>> Announcer: Live from Orlando, Florida. It's theCube covering PentahoWorld 2017, brought to you buy Hitachi Ventara. >> Welcome back to theCube's live coverage of PentahoWorld, brought to you of course by Hitachi Ventara. I'm your host, Rebecca Knight, along with my cohost James Kobielus. We are joined by Stephano Celati. He is a Pentaho Solutions consultant at BNova. Thanks so much for coming on theCube, Stephano. >> Thank you for having me. >> So I should say congratulations are in order because you are here to accept the Pentaho Excellence Award for the ROI category on behalf of LAZIOcrea. Tell us about the award. >> Yes, as I was saying, I'm really proud of this award because it is something that is related to public administration savings, which is a good thing, first of all for me as a citizen, let's say. This project is about healthcare spending. In Italy the National Healthcare Services allows the drugstore to sell medicines to total or partial reimbursement by NHS itself. And they also have the possibility to replace the medicine with a generic drug which normally costs less to the people and also to the health service itself. So a couple of years ago (speaks in foreign language) which is the political area to which Rome belongs just to explain, launched a new project to monitor, analyze and inspect the spending flow in drugs. So we partnered with LAZIOcrea to create a business analytics platform based on Pentaho obviously, and which collects all the data coming from the prescriptions and store it in an analytical database that is Vertica, and uses PDI/ETL tools to store this data. >> That's for Pentaho Data Integration. >> Yes, PDI is Pentaho Data Integration, good point. And after that we present the data in terms of reporting, analysis, dashboards, to all the people that are interested in this data. So we talk about regional managers, we talk about auditors, and also to local district users which are in charge of managing the expenditure for drugs. The outcome of this project was real impressive because we had an expenditure fell by 3.6%, which in a region where we have more than 200 million prescriptions every year means 34 million Euros in a years. >> Rebecca: Wow. >> So it was really huge result. We were very happy about that. And it was so simple because simply monitoring better the expenditure, monitoring how they deliver the drugs out, what kind of medicine they prescribe and targeting what pharmacies sell to the end user just gave these impressive results. And this year they are forecasting for 41 million Euros in savings more, so it's a huge result. It's something that is for us really a good result. >> So here in the U.S., I mean we have problems very similar to what you just described in Italy. And just putting the transparency around the data would be a huge revelation for the United States, too. How big a departure was it in Italy? >> Well, it was a really a big problem to start because they didn't have any system to collect all this data. So they had to set up everything from scratch, let's say, just by acquiring the paper where the physician writes the recipe, so it was not that easy to build it from scratch. But after that the region has had the opportunity to monitor this data and also to publish this data, which is something that in Italy is really relevant in this moment because we are talking about open government, we are talking about open data, and so again, the result was really impressive. >> Do you see any follow on opportunities to use this data for other purposes other than the initial application? >> Yes, we already experienced a different usage of this data because during the last major earthquake we have in 2016 in this area, those guys from LAZIOcrea were able to produce a list of mostly the drugs in that area just in a couple of hours, just by using the ETL and setting up this list that somehow help the first aid units in giving the right assistance on time. And next steps will be about hyper prescriptions because we want to monitor if there are any doctors that prescribe drugs that are not really necessary. And we also try to move our inspection also to hospitals because when you do a surgery, you get medicine, you get a lot of assistance in the hospital. So we want also to monitor that kind of the aspect, which is again in charge of the health system. >> To make sure that the right medicines are being distributed to the right regions at the right time for the intent to likely-- >> Yes, this could also lead to something that is a correlation analysis, meaning what is your pain and what are you assuming so that they can have an historical data they can use to prescribe better medicines. >> But the anecdote he was sharing about the earthquake too is really compelling too, if you think about a public health crisis and outbreak of some sort, to be able to get drugs quickly to those in needs, it's really astonishing. >> Again, this morning we were talking about data lake. This is a sort of data lake. We found several ways to use that data, to fish them back from the data, let's say from the lake, and it's really impressive what you can do if you have the right information and you know how to use it. >> How do you see the market developing over the next year, next five years? >> Yes, the problem in Italy is that the market is not so responsive to innovation like others, let's say U.S. or U.K. and Europe. So for this reason my company Bnova set up annual event which is called Big Data Tech, and the purpose of this event is to spread knowledge about big data systems, products, architecture and so on, which helps companies in knowing better what they can do with these platforms. So in the next month we see a lot of opportunities. Generically speaking data mining field, we start talking about predictive analysis, we start talking about smart cities and other stuff like that. So again, we will need maybe to enter in a new phase of let's say (mumbling) because companies like BNova and others that operate in this field of business analytics need to put to general knowledge what other innovative companies are doing. So in the next month we will for sure move to newer architectures, new technology, and we will have to support all the companies with this kind of stuff. >> In terms of the new technology you're moving to, is there a role for the internet of things, both in your plans and really in terms of the Italian market. What sort of potential applications are there for IOT related perhaps to the use of it with health data going forward in Italy? >> Yes, also for healthcare, but in Italy the IOT team is a parallel line that is growing thanks to a governmental initiative which is called Industry 4.0, which encourages the usag of interconnected machines, connected to the internet, so classical approach of the IOT field. So with this new approach and the government sustain we believe that the IOT will have a big improvement in the next years. Again, we are talking about Italy, so we are not so fast in growing. But again, we are starting to talk about smart cities for energy saving, sustainable energy and other stuff in which the IOT plays a key role. So as far as our business is concerned, that is business analytics, so on top of that we see a lot of opportunities coming from predictive analysis, which means to prevent the maintenance of a machine, for example, or to use virtual reality to simulate a laboratory test and other stuff. So with these opportunities for sure the usage of data mining tools, such Wake Up when we're talking about Pentaho Solutions, could be a great advantage because you will apply the knowledge to your data. So you will not only analyze the data, but you will also extract some sort of knowledge from the data which can help companies. >> Of course, Italy is where the renaissance began, and it just sounds like you, I mean renaissance use of analytics to help the Italian people and the Italian economy to continue to grow and innovate. >> Stephano: Yes, yes. >> So I want to see not a data lake, a data colosseum, that should be on your to do list. >> I want a data gallery with lots of data masterpieces hanging on the walls all around Italy. >> Exactly. >> You'll be the new Leonardo and Michelangelo. >> Stefano , I love it. Well, thank you so much for coming on theCube. >> Thank you for having me. >> I am Rebecca Knight for Jim Kubielus. We will have more from PentahoWorld just after this.