"Operations Intelligence" (OI) refers to an important class of information technology that enables better decision-making and improved business performance based on the ready availability of real time status and performance metrics throughout the organization.  
OI typically applies to production, planning and asset management activities but can also be applied to the internal supply chain, marketing and logistics. Typical objectives of OI are to achieve higher levels of production against assets, reduce the cost of production and, ultimately, improve the bottom line.

An OI platform aggregates, relates and presents operational and business data in real time. It does so in a manner that is intuitive and useful for every individual who plays a role in delivering business results. It can be applied initially to an individual site, and evolved to include all sites, divisions, regions and the overall enterprise.

To better understand Operations Intelligence, it is useful to contrast it with Business Intelligence (BI). BI involves the gathering and analysis of historical data that helps enterprise business analysts achieve insights for medium and long-term planning. BI traditionally serves Financial, CRM and Supply Chain activities. BI analytics and reports tend to be strategic in nature and do not require quick action. 

By contrast, OI focuses on the day-to-day activities of the production processes. It answers questions such as: How am I doing against objectives? How are we doing collectively? What should we do in this situation, given these current conditions?

A XHQ solution synthesizes information from these multiple sources into views that provide you with the appropriate information in a familiar context. The solution presents users throughout the organization with a common view of operational status and the various metrics used to monitor and manage performance.

Enterprises have invested heavily in pursuit of a better understanding of markets, improved service to customers, financial insights and reduced raw material costs. However, until recently, the activities that transform materials into the company's products have relatively little attention in terms of enterprise-wide IT initiatives.

XHQ extracts data from a variety of information sources - ERP, data warehouse, production databases, document management systems, process historians, and manufacturing automation - all with equal facility and ease.

Through XHQ's component-based model, this data is aggregated and related to produce information that is framed within a meaningful business context. Real-time views from the XHQ data model are streamed live over the internet/intranet to zero administration browser clients, mobile devices and Enterprise Portals. This information is personalized for your individual role to provide views that combine information to address your specific issues. The entire environment is maintained through an integrated configuration environment that enables non-technical business domain experts to create content without programming or extensive IT support.

Finally, the entire system is architected for scalability. Using the XHQ real-time data cache, hundreds of users can be served with live, streaming data without over burdening the network or backend operational systems.   

Everything moves rapidly in the process sector. Strong competition is a given and staying ahead of the game requires enormous effort. The typical enterprise has invested heavily in systems that manage transactions, automate manufacturing processes and, in general, execute the company's business.  These systems generate huge volumes of information that are typically available to only a few trained "power users." Much of this information has tremendous value to the rest of the organization and, in today's business climate, it is essential for the wider organization to have access to this information in real-time.

"Perhaps our greatest untapped resource," says a VP of Operations of a leading company, "is the strong desire of the average employee to make a meaningful contribution to the goals and objectives of the company." But this poses a challenge. How do you truly empower them? How do you aggregate, relate and present all of the combined operational and business data needed by a large user population in a useful format and in real time? In other words, how do you provide everyone in your organization with an up to the minute view of performance against individual and group objectives? How do you present them with all of the information they need to make the good day-to-day decisions that will drive the organization to higher levels of achievement?

In subsequent sections, we provide answers to these important questions, including overviews of the XHQ Operations Intelligence solution and the XHQ Difference. We'll describe key concepts that drive the design of XHQ, discuss XHQ in action, and chronicle how an XHQ solution is implemented and delivered.