Big push toward big data

More than a decade into the big data era, many say that Midwestern businesses are behind in harnessing the faster and better insights that the analysis of large, complex sets of information can provide.

However, four of the state's big data meetup groups, aiming to spur more awareness and discussion of these technologies here, will hold the first-ever BigDataWisconsin Conference in Madison on Monday.

“Business leaders are always looking for what is their competitive differentiator and how do they set up effective barriers to entry for competitors,” said Randy Kirk, an organizer for the conference and the 425-member MKE Big Data group. Kirk is executive vice president and chief scientist at Direct Supply Inc., a Milwaukee distributor of medical supplies. “I would say looking at these technologies is one of the most powerful things they can do to appeal to those two principles.”

Big data is a buzz phrase that means different things to different people. But at its core, it involves more than just the information, said John Byrnes, chairman of Mason Wells, a Milwaukee private equity firm.

"It isn't as much about collecting the data. It's about using machine learning to analyze it and draw conclusions," Byrnes said. Machine learning involves computer programs that can learn from previous computations so they are able to find insights without being directly programmed to do so.

It's complicated, but the benefits are numerous and varied — and sometimes unnerving.

IBM's Watson platform was used at Wimbledon this year to scour social media for stories fans engaged with most and drive creation of similar content. Target Corp. has used big data to make educated guesses about which female customers are pregnant in order to deliver to them relevant coupons. Netflix uses it to make recommendations based on customers’ viewing habits and preferences.

Big data technologies allow the Air Force Academy to predict how many students will eat lunch each day, helping to stop over-production, said Nick Mastronardi, a member of the U.S. Air Force Reserve and founder of Polco, a Madison start-up that offers polling and analytics to city governments.

Amazon, a big data leader, uses it to understand the impact of different types of marketing campaigns on the sales of particular products, said Mastronardi, who was previously a senior economist for the online retailer. Mastronardi said when he was at Amazon in 2014 and 2015, it had 86 PhD economists, all from top-tier schools, working on big data projects.

Therein lies the rub for many businesses here. Amazon has the financial wherewithal to keep so many economists on staff — and the technological savvy to know how to use them. How does a smaller business realize the benefits big data has to offer?

At Monday's conference, six speakers will make presentations aimed at helping Wisconsin companies, from those with no plans for big data to those that are using it to help guide their businesses, said Pitt Fagan, an organizer of the conference and the 1,340-member Big Data Madison group. Fagan is vice president of data engineering at Earthling Interactive, a Madison-based software developer.

Many companies make "really big mistakes" when they start getting involved in big data, said Jignesh Patel, a University of Wisconsin-Madison computer science professor who is the conference's keynote speaker.

The big data learning curve is littered with companies that have made sizable investments and have nothing to show for it, Kirk agreed. However, it's possible now to buy a big data cluster for about the same price as an archival system cost in the past. Such a cluster allows a company not only to store information but also analyze and potentially use the data in new ways, he said.

"These strategies will bring value to the table that have potential to change their marketplace and, obviously, grow their business," Kirk said.

Wisconsin may be behind in the development of the core technologies, but the real value of big data "comes in querying these technologies in specific business settings," said Patel, who founded three companies involved in core big data technologies and sold them to NCR, Twitter and Pivotal, a spin-out from EMC, respectively.

Patel said he plans to discuss at the conference common mistakes companies make and give suggestions for how to approach large projects.

Wisconsin has potential in the big data arena, particularly in the areas of health care IT, where Madison has deep expertise, and agriculture, Patel said.

"We have a large concentration of people who understand health care and health care IT," he said. "That’s where we have an opportunity to establish ourselves as a leader in developing the next generation of technologies to leverage big data to deliver value to the health care portion of the economy."

Regarding agriculture, which spans much of the state, in combination with the world-class big data expertise in the UW-Madison computer science department, there is potential to digitize information associated with farms and build intelligent technologies to improve productivity and develop more environmentally friendly methods, Patel said.

"Health care and agriculture, that's where we have leadership. We should take that and establish ourselves as a center of excellence for not just America, but the rest of the world," he said. "We have a shot at it."

The BigDataWisconsin Conference is one of more than 40 events that are part of the 2016 Forward Festival that is happening in Madison through Thursday. For more information about individual events, including start-up pitches, panel discussions and social activities, go to www.forwardfest.org.