SEATTLE -- SAS, the leader in business intelligence, today presented Hewlett-Packard's Imaging and Printing Group (IPG) with the 12th annual Enterprise Intelligence Award at the annual meeting of the SAS Users Group International (SUGI). This division of HP has successfully used SAS(R) products to capture the customer intelligence needed to create and implement better product development strategies. HP's IPG uses SAS data mining software for a variety of applications, including the manufacturing team, which needs to stay on top of potential product issues to ensure high levels of print quality; and the usage team, which is responsible for understanding customers and their printing behaviors. Through HP's Web-based interface, which was built using SAS software, the information that is gathered can be accessed by all people who need insight into customer behavior. Ultimately, this information is used to drive investment decisions and marketing dollars for future product development. "SAS enables us to capture the vast amounts of information we have about our customers, quickly analyze that data and then get that customer knowledge back into the hands of our designers to help them develop better products, as well as track the quality status of current products," said Michele Goins, vice president and CIO of HP's IPG. "SAS is a great partner for us and allows us to differentiate ourselves from our competitors by delivering higher levels of customer satisfaction." "SAS data mining software continues to provide our customers with the highest level of flexibility and usability available in the market," said Jim Davis, SAS' senior vice president and chief marketing officer. "The depth and breadth of our analytics offerings deliver solid ROI, particularly when it comes to providing a greater awareness of customer needs and the ability to effectively fulfill those needs. Only SAS can give leaders like HP such significant competitive advantages." According to Leslye Louie, vice president of supplies sales and marketing at HP IPG, "We view our partnership with SAS to be a key factor in our success by allowing us to do things we have not been able to do before -- such as quickly integrating and analyzing a lot of vital information about our customers to cost-effectively deliver higher quality products to the market."