Unlocking the Value of Business Intelligence:
Keys to Maximizing Business Performance

September 14, 2006
Hyatt Regency, Phoenix, AZ

Keith V. Collins, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, SAS

Keith Collins, senior vice president and chief technology officer at SAS, promotes corporate technology strategy and supports the efforts of the nearly 1,800-person global research and development, customer support and corporate information systems divisions to achieve that vision. With a primary focus on customer- and partner-facing activities, Collins fosters close working relationships with marketing and other customer-facing divisions to ensure that SAS technologies are aligned with customer needs and market demand.

Collins fosters an innovation-driven R&D culture, harvesting ideas from unexpected sources. He encourages development teams to build lasting relationships with customers that not only solve the customers' problems but also create new marketplace solutions.

A graduate of North Carolina State University with a bachelor's degree in computer science, Collins is a devoted supporter of the university. He helped establish the university’s Center for Knowledge Discovery, coordinated the funding of the SAS Distinguished Professor of Computer Science chair, and recruited a top faculty member from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to fill the position. He is also the chair and founding member of the strategic advisory board of the department of computer science. In 2003 the university named him a Distinguished Engineering Alumnus.

Mike Cozzi, Senior Technical Director, AT&T

Michael Cozzi is senior technical director, AT&T Centralized Development Team. He has been with AT&T for more than five years and has held management positions within IT. In his current role, he leads the centralized development team that provides internal consulting services to the AT&T IT department. He focuses on delivering business intelligence solutions that support various business functions and organizations.

Prior to this role, Cozzi was senior technical director of enterprise business intelligence. In this role, Cozzi delivered business intelligence solutions at an enterprise level. He holds a bachelor's degree from the Northern Illinois University, a master's degree from the DePaul University and has PMP certification. He has been an active user of SAS since 2003.

Thomas Davenport, President's Distinguished Professor of Information Technology and Management, Babson College

Thomas Davenport is the President's Distinguished Professor of Information Technology and Management at Babson College, the Director of Research for the School of Executive Education, and the Academic Director of Babson research centers dealing with knowledge and learning, process management, and innovation. He is the former Director and current Fellow of Accenture's Institute for High Performance Business. He is the author or co-author of eleven books, including his latest book, Thinking for a Living: How to Get Better Performance and Results from Knowledge Workers. Davenport is also a frequent contributor to leading business journals. His most recent article, "Competing on Analytics," appeared in the January 2006 issue of Harvard Business Review. In January of 2007, Harvard Business School Press will publish Davenport's newest book on this same topic.

Bill Hostmann, featured Research Vice President, Gartner

Bill Hostmann is a research vice-president in Gartner Research, where he focuses on business intelligence. Mr. Hostmann has worked for more than 15 years in the enterprise software market. He has held the position of Product Line General Manager for Informix Database and Internet Server product lines and, most recently, he was at Informatica Corporation. Mr. Hostmann holds a B.S., highest honors, in Electrical Engineering from the University of Portland, M.S., in Computer Science and Engineering from Oregon Graduate Institute and an M.B.A. from the University of Oregon.

Ron Milton, Executive Vice President, Computerworld

Ron manages the events business and strategic business programs for IT executive titles in storage networking, mobile and wireless, data center and business intelligence market sectors. Milton leads the team responsible for creating content, sponsor sales, operations, marketing and audience development for all of Computerworld's events, such as brands like Premier 100 IT Leaders, Storage Networking World, Mobile & Wireless World, Business Intelligence Perspectives and IT Executive Summit Series. He has 20+ years of experience in information technology, serving in both vendor and information services management positions. Before his current role at IDG, Ron was Senior Vice President of CXO Media and General Manager of CIO Magazine's Executive Program Divisions.

Prior to joining Computerworld in 1999, he was President and CEO of IDG's Internet Commerce (ICE) business unit, which he founded in 1996 as a start-up business, and was a pioneer in using e-commerce systems and web marketing. He was a 1996 recipient of the coveted IDG Chairman's Award for the most successful start-up business globally. Before joining IDG, Milton spent five years as Vice President/Partner of GLA computer Systems, a software developer and channel integrator with market share leadership in wholesale travel solutions. Prior to GLA, he also held a variety of management positions in channel management, field sales and marketing at Honeywell Information Systems and Bull HN. He holds degrees from Concordia University and Sir George Williams University.

Renée Romano Nocker, Executive Director, Enterprise Business Intelligence, AT&T

Renée Romano has been an IT professional for 19 years, focusing her career on decision support, data warehousing, and business intelligence. Her experience encompasses multiple industries, including telecommunications, manufacturing, consumer products, health care, transportation, financial services, insurance and HR benefits management.

For the past 10 years, Romano has focused her career in telecommunications. Today, she is responsible for the overall business intelligence strategy for AT&T across the enterprise, encompassing financial, marketing, sales/operations, regulatory, HR and procurement. She has delivered initiatives for marketing to deploy analytics to support customer relationship management and for sales/operations to support process re-engineering and performance management. Romano helps drive these capabilities across network technologies and across IT management. She also helps drive the overall enterprise strategy measures for the CEO and his leadership team.

Romano partners with functional area leaders enabling consistent information in meeting needs for both strategic planning and tactical performance management across the business. Her vision for a corporate business intelligence environment is being realized via these initiatives.

Tim Stanley, Chief Information Officer, Harrah's Entertainment

Tim Stanley is Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer of Harrah's Entertainment, Inc. He is responsible for the strategy, architecture, program management, development, support and operations of the entire portfolio of Harrah's IT-enabled business capabilities across more than 40 properties in the U.S. and abroad. In this role, he oversees approximately 1,000 IT professionals worldwide.

Before joining Harrah's in 2001, Stanley was a partner with consulting firms USWeb and marchFIRST, where he developed and led the travel practice for the firms, working with several leading airline, hospitality, travel and gaming clients. Prior to that role, he was the CIO of National Airlines, where he launched the company on an innovative platform of Internet-based IT applications, infrastructure and operations. He has also held various leadership positions in the U.S. and overseas in the areas of IT, marketing, operations and consulting with Intel Corporation, Optima/KPMG, InnovaTech and Kimberly-Clark Corporation. Stanley began his career as a U.S. Air Force officer, responsible for advanced missile guidance system technology projects and some of the original Global Positioning System (GPS) integration efforts.

Stanley was named one of InfoWorld's "Top 25 CTOs," and he has been honored with CIO Insight's "Partners in Alignment" award for successful linkage of business strategy and technology at Harrah's as well as being named one of "The Top 25 Unsung Heroes of the Internet" by Interactive Week magazine. He has led Harrah's IT to a number of awards ranging from the CIO 100 award; to Computerworld's Best Places to Work in IT for an unprecedented Top 25 ranking for the past eight years; to the American Business Awards Best MIS & IT Organization. He holds graduate degrees in International Business and Technology Management from Thunderbird (AGSIM) and Arizona State University, as well as a bachelor's degree in engineering from the University of Washington.