SAS Viya unveils new AI tools & services to boost productivity
SAS has announced a series of updates and new features on its SAS Viya platform, aimed at enhancing AI-driven productivity and supporting a wider range of users and organisations.
Platform updates
The SAS Viya platform now provides users with the ability to either build AI through a suite of end-to-end tools or purchase AI solutions and model packages, offering increased flexibility and productivity for decision-making across industries.
Kathy Lange, Research Director for AI Software at IDC, commented, "SAS is evolving its strategy and portfolio to embrace a broader ecosystem of user personas, preferences, and technologies within an enterprise's AI technology stack. SAS continues to develop offerings that streamline and automate the AI life cycle and enable organisations to make better business decisions faster."
Key releases
SAS Data Maker, first introduced through a private preview, is a synthetic data generator designed to help organisations address challenges related to data privacy and scarcity. The tool also aims to simplify data management processes and reduce resource usage. The development of SAS Data Maker was accelerated by SAS's recent acquisition of principal software assets from Hazy, a specialist in synthetic data. General availability for SAS Data Maker is expected in the third quarter of 2025.
SAS Viya Intelligent Decisioning, which is currently available, offers organisations the ability to create and deploy intelligent AI agents with a controlled mix of AI autonomy and human involvement. According to SAS, this is intended to ensure appropriate oversight for tasks with varied complexity and risk profiles.
Another new addition is SAS Managed Cloud Services: SAS Viya Essentials. This service packages selected SAS Viya products into an out-of-the-box managed cloud environment. Initially targeted at small and medium-sized businesses, SAS Managed Cloud Services: Viya Essentials is intended to reduce barriers to adopting AI solutions by providing an accessible hosted service.
The SAS Viya Copilot, an AI-powered conversational assistant, is built into the SAS Viya platform to support developers, data scientists, and business users with analytical, business, and industry tasks. Currently available by invitation through a private preview, the general release is scheduled for the third quarter of 2025. The Copilot offers AI-powered assistance with model development and coding for SAS users. It is built on Azure AI Services, reflecting the ongoing partnership between SAS and Microsoft.
SAS Viya Workbench, originally launched in 2024, is a cloud-based environment intended for developers, data scientists, and modellers. The workbench supports coding in SAS and Python via Visual Studio Code or Jupyter Notebook. Updates in 2025 include the addition of R language support, the integration of SAS Enterprise Guide as an optional development environment, and expanded availability to the Microsoft Azure Marketplace in addition to the existing AWS Marketplace.
AI in practice
SAS has reported that organisations using the Viya platform benefit from the ability to build and deploy AI models more efficiently. The platform's structure allows multiple job functions—including developers, data scientists, IT professionals, and business analysts—to collaborate throughout the data and AI life cycle. SAS suggests this collaboration streamlines the path to making informed business decisions and accelerates productivity across various sectors and regulatory contexts.
Referencing industry research, SAS cited a 2024 AI productivity study by Futurum Group: "SAS Viya helps users accelerate the AI life cycle, enabling them to collect data, build models, and deploy decisions 4.6 times faster than selected competitors – all while helping them increase innovation, expedite decision making and drive revenue growth."
"The current economic climate and rapid pace of AI innovation can feel intense and overwhelming," said Bryan Harris, Chief Technology Officer at SAS. "Our goal is to deliver cutting-edge AI capabilities that help organisations navigate the hype and disruption, make breakthroughs in problem solving, and gain a decision advantage."
Real world usage
SAS highlighted the use of its platform by Fathom Science, a start-up focused on marine data analytics. Fathom Science used SAS Data Maker to generate synthetic shipping lane data, expanding their dataset to 500,000 points, in order to validate a model designed to predict whale locations and reduce the risk of vessel strikes on critically endangered North Atlantic right whales. SAS Viya Workbench was used subsequently to develop machine learning models for calculating the probability of whales' proximity to shore, assisting with statistical and machine learning validation of the location prediction model.
