Emerson Process Management, a global supplier of measurement,analytical, and monitoring instruments and services based inAustin, Texas, had a new data warehouse designed for analyzingcustomer activity to improve service and marketing that was full ofinaccurate and redundant data. The data in the warehouse came fromnumerous transaction processing systems in Europe, Asia, and otherlocations around the world. The team that designed the warehousehad assumed that sales groups in all these areas would entercustomer names and addresses the same way, regardless of theirlocation. In fact, cultural differences combined with complicationsfrom absorbing companies that Emerson had acquired led to multipleways of entering quote, billing, shipping, and other data. Assessthe potential business impact of these data quality problems. Whatdecisions have to be made and steps taken to reach a solution?
