Democratizing Retail Analytics with Generative AI
Ask Udi transforms how retailers and consumer brands can harness AI-enabled retail analytics and intelligence for smarter decisions and better business results.
We are excited to announce the launch of our new Ask Udi feature, which democratizes predictive retail analytics across the organization for retailers and consumer brands.
By leveraging our Unified Demand Intelligence platform’s output and generative AI algorithms, this capability allows business users to perform a myriad of analyses typically undertaken by data analysts through simple natural language queries (that is, plain questions).
Bridging the Retail Analytics Gap Between Data and Decisions
Ask Udi can understand natural language queries and translate them into code, and fetch relevant insights from Parker Avery’s Unified Demand Intelligence database. Ask Udi effectively turns everyday words into actionable analytics on the fly. Bypassing data analysts, Ask Udi brings these capabilities directly to business users.
A simple example question would be “What is the impact of a 20% discount on sales forecasts for Canada Dry Ginger Ale 12 oz, 24 cans heading into Independence Day this year?”
This opens up a world of enhanced business intelligence that goes far beyond traditional backward-looking analyses. With Ask Udi, you can explore factors like:
- What stores are most affected by specific price changes?
- How will demand forecasts be impacted by a federal reserve rate cut?
- What products are exceeding planned demand trends in the southeast?
Users can ask about virtually any modeled variable across products, geographies, customer segments, sales channels, and suppliers. Simply phrase your question, and the system surfaces the predictive insights you need. Further, Ask Udi can produce graphs and images to represent retail analytics visually.
The Power of the Ask Udi
The key advantage? Ask Udi taps into our Unified Demand Intelligence and industry-leading retail analytics technology. This approach focuses advanced language models on a curated, relevant data universe and provides answers in terms appropriate to the user’s specific question. Ask Udi enables users to get answers on granular data, for example, specific SKU performance. This empowers our AI algorithm to provide more accurate, meaningful predictions from the start—with the capability to continue learning and improving over time.
Continuous Learning and Customization
Another standout feature of Ask Udi is its ability to evolve through user interactions. The algorithm learns and refines its responses continually, ensuring that the insights it provides become more accurate and valuable over time. Put simply, the more you interact with Ask Udi, the more it learns and improves its responses tailored to your needs.
Future iterations of our retail analytics platform will offer even more powerful customization options. Users will be able to tailor models to their specific needs without involving an analyst. For instance, users will be able to optimize promotional pricing for specific products and periods to boost financial metrics. Or generate long-range demand forecasts based on different macroeconomic scenarios. All without involving analysts or data scientists.
Predictive, Cost-Effective Retail Analytics
Further, our Unified Demand Intelligence-based solution reduces costs by optimizing data storage, processing, and accessibility, making sophisticated analytics more affordable and accessible to a broader range of users within the organization.
Data Pruning and Efficient Simulations
Generative AI models often require significant computational power and resources to operate effectively. Our Ask Udi architecture prunes data, meaning it consolidates and organizes information into a compact form optimized for querying. This retail data optimization enables simulations and analyses to become more efficient and less resource-intensive, thus reducing costs associated with running generative AI models.
Accessibility and Ease of Use
Another factor contributing to cost-effectiveness is the democratization of data analysis. By enabling anyone in the organization to run simulations and analyses through simple English queries, the solution reduces dependency on specialized analysts or IT resources, thereby optimizing labor costs associated with data handling and analysis.
Retailers and consumer brands can now unlock the full potential of their data, gaining insights that drive smarter decision-making and ultimately lead to better business outcomes. With Ask Udi, we’re not just enhancing BI capabilities; we’re transforming the way you interact with and interpret your data.
Book a discovery call to get started.
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