Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) in Pakistan deployed an innovative geographic information system (GIS) running on an IBM POWER7-based system to improve its ability to track supply and demand patterns for natural gas. The solution overlays digital maps with operational and financial data, enabling SSGC to visualize and analyze data geospatially. This provides better insight into issues like gas leakages and unaccounted-for gas. The new system using IBM Cognos software replaced outdated paper maps and manual reporting, allowing SSGC to more efficiently match supply and demand.

1. IBM Systems & Technology Group Energy & Utilities
Smarter Computing
SSGC mitigates business
risk through better insight
into supply and demand
Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGC) is Pakistan’s leading
natural gas provider, with a transmission pipeline network more than
Overview
3,220 km long and a distribution network that spans more than 1,200
The need towns in the Sindh and Baluchistan provinces. The company has more
Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) in than 2.2 million industrial, commercial and domestic customers and
Pakistan wanted to improve its ability to
track and predict changing patterns of
supplies approximately 390 million cubic feet of natural gas each year.
supply and demand for natural gas to SSGC also owns and operates Pakistan’s only gas meter manufacturing
its 2.2 million customers, and to reduce facility, with annual production capacity of more than 750,000 meters.
the loss of gas through leakages and
theft. Without a single comprehensive
source of reliable data or a consistent Keeping an eye on operations
set of analytical tools, the company was To manage its transmission and distribution networks, SSGC had
expending considerable time and effort on
more than 5,000 paper maps, and was steadily adding new maps as the
manual reporting that offered limited value
to business managers scope of its operations grew. The day-to-day handling, storage and
maintenance of these maps were a significant drain on resources. More
The solution
important, the information they contained was outdated almost as soon
Working with IBM and its Business
Partner InfoTech Private Limited, SSGC as they were created, and there was no consistent scale or format for
deployed an innovative geographic the maps. Reconciling operational data with mapping data to get a clear
information system (GIS) running on an picture of supply and demand issues was practically impossible: not
IBM® POWER7® processor-based IBM
Smart Analytics System 7700 with IBM only were the maps inconsistent and difficult to use, but also there was
Cognos® Business Intelligence and IBM no single source of reliable data.
Cognos TM1® software. The solution
overlays digital maps with real-time
SSGC wanted to be able to visualize data by geographic location, to
operational and financial data, enabling
SSGC to visualize and analyze data in a improve its efficiency in matching supply and demand, and to help
real-world context. plan its ongoing corporate expansion. The company also wanted better
visibility of gas leakages and unaccounted-for gas (UFG), so that it
could close the gap between the value of gas delivered to the network
and the value of the revenues generated from its sale.

2. IBM Systems & Technology Group Energy & Utilities
Smarter Computing
“As part of our GIS project, we needed a single source of the truth for
business analytics,” explains Irfan Zafar, Chief Technology Innovation
The benefit
Officer and Senior General Manager of Customer Services, Sui
User-driven reporting with real-time data Southern Gas Company Limited. “We had some analytics tools already,
updates has replaced the laborious, but they were limited in scope, and did not span the full spectrum of
time-consuming creation of static
reports. Different views and dashboards our information needs. Metrics were not always defined consistently
are provided to each different type of across different systems, and it was difficult to compare data from
information consumer within SSGC. With different sources. In addition to improving the quality and consistency
a single trusted version of information,
of the underlying data, we wanted to deliver information faster, to
and the ability to geo-reference data,
SSGC has a scalable integration introduce user-driven reporting, on demand.”
platform to handle the variety of data
and dramatically improve the speed
and clarity of its insight into supply and
Choosing IBM Smart Analytics
demand issues. SSGC worked with ESRI, IBM and IBM Business Partner InfoTech
Private Limited to create a combined GIS and analytics solution that
features ESRI ArcGIS mapping software and an IBM POWER7
processor-based Smart Analytics System 7700 solution. The first
stage of the project was the creation of a digital base map that merges
spatial and geodesic data with scanned paper maps, new digital maps
and satellite images. The base map covers land-use functions, water
resources, gas pipeline network and assets, road and railway networks,
and major and minor landmarks. In the second stage, the combined
project team integrated the base map with a sophisticated yet user-
friendly analytics solution.
Smarter Computing: The IT Infrastructure of a Smarter Planet
The IBM solution aggregates geographic data from more than 5,000 maps with data on assets (pipelines, fittings, depots), road
and rail networks, and data from SSGC’s ERP and billing systems. By combining real-time operational and current geographic
information, the solution enables timely, sophisticated analytics that reveal previously hidden insights. Uniting operational
data with geographic data brings reporting and analysis to life, enabling SSGC to visualize supply and demand issues as never
before. What-if analyses enable the business to test new ideas faster and understand the results with greater clarity, supporting
key business transformation initiatives.
The IBM Smart Analytics System 7700 solution is a pre-integrated and optimized stack of data warehouse management
software, analytics tools, storage and IBM Power Systems servers. Designed to deliver optimal performance and flexibility for
business analytics, the IBM solution was also fast and easy to deploy. As a complete business-ready analytics solution, the IBM
Smart Analytics System 7700 offers simple deployment and operation, yet provides a rich and complete stack of technologies
with the resiliency required for SSGC to analyze data with confidence and focus on business issues rather than on platform
integration.

