist A.Adheem Naser Information System Specialist

User User IT IT IT

Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept

IT IT

Accept Accept

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APPENDIX D
Evaluating SAPs Standard Analysis Tool Model

In this section the analytical model is tested, and this function is highly depended on by the users to make the right decisions. The standard analysis tools by most SAPs users to analyze daily business transactions.

Steps:
i. four invetory items for the SAP test system to exhibt as shown below:

The test will cover the following transactions in last four months : Qty Receipt QTY Issued Total usage.

ii.

Now we like to know the qtys for each item based on monthly basis by using the drilldown function:

Select Month and click OK

The following details will be given :

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The system gives full details on transaction took place on the selected item in the selected months. Details fall into recepts, issues and total usage.

iii.

If you want to see the qyts according to each storage locations within Batelco plant ( i.e. different stores )

Just select storage

As shown the system show figures in each location in left hand side. In most cases the user want to anaylse the situation according to chart bars. SAP provides this function as well in order to make the job easy for the analyst to see any variations that can help to take the right decision.

Just select the chart icon

iv. analyse the transactions in last four months through the chart, and see how it looks like:

And see the results:

v. So through this way the manager can know exactly how the concerned items were treated and accordingly can take a proper decision and hence plan intellegnetly for future demands as shown below:

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