Bringing business information to AT&T network systems through a data warehouse

The concept of data warehousing originated from the observation that the systems used to run businesses on a daily basis differ fundamentally from those employed to help plan and develop future businesses. For example, operational systems are generally focused on specific functional views based on the needs of a single aspect of the business. However, managers need information that shows relationships, trends, and correlations about different kinds of data, integrating several functions into a broader view. Historically, systems and manual processes were established to gather management data from the various operational data sources — one for each kind of decision. Extracting and combining such data from different systems is time consuming and often leads to inconsistent results. Users must accommodate printed reports, manual reentry of data into spreadsheets, and significant rework to produce summary reports that match the way they manage the business. Furthermore, by the time some of these reports are ready, the data are no longer current. The Warehouse of Information for Network Systems (WINS) provides needed information to AT&T Network Systems (AT&T-NS) managers world wide. WINS transforms operational and financial data into consolidated business views that are used to analyze certain activities and to make management decisions. This paper discusses the importance of WINS to the business management strategy of AT&T-NS, the WINS technical architecture, the status of WINS, and plans for future implementation.