3. IBM Systems & Technology Group Energy & Utilities
Smarter Computing
Kashif Qadeer, Deputy General Manager (Business Systems), Sui
Southern Gas Company Limited, comments, “Our key selection
Solution Components
criteria for the data warehouse and the analytics parts of the solution
Hardware included the performance and scalability of the technology, the
• IBM® Power® 740 quality of ETL [extract, transform, load] tools, and the quality of the
• IBM System Storage® DS5300
user interface. The IBM solution scored highly in all areas, and we
Software particularly appreciated the user-friendliness of the Cognos interfaces.
• IBM AIX® We also found that the availability of skilled personnel in Pakistan
• IBM Cognos® 8 Business Intelligence
was much better with IBM than with Teradata or Oracle, and IBM’s
• IBM Cognos TM1®
• IBM General Parallel File System commercial offer was also much more compelling.”
• IBM InfoSphere® Business Glossary
• IBM InfoSphere Change Data Capture The key components of the data warehouse are IBM InfoSphere®
• IBM InfoSphere DataStage
• IBM InfoSphere Metadata Workbench Warehouse, IBM InfoSphere Business Glossary and IBM InfoSphere
• IBM InfoSphere QualityStage DataStage®. The IBM Smart Analytics System 7700 deployed by SSGC
• IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Enterprise is a pre-integrated stack of data warehouse management software and
Edition
analytics tools, with an IBM System Storage® DS5300 array and an
IBM Business Partner IBM Power® 740 server with IBM POWER7 processors. Tuned to
• InfoTech Private Limited deliver optimal performance and flexibility for business analytics, the
IBM solution was also fast and easy to deploy, enabling SSGC to focus
on business issues rather than on integration.
“Both IBM and InfoTech were very accommodating during the
deployment regarding change requests and scope variations,” says
Irfan Zafar. “This helped to ensure a very smooth rollout with minimal
disruption to the business. The combination of IBM analytics software
and the IBM Power 740 server enables us to deliver business reporting
faster, with low total cost of ownership.”
Gaining a comprehensive view
The combined GIS and analytics solution provides a web portal that
delivers detailed, multi-layered digital maps overlaid with business
and customer information for improved decision-making. Users can
generate up-to-date versions of pre-built reports tailored to meet the
needs of different job functions and management levels. Executive
dashboards provide at-a-glance views of performance, and managers
can use the intuitive drag-and-drop interface of IBM Cognos Report
Studio to create their own tailored reports.
There are two main application groups for business intelligence and
analytics at SSGC: Customer Care and Billing, and ERP. The solution
is already fully rolled out to the first group, which will represent 90
percent of the eventual total user base. SSGC is now integrating data
from its ERP system into the combined GIS and analytics solution.
When this part of the project is complete, SSGC will be able to
consolidate information on gas sales (managed in the Customer Care
and Billing environment) with information on gas purchases (managed
in the ERP environment) in real time. This new insight will help
improve pricing efficiency and maximize profitability.

