Mu Sigma Launches muUniverse, A New Platform to Automate Aspects of Dynamic Thinking at Fortune 500 Companies

BANGALORE, October 22, 2014 /PRNewswire/ --

Enterprise Suite Brings a New 'Art of Problem Solving' to Address the Growing Complexity in Business Decision Making and Helping Capitalize on Growth Opportunities Powered by Big Data

Mu Sigma, the world's largest private decision sciences and big data analytics company, today announces the launch of muUniverse™, a new product that serves as a Google Maps for decisions that helps leaders choose the right path. By bringing technologies, people and methodologies together under one roof, muUniverse is designed to give decision makers at Fortune 500 companies a complete view of their business decisions, allowing them to navigate an increasingly complex set of interconnected problems they face in areas such as sales, marketing, finance, supply chain, risk, and others.

Backed by Sequoia Capital and General Atlantic, Mu Sigma already works with global brands like Microsoft, Pfizer, Dell, and Wal-Mart to help institutionalize data-driven decision making so they can harness the power of big data more effectively. With more than 3,500 decision scientists, the company works hand in hand with its clients to pinpoint problem areas and develop solutions to solve them. This extends from working with a pharmaceutical company to determine the best price point for drugs or working with a telecommunications company to identify the best ways to retain customers.

"Identifying the 'linkage' across analytics problems truly is fundamental to how companies will distinguish themselves in this space going forward. I can think of dozens of such projects in our past where the real breakthrough occurred when we began connecting what may have seemed tangential elements or projects into one cohesive analytics exercise," said Ruben Sigala, Senior Vice President and Chief Analytics Officer at Caesars Entertainment Corporation.

A New Augmented Intelligence Framework that brings Man and Machine together to Automate the Dynamic Thinking Required to Address Complexity in Business Decisions

The concept for muUniverse is unique, in that it is based on the patterns found in nature where problems occur in clusters rather than isolation and organisms increase in complexity over time. By creating a common language around business decisions, muUniverse automates the dynamic thinking process and eliminates blind spots while planning the analytical roadmap. It maps the decision foot print within the organization and is the only solution available today that can provide an intelligent path to drastically improve decision making and impact outcomes that are necessary for growth and survival.

With muUniverse, businesses can improve the way they:

Plan: Drive a more holistic perspective to problem solving thereby allowing the creation of better insights

Prioritize: Align on major initiatives to be solved, eliminate chokepoints and identify areas with possibilities of non-linear returns

Engage: Allow multiple stakeholders to have a shared understanding and common language around organizational issues

Investigate: Investigate the strength of the relationship between each problem to predict and anticipate the impact of shocks to the system

De-risk: Build better governance models by eliminating blind-spots during the business planning process

Discover: Identify new opportunities powered by data and analytics

Mu Sigma has worked with some of the world's largest companies over the past 10 years. This hands-on experience has led to the discovery of thousands of problems across 10-12 industry verticals including airlines, hospitality, banking, finance and insurance, entertainment, big pharma, healthcare, CPG and retail, technology, media, telecom, etc. muUniverse builds on top of Mu Sigma's muPDNA platform that encodes the intelligence of business problems and serves as the basis of discovering interconnections.

"In the age of big data, companies often lack the tools they need to appreciate and understand the complexity of problems they face. A new art of problem solving is needed to address this. The big goal of our new platform is to automate dynamic thinking that is often baked into the DNA of innovators like Steve Jobs and Elon Musk, but now make this available to any major corporation," said Dhiraj Rajaram, founder, chairman and CEO of Mu Sigma.

"The muUniverse framework is an innovative 'lens' to look at relationships between distinct rules of thumb that have evolved over time. As business complexity increases, old rules of thumb may not apply and new rules need to be created. Traditional problem solving techniques focus on drilling down and solving problems independently. The muUniverse framework allows you to elevate the business issues and look at the inter-relationships and then tackle problems holistically," said Mike Delehant, Vice President, Strategic Planning at Southwest Airlines.

Headquartered in Chicago and backed by firms whose previous investments have included Apple, Google, Facebook, Oracle, and others, Mu Sigma has raised more than $200 million in financing to date. The company is committed to developing award-winning products that utilize an interdisciplinary approach consisting of business, applied math, technology and behavioral science to enable the creation and consumption of data-driven insights for enterprise customers.

To learn more, visit the muUniverse webpage: http://mu-sigma.com/muuniverse

About Mu Sigma

Mu Sigma is a category-defining Decision Sciences and Big Data analytics company helping enterprises institutionalize data-driven decision making. Mu Sigma's unique interdisciplinary approach and cross-industry learning drive innovation in solving high-impact business problems across marketing, risk and supply chain. With over 3500 decision scientists and experience across 10 industry verticals, Mu Sigma has been consistently validated as the preferred Decision Sciences and analytics partner. Mu Sigma provides an integrated decision support ecosystem of products, services and cross-industry best practice processes transforming the way decisions are enabled in enterprises for more than 125 Fortune 500 clients. Visit www.mu-sigma.com.

Mu Sigma is a trademark of Mu Sigma, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks contained herein are the property of their respective owners.

About Sequoia Capital

Sequoia Capital in India currently manages funds capitalized at close to USD 1.4 billion and invests across venture, growth, and late stage opportunities. It takes a long-term view on investments and plays the role of an active, value-added partner to entrepreneurs, business families and management teams. Over the past 7 years, Sequoia Capital has invested in more than 70 companies in India including Capillary Technologies, Druva, Justdial, Micromax, Mu Sigma, Pine Labs, Prizm Payments, Quick Heal and Zomato. Sequoia Capital operates out of offices in Bangalore, Mumbai, and New Delhi.

Globally, Sequoia Capital has an unparalleled track record of partnering with entrepreneurs to create global market leaders. Sequoia Capital has been an early investor in companies such as Apple, Cisco, Dropbox, Google, LinkedIn, Oracle, Yahoo, YouTube and Zappos. Sequoia Capital maintains dedicated teams in USA, China, India and Israel. For more information, please visit: www.sequoiacap.com.

Media Contact: Vinitha Oommen, [email protected] , +91-9886453043, Senior Manager - Marketing, Mu Sigma