Amazon Forecast: Revolutionizing Business Forecasting
Amazon Forecast is a cutting-edge time-series forecasting service based on machine learning. It is specifically designed for business metrics analysis and offers a plethora of benefits to various industries.
In the retail sector, it helps reduce waste, increase inventory turns, and improve in-stock availability by accurately forecasting product demand at specific probability levels. For workforce planning, it enables businesses to forecast staffing at 15-minute increments, optimizing for both high and low demand periods. In the travel industry, it can forecast foot traffic, visitor counts, and channel demand, allowing for more efficient management of operating costs.
The service is capable of forecasting 10,000 time series for 2 months with the AWS Free Tier, enabling businesses to scale their operations. It uses the same technology as Amazon.com, ensuring accurate forecasts at a granular level, which in turn helps optimize inventory, reduce waste, improve capital utilization, and make long-term decisions with more confidence. Additionally, it can increase customer satisfaction by ensuring optimal staffing to meet varying demand levels.
Existing customers of Amazon Forecast can continue to use the service as normal, while new customers are no longer able to sign up. However, for those interested in getting started, the AWS Free Tier offers an opportunity to try the service for free while learning the fundamentals and building on AWS. Additionally, businesses can deploy recurring workflows with no-code using AWS CloudFormation and AWS Step Functions to set up repeatable and sustainable workflows. Moreover, experts are available to provide support from development to enterprise-level programs, ensuring that businesses get the right support at the right time.