System and method for integrating, managing and coordinating customer activities

• US 8,583,680 B2
• Filed: 05/14/2012
• Issued: 11/12/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Informatica Corporation
• Original Assignee: Informatica Corporation
• Inventors: Hoang, Khanh
• Primary Examiner(s): HASAN, SYED HAROON
• Application Number:
  US13/471,422
• Publication Number:
  US 20120290610A1
• Time in Patent Office: 547 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 707/769
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0268 at point-of-sale [POS]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0269 based on user profile or attribute

Abstract

A system, method and computer program product for integrating, managing and coordinating activities of customers in an enterprise, across a plurality of applications, resources and touch-points. Customer data is obtained during interactions between a customer and an application, a resource or a touch-point. This data is stored in the form of virtual composite objects in cache memory, on a cluster of servers. The virtual composite objects contain customer data, policies and behaviors of the enterprise. The applications query for the virtual composite objects through the server. The server hosting the queried virtual composite object delivers the queried virtual composite object in real time to the querying application. Any updates to the virtual composite object on account of events at the applications, resources or touch-points, is carried out in real time.

Claims

1. A computerized system for managing activities of customers in an enterprise comprising a plurality of distributed data storages, the system comprising:

a query engine for receiving from an application a request for data relating to a customer;

a matching engine for identifying the customer from referential data stored in a first data storage;

a harvester for gathering interaction data relating to interactions of the customer with the enterprise from a second data storage based on the identification of the customer by the matching engine;

a lifecycle manager for creating a composite object for the customer using the gathered data and providing the composite object to the query engine for the query engine to deliver the composite object in real time to the application, wherein the composite object encapsulates a set of update rules; and

a rules engine for updating the composite object stored in a cache memory according to the set of update rules and communicating changes to the composite object to the second data storage in response to the customer'"'"'s interaction with the application.

2. The computerized system as recited in claim 1, wherein the matching engine is further for reconciling the gathered data to remove duplicate entries.

3. A computerized system for managing activities of customers in an enterprise comprising a plurality of distributed data storages, the system comprising:

a query engine for receiving from an application a request for data relating to a customer;

a matching engine for identifying the customer from referential data stored in a first data storage;

a harvester for gathering interaction data relating to interactions of the customer with the enterprise from a second data storage based on the identification of the customer by the matching engine;

a lifecycle manager for creating a composite object for the customer using the gathered data and providing the composite object to the query engine for the query engine to deliver the composite object in real time to the application; and

an object registry that associates a customer identification index with a cross-reference that is used to represent the same customer in the second data storage, wherein the matching engine identifies the customer by identifying the customer identification index, wherein the harvester gathers the interaction data relating to the customer from the second data storage based on the cross-reference associated with the customer identification index identified by the matching engine.

4. The computerized system as recited in claim 3, wherein the lifecycle manager is further for selecting the most relevant data relating to the customer to create the composite object.

5. A computer implemented method for centrally managing data that relates to interactions of customers with an enterprise and that is stored in a plurality of distributed data storages, the method comprising:

receiving from an application a request for data relating to a customer;

gathering data relating to the customer from at least first and second data storages;

for the customer, creating a composite object that encapsulates the gathered data and a set of policies for updating data relating to the customer stored in the first and second data storages, wherein creating the composite object comprises applying a set of lifecycle rules to the composite object to manage a lifecycle of the composite object in a cache memory;

maintaining the composite object in the cache memory based on the set of lifecycle rules in order to optimize customer look up;

delivering the composite object in real time to the application;

from the application, receiving changes to at least a portion of the gathered data for the customer; and

using the received changes to update the data stored in said first and second data storages based on the set of update policies.

6. The method as recited in claim 5, wherein the first data storage stores referential data to identity the customer and the second data storage stores interaction data relating to interactions between the customer and the enterprise, wherein gathering data relating to the customer comprises:

formulating a query based on the request,

querying the first data storage to identify the customer,

obtaining referential data specific to the customer from the first data storage, and

based on the identification, obtaining interaction data relating to the customer from the second data storage.

7. The method as recited in claim 5, wherein using the received changes to update the data comprises:

capturing a customer interaction that changes the composite object delivered to the application, and

updating in real time the data stored in said second data storage based on the captured customer interaction.

8. A computer implemented method for centrally managing data that relates to interactions of customers with an enterprise and that is stored in a plurality of distributed data storages, the method comprising:

receiving from an application a request for data relating to a customer;

gathering data relating to the customer from at least first and second data storages, wherein gathering data relating to the customer comprises identifying a unique customer identification index associated with the customer, accessing an object registry that maintains a set of cross-references to the customer identification index used to represent the same customer in the plurality of distributed data storages, and using a cross-reference in the set of cross-references to obtain the interaction data relating to the customer from the second data storage;

for the customer, creating a composite object that encapsulates the gathered data and a set of policies for updating data relating to the customer stored in the first and second data storages;

delivering the composite object in real time to the application;

from the application, receiving changes to at least a portion of the gathered data for the customer; and

using the received changes to update the data stored in said first and second data storages based on the set of update policies.

9. The method as recited in claim 8, wherein the request comprises referential data related to the customer, wherein identifying the unique customer identification index comprises querying the first data storage to match the referential data in the request against the referential data stored in the first data storage.

10. A computerized system for managing activities in an enterprise, the enterprise comprising a plurality of data sources, the system comprising:

a query engine for receiving a request from an application for data relating to a customer associated with the enterprise;

an object registry that associates a customer identification index with a plurality of different cross-references that is used to represent the same customer in the plurality of data sources;

a matching engine for receiving the request from the query engine for a composite object relating to the customer and accessing the object registry to obtain a set of cross-references;

a harvester for gathering data relating to the customer from at least two data sources in the plurality of data sources based on the set of cross-references obtained from the object registry;

a lifecycle manager for creating a composite object for the customer using the data gathered by the harvester and providing the composite object to the query engine for the query engine to deliver the composite object in real time to the requesting application, wherein the composite object encapsulates a set of synchronization rules; and

a rules engine for synchronizing changes to the gathered data of the composite object to at least the first and second data sources in real time based on the set of synchronization rules.

11. The computerized system as recited in claim 10 further comprising a cache memory for storing the composite object.

12. The computerized system as recited in claim 10, wherein the matching engine is further for reconciling the gathered customer data to remove duplicate entries.

13. The computerized system as recited in claim 10, wherein the lifecycle manager is further for selecting the most relevant data relating to the customer to create the composite object.