Beacon Point Associates 

Introduction

Beacon Point Associates (BPA) is a Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) that specializes in providing medical and surgical equipment to the Federal healthcare market. Founded in 2013 by Jeff Summerour, a retired senior Navy Supply Officer, BPA leverages its expertise in government acquisition, contracting, and procurement processes to help manufacturers develop effective strategies for selling to the Federal government.

Before implementing EasyLake, BPA faced several challenges in managing their data effectively:

• Inadequate reporting and dashboard capabilities: BPA was looking for a robust business intelligence solution that could provide reliable and timely reports on their daily and monthly sales performance.
• Unreliable sales tracking system: The existing system that tracked sales at the user interface layer was unreliable and difficult to maintain, leading to inaccuracies and inefficiencies in sales reporting.
• Lack of a scalable data warehousing platform: BPA wanted to build a strong foundation for their future data reporting needs by implementing a data warehousing platform that could accommodate their growing data volumes and evolving requirements.
• Need for transaction-level reporting: To gain better visibility into their operations, BPA required a transaction report that could track daily transactions with both customers and vendors, enabling them to monitor and analyze their business activities more effectively.

Recognizing the need for a more robust, reliable, and scalable data management solution, BPA turned to EasyLake to address these challenges and transform their data warehousing and analytics capabilities.Solution

Results

The implementation of EasyLake has significantly improved Beacon Point Associates' data management and reporting capabilities, enabling them to make informed decisions based on reliable and up-to-date data. The solution has provided BPA with a robust and scalable data warehousing platform that serves as a solid foundation for their current and future data needs.

EasyLake has enhanced data consistency, reliability, and accessibility for BPA. The centralized data repository has reduced the need for manual data processing, minimizing the risk of errors and saving time. The solution has also improved BPA's financial reporting capabilities, providing comprehensive ledger reports that facilitate financial tracking, analysis, and decision-making processes.

The EasyLake implementation project was completed within a 4-month timeframe, thanks to the efficiency and expertise of the Warecorp team. The project included thorough testing to ensure the robustness and accuracy of the solution before the final rollout, ensuring a smooth transition for BPA.

Phil Ensminger, CTO of Beacon Point Associates, shared his thoughts on the partnership with Warecorp in designing and delivering the EasyLake data warehouse:

"Capturing, storing, and using first-party data is essential to our success in this mission, and Warecorp is helping to make that possible. Their work to modernize our data practice through the EasyLake architecture is transformative. Complex application data now flows through a centralized, accessible system built specifically for reporting and analysis. Without it, our perspective would be flawed, and informed decision-making would be impossible.

None of this happens by chance. Building a reliable, production-ready platform that is worthy of such trust requires focus, expertise, and persistence through every stage of development. Warecorp brings all that to the table and more, guiding us along this difficult path with skill and dedication."

By leveraging EasyLake, Beacon Point Associates has enhanced its data management capabilities, enabling more accurate reporting and data-driven decision-making. The scalable and reliable data warehousing platform provided by EasyLake has positioned BPA for future growth and success in the Federal healthcare market.

Technical Details

The EasyLake implementation for Beacon Point Associates represents a comprehensive data warehousing solution built on cutting-edge technology. The process begins with secure data import from a cloud-hosted MySQL database into the EasyLake environment, where it's stored in a Delta Lake within Microsoft Fabric, ensuring scalability and reliability. Our Fabric pipelines handle the initial ETL process, creating 15 bronze tables in the Delta Lake as the foundation of the data architecture.

For data transformation, we employ Python PySpark notebooks to perform Slowly Changing Dimension (SCD) processing on each bronze table, with the processed data flowing into silver tables within the Delta Lake. The solution generates three gold ledger reports using Python PySpark notebooks, providing essential summarized views of the data. For visualization, Power BI connects directly to the semantic table in Microsoft Fabric, enabling interactive dashboards and reports. The entire solution operates across separate development and production environments, ensuring proper testing and deployment protocols.

Future Plans:

Beacon Point Associates' roadmap for their EasyLake solution focuses on comprehensive growth and enhanced capabilities. The organization plans to expand their data ecosystem by integrating additional tables from their transactional database, providing a more complete view of business operations. This expansion will be accompanied by a thoughtful refinement of existing silver tables and the creation of new ones, designed to capture more nuanced dimensions and metrics for advanced analytics.

The team is committed to developing additional reports that leverage this enriched data, delivering deeper insights into operations, customer behavior, and financial performance. To maximize the value of these improvements, Beacon Point Associates will roll out interactive Power BI dashboards based on silver and gold tables across the organization, democratizing data access and enabling data-driven decision-making at all levels.  These initiatives will enable them to gain deeper insights into their business and make informed decisions to drive growth in the Federal healthcare market.

Conclusion

The implementation of EasyLake has significantly enhanced Beacon Point Associates' data management and reporting capabilities. The scalable data warehousing platform, built on Microsoft Fabric and Delta Lake, provides a solid foundation for their current and future data needs.

Call-to-Action:

If you're interested in improving your organization's data management and reporting capabilities, consider exploring the EasyLake data warehousing solution. Contact Warecorp to learn more about how EasyLake can help you build a scalable and reliable platform that empowers your organization to make data-driven decisions and achieve your business goals.