AES D³ PRODUCT ROADMAP

The AccuWeather Enterprise Solutions' D³ Product Roadmap is a shortened moniker for our Database Migration and sunsetting of legacy products and it has been a true labor of love for me and my team. From my first days at AccuWeather in August 2016, I have been helping with getting us to today! We are still very much in the early stages of the process, but true progress has been made. We have streamlined our D³ products into three tiers of service levels - this provides enhanced scalability between tiers but also within each tier, and will allow us to keep a standardized product line across many software platforms including Microsoft, Google, Esri, our proprietary portal, and more. The streamlined scalability of D³ means that we will be able to provide standardization and automation across product lines and software platforms to best support our clients. I have assisted in roadmapping the creation of our three tier D³ Product Line. Below, I'll discuss the various steps and my roles in transitioning from WeatherBank to the updated D³ Product lines and roadmap. Working with Microsoft and a third party, the AccuWeather powered by Microsoft D³ Product website will launch on May 10th, 2017 which was developed from my work with Power BI. This will feature our D³ Express product with weather impacts and basic weather metrics provided to clients.

In 2015, AccuWeather purchased WeatherBank and slowly began the process of migrating/integrating WeatherBank data, analytics, and products to the D³ group at AccuWeather Enterprise Solutions. My initial tasks included determining who were WeatherBank clients then cataloging and organizing the WeatherBank legacy clients and products into a clear and understandable spreadsheet. WeatherBank had over 300 weather metrics spread across more than 300 products, and delivered to more than 130 clients but we did not know the details for any of this and had to start with confirming just who were still clients. This was a major undertaking that required communication and cooperation with many different departments and business units including WeatherBank, AES, Accounting, Sales, and upper management. I had to pour through old WeatherBank websites, excel spreadsheets produced for WeatherBank clients, and other sources to compile a master list that includes every client, what weather metrics and products they receive, and how they receive this data.

After compiling the spreadsheet, we looked at how to streamline the metrics and products WeatherBank legacy clients receive and how to integrate them with current AccuWeather Enterprise Solutions clients and produts. This lead to seeing the best option for moving forward is to develop a three-tired product line that streamlines, standardizes, and automates our data delivery to clients in a logically scalable manner. By working in the weeds of the WeatherBank data, I have been able to easily provide details and explanation to help my boss further develop the D³ Product Roadmap. It is not only important to provide quality data to clients, but we see the value and ability to increase AccuWeather revenue by providing clients with scalable compelling customization of visualized data. With multiple tiers of service, AccuWeather will be in a position to provide clients with scalable solutions that range from D³ Express (we provide data to the client plus basic customer data with no analysis or customization - SEE VIDEO BELOW) to the middle tier, D³ Advanced (client provides us data to analyze with our data, some customization allowed) to the D³ Tailored line (full customization). AccuWeather D³ Powered by Microsoft can be found at d3.accuweather.com.

This presentation will take you through the multiple steps: 1) Tour of a WeatherBank website from the client perspective, 2) Brief look at the master spreadsheet I helped develop for my Analytics team, 3) Examples of the D³ Express Powered by Microsoft Power BI, and 4) Prototype examples of the D³ Express "plus" and Advanced products in Microsoft Power BI.