Ricoh Leasing Revamps BI with WebFOCUS

Ricoh Leasing, a company that leases products such as medical equipment, industrial machine tools, and vehicles, and provides collection, loan, and financial services for these leases, was facing challenges with its data warehouse system. The system was slow, required a lot of paper, data was not being used effectively or practically and security was questionable. The field staff, who deal with many different kinds of customers, had developed their own systems for handling customer information. The data warehouse system, as it was originally designed and implemented, did not catch on with the field. The original business intelligence tool was attractive for power users, but not for most people in the field, who were used to their own different systems and did not have the time to learn a new tool that did not exactly suit their needs. To make it more accessible, the Information Systems Division switched from a client/server-based to a Web-based system. This, however, made the cost prohibitive, because licensing was based on the number of users, and with Web-based access the number of users was now potentially the whole company. The Web-based system also raised security concerns.

Ricoh Leasing was established in 1976 for sales promotion of Ricoh products, leasing products such as medical equipment, industrial machine tools, and vehicles, as well as providing collection, loan, and financial services for these leases. The company has a large field staff that deals with many different kinds of customers. In a mature business like leasing, the field and management have to communicate well in order to find new customers and make the most of their existing customer base. The company had initially built a data warehouse and acquired a business intelligence tool as a logical first step for accessing more customer and prospect information and bringing the field and management together. However, the system did not catch on with the field staff, who were used to their own different systems and did not have the time to learn a new tool that did not exactly suit their needs.