CASE STUDY

Case Study Questions:

1. What are some of the key requirements for building a good data warehouse? Use Henry Schein Inc. as an example.

ANSWER:
Key requirements would include:
*Those involved in building the data warehouse should have the right skills and experience.
*Ensure data quality.
*Determine on the front-end the information the potential business users need access to and the reports they want to see.
* Analyze the old paper reports and the condition of the data housed in the company’s core transaction system.
*Standardize transactional codes in order to produce reports needed.
*Developing and testing summary tables to make queries work faster.

2. What are the key software tools needed to construct and use a data warehouse?

ANSWER:
Key software tools need would include:
*Data extraction software.
*User query and reporting software.
*Data transformation and loading software.

3. What is the business value of a data warehouse to Henry Schein? To any company?

ANSWER:

The business value would include:
* Determine the most profitable customers.
* Determine which customers to target with special promotion offers.
* Analyze the business by product category, sales territory, etc.
* Determine which customers should be included in specific direct marketing efforts.
* Ability of a user to add more fields to reports as they are using the system.