Profitability simulator

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10248962-B2
Application number	US-201414247754-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 8, 2014
Priority date	Apr 8, 2013
Publication date	Apr 2, 2019
Grant date	Apr 2, 2019

Abstract

Disclosed are methods and apparatuses for generating sales data reports. One approach is provided for receiving time information, simulation information, and forecast parameters to generate on the fly revenue and profitability reports for past historical data and future forecasts.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method implemented with a processor for generating data reports, comprising:
receiving inputs comprising a simulation period, simulation information, and a plurality of subsets of the simulation period corresponding to a first granularity of results to be provided in a report of a simulation, wherein a subset of the plurality of subsets of the simulation period corresponds to a time period within the simulation period, wherein a granularity of results is a unit of time corresponding to the results;
running the simulation based at least in part on the simulation period and the simulation information by:
performing historical charting with parallel processing by:
building multiple thread groups wherein work among a plurality of threads is divided according to date ranges,
performing fetches of historical data in parallel via the plurality of threads, and
concatenating results from the fetches and updating a scaling to chart results data,
wherein concatenating results comprises concatenating the results from the fetches into an XML string structure based upon an ordering of the date ranges processed by the plurality of threads; and

performing future forecast charting by:
receiving forecast data corresponding to one or more subsets of the plurality of subsets of the simulation period, the one or more subsets of the forecast data having a second granularity of results;
identifying a mismatch between the first granularity for the report of the simulation and the second granularity of results from the forecast data, wherein the mismatch is due to the first granularity for the report of the simulation being smaller than the second granularity of results from the forecast data; and
generating data corresponding to the first granularity by determining a proportional amount of forecast data corresponding to the mismatch; and
adding the data generated to the XML string structure; and

generating the report of the simulation to be displayed to a user or saved on a database, wherein the report of the simulation is generated using the XML string structure.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the simulation period comprises a start date and a number of periods.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the simulation period includes both past and future time.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein simulation information comprises product information, customer information, or product location information.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising loading a saved report and displaying the report with the saved report.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the simulation is performed using a process comprising:
receiving simulation parameters for performing the simulation;
performing historical charting by accessing historical sales data; and
performing future charting by accessing forecast data.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein at least part of the forecast data was generated before receiving the simulation period and the simulation information.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein generating the report of the simulation to be displayed to a user comprises:
displaying the inputs on a first portion of a graphical user interface display; and
displaying the report on a second portion of the graphical user interface display, the report comprising:
the plurality of subsets of the simulation period on an x-axis, and
the historical charting and the future forecast charting on a y-axis having a visual difference between historical data and forecasted data, wherein when a subset of the simulation period has a part of time already elapsed and a part of time still in a future, displaying a combination of the historical charting and the future forecast charting, the combination of the historical charting and the future forecast charting having the visual difference displayed within the subset of the simulation period,
wherein the report is generated based at least in part on the inputs received and displayed on the graphical user interface, wherein an update to values of the inputs in the first portion of the graphical user interface display results in an immediate update of the report displayed in the second portion of the graphical user interface display.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein scaling is performed to a chart for the report.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein a further mismatch between the first granularity for the report of the simulation and a third granularity of results corresponding to one or more other subsets of the forecast data corresponds to the third granularity of results of the forecast data being smaller than the first granularity for the report of the simulation, and the data for the simulation is adjusted by performing accumulation of the forecast data corresponding to the third granularity of result of the forecast data over multiple time periods.

11. A system for generating sales data reports, comprising:
a processor; and
a memory to hold program code instructions, in which the program code instructions comprises program code to perform:
receiving inputs comprising a simulation period, simulation information, and a plurality of subsets of the simulation period corresponding to a first granularity of results to be provided in a report of a simulation, wherein a subset of the plurality of subsets of the simulation period corresponds to a time period within the simulation period, wherein a granularity of results is a unit of time corresponding to the results;
running the simulation based at least in part on the simulation period and the simulation information by:
performing historical charting with parallel processing by:
building multiple thread groups wherein work among a plurality of threads is divided according to date ranges,
performing fetches of historical data in parallel via the plurality of threads, and
concatenating results from the fetches and updating a scaling to chart results data,
wherein concatenating results comprises concatenating the results from the fetches into an XML string structure based upon an ordering of the date ranges processed by the plurality of threads; and performing future forecast charting by:
receiving forecast data corresponding to one or more subsets of the plurality of subsets of the simulation period, the one or more subsets of the forecast data having a second granularity of results;
identifying a mismatch between the first granularity for the report of the simulation and the second granularity of results from the forecast data, wherein the mismatch is due to the first granularity for the report of the simulation being smaller than the second granularity of results from the forecast data; and
generating data corresponding to the first granularity by determining a proportional amount of forecast data corresponding to the mismatch; and
adding the data generated to the XML string structure; and

generating the report of the simulation to be displayed to a user or saved on a database, wherein the report of the simulation is generated using the XML string structure.

12. The system of claim 11 , wherein the simulation period comprises a start date and a number of periods.

13. The system of claim 11 , wherein the simulation period includes both past and future time.

14. The system of claim 11 , wherein simulation information comprises product information, customer information, or product location information.

15. The system of claim 11 , further comprising loading a saved report and displaying the report with the saved report.

16. The system of claim 11 , wherein the program code instructions fur

Assignees

• Oracle Int Corp

Inventors

• Mitchell Kara
• Johnson Aaron
• Vance Eric

Classifications

• G06Q30/0202 Primary

  Market predictions or forecasting for commercial activities · CPC title

• G06Q30/0201

  Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data · CPC title