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| Background |
Heren Energy is the leading, fully independent, specialist energy data provider in Europe. With a combination of daily reports and regular newsletters, all internationally recognised as the Heren Reports, the company's simple aim is to report the news, index the markets, and supply analytical and statistical information that will be of real use to its customers
Their production processes had been evolved over time and utilised a mixture of complex Excel sheets and macros to create the final reports. The production process was slow, labour intensive and prone to error. The editorial team were spending a lot of time resolving design and technical issues instead of being able to focus creating the editorial content and analysis. Storage of valuable historic data was on spreadsheets limiting the value that could be gained from information assets |
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| Our Thinking and Approach |
Cohezia developed an eBusiness and Content Management strategy and implementation roadmap. The key objectives were to speed up the production process, improve the data and report quality and build a solid foundation for developing a range of additional information services for Heren’s clients. Core to the success was the implementation of a central scalable database.
The solution architecture - called Heren Energy Reporting Online (HERO) was developed by Cohezia addressing the core requirements in a strategic manner |
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| The HERO applications included : |
- Automated data collection and import facilities (from various file types) to acquire and load data directly into the central database
- Automation of the complete editorial workflow process from information collection and publication, to distribution
- Creation of the structured content for the regular (daily, weekly and monthly) reports which incorporate complex data, tables, text and graphical content
- Analysis tools to allow editorial team to analyse the data in multi-dimensional interactive ‘cubes’
- An facility to allow customers to select and purchase historic data online
- A database and XML driven interface with the publishing software, In-design to quickly and easily incorporate the content into design templates to create final reports
- The reports and data are distributed in various formats including PDF, CSV, Excel, HTML
- Complex configuration and system management functions due to the nature of the business (e.g. custom period definitions, multi-units, multi- currency)
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| Technology Utilised |
| The production systems are browser based, working on a Microsoft platform using MS SQL Server database and .NET tools. Database driven XML files are created and used to create reports using an interface with Adobe In-Design. Analysis functions are provided by MS OLAP and dynamic Excel links. The external website uses Macromedia Flash, HTML and is based on a MySQL database. The system incorporates advanced user, subscriber and Content Management Systems and application administration facilities |
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| Creative and Usability Design |
| The Heren editorial team has very tight daily editorial deadlines to meet so a simple interface, ease of use and speed were core requirements.The design also needed to cater for a large number of data tables and charts. Report content is detached from report layout by using In-Design templates and automated processes to populate content |
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www.heren.com |
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| Results |
Heren Energy now have integrated systems and a comprehensive centralised database to help them carry out their complete production and editorial process
The solution has significantly reduced their report preparation and production time and made the whole process much more stable and easier for the editorial staff. The reduction in manual entry and reliance on spreadsheets has improved the quality of the report information
This stable and scalable foundation has allowed Heren Energy to reduce production costs, develop improved services to customers and created new revenue streams. |
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