4. IBM Systems & Technology Group Energy & Utilities
Smarter Computing
The GIS system includes full information on SSGC’s pipeline assets,
with details such as the year each pipe was laid, and the materials used
“With IBM Cognos in its construction. This information is cross-referenced to information
Business Intelligence, on the local population, supporting improved risk analysis around the
reporting is essentially likelihood gas pilferage. The GPS coordinates for every customer are
stored in the system and cross-referenced to meter readers, enabling
instantaneous, so there’s SSGC to ensure that field operatives are completing this work
no need to wait until the correctly.
month-end - or longer -
The transmission network has a full SCADA (supervisory control and
to get the latest figures. data acquisition) solution that is linked into the GIS, so that SSGC
There’s also no effort can monitor the health of components and see incidents on the map in
required, and the business real time. The distribution network is not controlled in the same way,
though it does include some gas-leak detectors that deliver real-time
is no longer reliant on alerts into the GIS.
the IT function to get the
reporting done.” Having built up internal skills with help from IBM and InfoTech,
SSGC is now actively looking to offer similar GIS and analytics
solutions to external clients, both in its own industry and beyond.
—Kashif Qadeer, Deputy General Manager
(Business Systems), Sui Southern Gas
Company Limited
Benefiting from enhanced reporting
The IBM solution gives SSGC faster, more accurate and more
comprehensive reporting and analytical capabilities, helping the
company to identify hot spots for leaks and pilferage, to visualize
supply and demand issues, and to undertake what-if analyses to plan
more efficient processes. The creation of a data warehouse to store
operational data for analysis and reporting has given SSGC a single
version of the truth, improving the consistency and reliability of
reporting. Thanks to the data warehouse, SSGC can also now easily
leverage information from a wide variety of sources, providing a richer
view of operational performance across multiple different dimensions
and a better understanding of customer behavior.
In the past, all reporting was based on month-end data - the billing
cycle was, and continues to be, monthly. More than 1,000 standard
reports on financial, volumetric and taxation data were run each month,
and were typically available approximately 15 days into the following
month. It would then take time for the reports to be manipulated
and to reach the decision-makers - in some cases, managers were not
receiving actionable information until the end of the following month,
severely impacting the responsiveness of the business. Equally, the
delay between taking an action and seeing the outcome made it difficult
and risky to test new ideas.

5. IBM Systems & Technology Group Energy & Utilities
Smarter Computing
Kashif Qadeer comments, “In many cases, we were using Excel scripts
to pull data in from multiple operational systems - that alone could
“The IBM analytics take up to 48 hours. You would need to work on the report for a couple
solution greatly improves of days to validate the data. With IBM Cognos Business Intelligence,
our ability to define and reporting is essentially instantaneous, so there’s no need to wait until
the month-end - or longer - to get the latest figures. There’s also no
monitor business KPIs, effort required, and the business is no longer reliant on the IT function
and it brings much to get the reporting done.”
greater transparency
Previously, it might have taken up to a week for the IT function to
to reporting. We now create a new report. Now, business managers can use Cognos Report
have a single version of Studio to build their own reports in minutes. They are also now self-
the truth, and a single sufficient - the only time the IT function needs to get involved is when
the business wants to add a new data source (and even this is now just a
comprehensive report one-off ETL exercise).
for each topic, instead of
the multiple overlapping “The IBM solution has made a huge difference to the way we do
business,” says Kashif Qadeer. “Business users now have the power to
reports that we previously run forecasts, to test new ideas, and to see the impact of changes almost
had, all giving a slightly immediately. They also spend far less time manually creating and
different picture.” tweaking reports, so they can work much more productively.”
Irfan Zafar comments, “The IBM analytics solution greatly improves
— Irfan Zafar, Chief Technology Innovation
Officer and Senior General Manager of our ability to define and monitor business KPIs, and it brings much
Customer Services, Sui Southern Gas Company greater transparency to reporting. We now have a single version of the
Limited
truth, and a single comprehensive report for each topic, instead of the
multiple overlapping reports that we previously had, all giving a slightly
different picture. Reports are automatically and instantly refreshed
with the latest data, so the business can actually see the impact of any
changes it makes within days, rather than having to wait a month for
the next report to appear.”
For more information
Contact your IBM sales representative or IBM Business Partner, or
visit us at: ibm.com/systems/smartercomputing

6. © Copyright IBM Corporation 2012
IBM Corporation
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Produced in the United States of America
April 2012
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