SAS stated that through these enhancements, the Viya platform aims to support a diverse range of users in addressing real business and environmental challenges efficiently with AI-driven solutions.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Techday NZ
2 hours ago
- Techday NZ
SAS launches AI models after USD $1 billion investment push
SAS has released a set of artificial intelligence models targeting business processes that are traditionally labour-intensive and time-consuming. The launch is part of a USD $1 billion investment by SAS in industry-focused data and AI solutions intended to streamline specific business bottlenecks. The newly introduced models are designed either for immediate deployment or to serve as a foundation that organisations can quickly customise, enabling faster model training on internal data. SAS states that these packaged models are compatible with existing systems and suitable for organisations regardless of size. Model Applications The available models span several industries. For cross-industry use, SAS has presented AI-Driven Entity Resolution and Document Analysis. Within health care, there is a model focused on Medication Adherence Risk, while manufacturing clients have access to Strategic Supply Chain Optimisation. Public sector releases include Payment Integrity for Food Assistance and Tax Compliance for Sales Tax. SAS has indicated that each model was developed according to its Data Ethics Practice guidelines. According to the company, this ensures the resulting outputs are easy for organisations to understand and explain. SAS asserts that users can improve productivity and return on investment as a result of deploying these solutions, while maintaining an adherence to principles of responsible use. Kathy Lange, Research Director at IDC, commented on the nature and flexibility of the SAS Models portfolio. She said, "SAS Models are based on SAS' core assets, talent and intellectual property from its wealth of experience working with customers to solve industry problems. Between its scalability and seamless integration with existing environments, SAS Models are a great option for those looking to accelerate time to production who might lack the expertise or time to build models from scratch." Future Roadmap In addition to the models now available, SAS outlined plans for expanding its industry-specific AI library. Scheduled for later in 2025 are new models addressing needs in banking (Fraud Decisioning for Payments and Card Models), health care (Payment Integrity for HealthCare), manufacturing (Worker Safety Monitoring) and the public sector (Tax Compliance for Individual Income Tax). SAS also announced it is working on "agentic" versions of its models, designed to increase autonomy within business-specific AI solutions. According to SAS, these forthcoming agentic offerings will aim to further reshape operational efficiency by introducing pre-built agents capable of automating complex data preparation processes. Data Preparation Solution The challenge of preparing large volumes of raw data so that it is suitable for AI model training is significant for many organisations. Data scientists often spend extended periods building and refining data lakes—repositories that structure raw customer data for analysis. SAS is responding to this challenge with an AI agent designed to automate complex data preparation processes, thereby facilitating real-time model operation with minimal manual intervention. "We believe the future of AI lies in agents that are not only intelligent but also responsible, ready-to-use and relevant," said Udo Sglavo, VP of Applied AI and Modeling, R&D at SAS. "Our new industry-specific models, built on decades of domain expertise and guided by our ethics-first approach, represent a bold step toward agentic AI: solutions that think with context, act with purpose and deliver real-world impact." Delivery and Integration SAS reports that organisations implementing its models have access to clear, simplified documentation intended to support transparent and responsible use. Each model can be tailored to meet sector-specific requirements and can supplement existing IT and business infrastructures. The release of these new AI models represents the latest step in SAS' long-term development strategy, continuing its aim to address evolving customer priorities across a range of sectors.
Techday NZ
2 hours ago
- Techday NZ
SAS Viya unveils new AI tools & services to boost productivity
SAS has announced a series of updates and new features on its SAS Viya platform, aimed at enhancing AI-driven productivity and supporting a wider range of users and organisations. Platform updates The SAS Viya platform now provides users with the ability to either build AI through a suite of end-to-end tools or purchase AI solutions and model packages, offering increased flexibility and productivity for decision-making across industries. Kathy Lange, Research Director for AI Software at IDC, commented, "SAS is evolving its strategy and portfolio to embrace a broader ecosystem of user personas, preferences, and technologies within an enterprise's AI technology stack. SAS continues to develop offerings that streamline and automate the AI life cycle and enable organisations to make better business decisions faster." Key releases SAS Data Maker, first introduced through a private preview, is a synthetic data generator designed to help organisations address challenges related to data privacy and scarcity. The tool also aims to simplify data management processes and reduce resource usage. The development of SAS Data Maker was accelerated by SAS's recent acquisition of principal software assets from Hazy, a specialist in synthetic data. General availability for SAS Data Maker is expected in the third quarter of 2025. SAS Viya Intelligent Decisioning, which is currently available, offers organisations the ability to create and deploy intelligent AI agents with a controlled mix of AI autonomy and human involvement. According to SAS, this is intended to ensure appropriate oversight for tasks with varied complexity and risk profiles. Another new addition is SAS Managed Cloud Services: SAS Viya Essentials. This service packages selected SAS Viya products into an out-of-the-box managed cloud environment. Initially targeted at small and medium-sized businesses, SAS Managed Cloud Services: Viya Essentials is intended to reduce barriers to adopting AI solutions by providing an accessible hosted service. The SAS Viya Copilot, an AI-powered conversational assistant, is built into the SAS Viya platform to support developers, data scientists, and business users with analytical, business, and industry tasks. Currently available by invitation through a private preview, the general release is scheduled for the third quarter of 2025. The Copilot offers AI-powered assistance with model development and coding for SAS users. It is built on Azure AI Services, reflecting the ongoing partnership between SAS and Microsoft. SAS Viya Workbench, originally launched in 2024, is a cloud-based environment intended for developers, data scientists, and modellers. The workbench supports coding in SAS and Python via Visual Studio Code or Jupyter Notebook. Updates in 2025 include the addition of R language support, the integration of SAS Enterprise Guide as an optional development environment, and expanded availability to the Microsoft Azure Marketplace in addition to the existing AWS Marketplace. AI in practice SAS has reported that organisations using the Viya platform benefit from the ability to build and deploy AI models more efficiently. The platform's structure allows multiple job functions—including developers, data scientists, IT professionals, and business analysts—to collaborate throughout the data and AI life cycle. SAS suggests this collaboration streamlines the path to making informed business decisions and accelerates productivity across various sectors and regulatory contexts. Referencing industry research, SAS cited a 2024 AI productivity study by Futurum Group: "SAS Viya helps users accelerate the AI life cycle, enabling them to collect data, build models, and deploy decisions 4.6 times faster than selected competitors – all while helping them increase innovation, expedite decision making and drive revenue growth." "The current economic climate and rapid pace of AI innovation can feel intense and overwhelming," said Bryan Harris, Chief Technology Officer at SAS. "Our goal is to deliver cutting-edge AI capabilities that help organisations navigate the hype and disruption, make breakthroughs in problem solving, and gain a decision advantage." Real world usage SAS highlighted the use of its platform by Fathom Science, a start-up focused on marine data analytics. Fathom Science used SAS Data Maker to generate synthetic shipping lane data, expanding their dataset to 500,000 points, in order to validate a model designed to predict whale locations and reduce the risk of vessel strikes on critically endangered North Atlantic right whales. SAS Viya Workbench was used subsequently to develop machine learning models for calculating the probability of whales' proximity to shore, assisting with statistical and machine learning validation of the location prediction model. SAS stated that through these enhancements, the Viya platform aims to support a diverse range of users in addressing real business and environmental challenges efficiently with AI-driven solutions.
