2025 will be “explosive” for SAS – CTO Bryan Harris

Next year is set to explosive for SAS, according to its chief technology officer Bryan Harris. 

Speaking to media at the SAS Innovate 2024 event in Las Vegas, Harris said the analytics, artificial intelligence and data management company is at a point where it can innovate at a rate much faster than it has in the past.

"By unifying our software, both the platform and our solutions, we're able to give a consistent experience to our customers, and it allows us to innovate faster because we have a single code base to evolve," he said. 

"So for me, I've actually never been more bullish, because I feel like we are at a place where we can innovate at a rate much faster than we ever have before. And I would say that 2025 is going to be explosive for us. Because of where we are at as a company, and building the foundations of everything we've got in the software, going forward it's really going to be about how do we work with customers, understand their core, critical needs, and evolve the software to match their needs at a rate that is differentiated in the market."

That differentiation is key for SAS, according to Harris.

"If everyone is saying the same words, your differentiation is your execution and your time to value. That's it," Harris says. 

"So that's what we're going to focus on – how do we improve our execution? How do we improve our time and value? So customers call SaaS first versus someone else," he says.
 
SAS Innovate saw the official launch of the company's packaged AI models, a new approach for organisations to tackle business challenges head-on.

The industry-specific AI models are designed to enable organisations to rapidly deploy AI technology for real-world use in an efficient manner. 

Delivering the models as packaged offerings is one outcome of SAS' commitment of $1 billion to AI- powered industry solutions, announced in May last year. The multiyear investment will fuel cloud-first solutions and further develop advanced analytics solutions across numerous industries, namely banking, government, insurance, health care, retail, manufacturing, energy, telecom/media. Harris says this industry commitment and the rapid time-to-value these solutions deliver are key SAS differentiators.

The billion-dollar investment includes direct research and development, industry-focused line-of-business teams, and industry marketing efforts. It will fund the work of SAS data scientists, statisticians and software developers working with consultants, systems engineers and marketers with specific industry experience.

"Through this investment, SAS will continue to support companies using AI, machine learning and advanced analytics to fight fraud, manage risk, better serve customers and citizens," Harris says.