Forecasting Software

With SAS forecasting software, you can accurately analyze and forecast processes that take place over time. You can identify previously unseen trends and anticipate fluctuations so you can more effectively plan for the future. Factors that impact your business, such as the economy, market conditions, customer demographics and marketing activities such as sales promotions, can be identified, quantified and included in your forecasting processes for improved results.

SAS software provides a wide range of integrated capabilities for time series analysis and forecasting, econometrics and systems modeling, and financial analysis and reporting, with direct access to your internal/external commercial data warehouses/marts. With the power of SAS at your command, you can:

Forecast demand for products and services.
Perform promotional analysis.
Predict staffing and resource needs.
Perform site selection analysis.
Make effective pricing decisions.
Plan and understand your markets.
Predict customer and market behavior.
Analyze investment options.

SAS software provides a variety of ways to model business processes and provides powerful mechanisms for "what-if" simulation analyses. Complex business processes can be simulated and a variety of scenarios tested, giving you a safe means for evaluating and refining proposed policies before implementation. Whether you want to understand past trends, forecast the future or better understand how your business functions, we provide a wide range of analytical tools that ensure your success.

Data preparation is important for producing accurate forecasts. Data collected in transactional format is not always suitable for forecasting because it is not recorded in equally spaced time intervals. SAS converts transactional data to time series data by accumulating the data into any time interval desired. This means the same set of transactional data can be quickly transformed into different time series to address different planning problems. Data already in time series format can be aggregated into different time intervals.
Quickly and automatically generate large quantities of accurate forecasts from very large volumes of data. SAS High-Performance Forecasting can produce thousands, even millions, of forecasts quickly, automatically and accurately. Each forecast is individually calculated using statistically optimized parameters so you can be confident your forecasts are up-to-date and accurate. Use the results to drive strategic planning.
Automatically detect and adjust for outliers. The history of each item being forecast is examined, and outliers and shifts in data can be automatically identified. Subsequent forecasts can be adjusted accordingly for the outliers and shifts, preventing spurious results due to abnormalities in the data. This automatic detection capability enables forecasters to spend less time fixing data related problems and more time focusing on more strategic forecasts.
Automatically identify and measure key marketing events. Regressors and events that can improve your forecasting model are automatically selected from key business drivers supplied in the modeling process. SAS High-Performance Forecasting automatically determines how they are to be specified in your model. Variable transformations, lags and transfer function definitions are computed automatically.
Take the guesswork out of forecasting by providing analysts with capabilities to suit any forecasting problem. SAS/ETS software contains popular forecasting methods such as regression analysis, trend extrapolation, exponential smoothing, Winter's method (additive and multiplicative), ARIMA (Box-Jenkins) and dynamic or transfer function models. For automated forecasting of multivariate time series, SAS provides VARMAX and general statespace models, including Unobserved Components Models (UCM).
Help novice forecasters achieve high-quality results with an interactive interface, which also includes robust tools for more experienced analysts. The SAS/ETS Time Series Forecasting System can automatically generate forecasts by selecting the best-fitting forecasting model from a list of candidate models. For forecasters with more experience, there is a development workspace for creating customized models. The interface also makes it easy for users to explore plots and results with interactive graphical tools.
Integration and synchronization are vital to improving your forecast process. SAS forecasting applications/tools are part of an integrated suite of analytical and business intelligence offerings, providing you with a complete forecasting solution encompassing data management, analysis, visualization and reporting.
Simulate business processes for strategic forecasting and planning. Complex systems and processes can be simulated and a variety of scenarios can be tested so you can evaluate and fine-tune proposals. Gain powerful insight with "what-if" simulation analysis.

SAS uniquely addresses the forecasting and analysis needs for all levels of decision making, from tactical to strategic, from the short-term to the long run. No other vendor offers such a complete forum for solving problems that involve analyzing data collected over time.

Globally recognized as an industry leader in analytics, SAS ensures accurate, consistent and reliable analysis of all your business information to produce insights that provide competitive advantage. After all, who doesn't want to accurately predict the future?

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