Techday NZ
5 days ago
- Techday NZ
Ataccama ONE brings document AI to Snowflake for better data
Ataccama has announced the integration of its unified data trust platform, Ataccama ONE, with Document AI on the Snowflake Marketplace, allowing businesses to transform unstructured content into structured data for analytics and artificial intelligence applications. The announcement from Ataccama enables enterprises to extract, structure, govern, and monitor the quality of unstructured data, making a greater proportion of their information usable for analytics, AI, and business operations. With the majority of enterprise information now classed as unstructured data and continuing to grow rapidly, many organisations struggle to manage this resource effectively. Industry research from IDC indicates that unstructured data accounts for most enterprise data and is expanding by more than 55% annually. According to market findings, 95% of businesses face difficulties in managing their unstructured data, with over half citing it as the most challenging type of information to govern. Unstructured data frequently remains siloed and difficult to leverage, creating operational risk and impacting the reliability of AI systems as these systems increasingly rely on such data for powering large language models and retrieval-augmented generation applications. Through the integration of Ataccama ONE and Document AI within the Snowflake environment, enterprises can convert documents such as contracts, invoices, and PDFs into structured records. Natural language prompts—such as, "What is the effective date of the contract?"—are processed by the Arctic-TILT large language model developed by Snowflake, generating structured outputs stored directly in Snowflake tables. Ataccama ONE then connects to the resulting data tables to profile the data, perform quality checks, and manage governance policies on the structured outputs. The system also allows companies to follow the data through analytics, reporting, and AI workflows by capturing lineage at the table level. Additional metadata can be added from the original documents to increase traceability where required. This process aims to reduce manual intervention, build trust in the data, and enable repeatable workflows for business teams. Speaking to the importance of unlocking value from unstructured data, Sam Wong, Senior Director of Data & AI at a global beverage company, said: "Unstructured data is an untapped data source as real business context lives there, but it's also the hardest to govern. Documents, contracts, and communications contain the terms, conditions, and risks that structured systems miss. Without a way to extract, validate, and manage that information at scale, AI lacks the foundation it needs to be reliable. With Ataccama ONE and Document AI inside Snowflake, organizations can turn thousands of documents into trusted, structured data. That will give us improved analytics, enhanced data quality, and a better foundation for powerful and trustworthy AI." This integration offers several capabilities for users. Companies can extract structured data from documents using natural language, specifying prompts such as "What is the payment term?" to convert unstructured information into structured outputs without the need for custom code. The extracted data is immediately available for use in reporting, analytics, and AI activities, as it is saved directly into Snowflake tables, ready for consumption by business intelligence tools and model pipelines without further transformation. Ataccama ONE provides automated profiling and rule-based validation to monitor the quality of unstructured data on a continual basis, assisting teams in detecting inconsistencies and managing risks early. Document AI models can be trained and reused within Snowsight, allowing for standardised extraction across various document types at scale, including contracts, invoices, and policies. All processes, validation, and governance are performed natively in Snowflake, reducing integration complexity and improving security. Jay Limburn, Chief Product Officer at Ataccama, said: "Unstructured data remains a black box for most organizations, even as it becomes critical for AI and business operations. Without a way to structure, govern, and trust that information, enterprises risk missing the full value of their data. Ataccama ONE combines data quality, governance, observability, lineage, and master data management in a single platform and now extends those capabilities to unstructured content. This allows organizations to improve trust and confidence in all their data, structured and unstructured alike, and build a stronger foundation for AI, analytics, and operational decision-making." Kieran Kennedy, Vice President, Data Cloud Products at Snowflake, said: "Ataccama's presence on Snowflake Marketplace reinforces the value of our integrated platform approach that allows our partners to bring their innovative solutions to market within the Snowflake environment. With this solution, joint customers have the power to streamline document extraction, ensure data quality, and accelerate insight delivery, all within a governed and scalable environment."
