Will your AI scale? The answer lies in data

Visium is now a Gold Corporate Member of DAMA Switzerland, Zurich Chapter. Here, we discuss why data management is so crucial for any firm that uses AI. 

AI capability is expanding all the time. But most AI programmes face a crucial limitation: the data that drives them. 

Where did our data come from? Who owns it? Can we trust it? And can we prove our answers if somebody asks?

These questions pose a challenge for many firms. But when you’re working in a regulated industry, they’re impossible to ignore. 

For example, a pharma firm deploying a model in a GxP environment must explain data lineage, ownership and controls to auditors who may have no interest in the model architecture. 

In the same way, a specialty chemicals company consolidating decades of process data across sites must first reconcile all its definitions – or risk comparing “apples with oranges”. 

In both cases, the real work to be done is data management. And it needs to be nailed down before anyone even starts talking about AI.

That’s why we have joined the Zurich Chapter of DAMA (the Data Management Association) Switzerland as a Gold Corporate Member.

What is DAMA?

DAMA is the professional association behind the Data Management Body of Knowledge (DAMA-DMBOK®). DMBOK is the globally recognised reference data management framework that many leading organisations use to define governance, data quality and operating models.

 Crucially, DMBOK is vendor-independent. It gives companies a common language for data management that does not belong to any supplier.

Why we joined

We’ve joined DAMA to help improve data standards, based on our experience of using them under real constraints. 

The sectors we work in, life sciences and specialty chemicals, place demands on data governance that general frameworks don’t always address. For example, we often deal with validated systems, high expectations of data integrity, batch and process context, and IP boundaries that span research partnerships. And we work in a world where a single data definition can incur serious regulatory consequences. 

Now, we’re hoping to bring that learning into the work of DAMA’s Zurich Chapter, while also benefiting from the knowledge of its many practitioners. Together, as a community, we can advance standards far more quickly than any single company can do alone.  

“Data management is ultimately about enabling organisations to treat data as a strategic asset,” says Christina Bote Ruiz, Senior Data & AI Strategist at Visium. “Joining DAMA allows us to contribute to, and learn from, a community that shares that ambition.” 

What this means for you 

Our membership of DAMA will bring three major benefits for our clients:

A light to guide us. When we assess or design your data governance, we can now measure it against a recognised external standard. That makes life simpler, whether you need to justify your approach internally or to an external auditor.

Deeper expertise, free from lock-in. DAMA membership will anchor our data strategy, governance and platform work in a clearly defined body of knowledge that develops independently of any vendor roadmap.

New networks, new knowledge. Data teams in pharma, banking, insurance and public administration are all essentially grappling with the same governance problem – just in different guises and under different regulators. Yet they rarely get the chance to compare notes. Through DAMA, we will co-host events that allow practitioners to get together with their peers to share valuable experience and knowledge. We’ll announce dates and details once they’re confirmed. 

If you’re building the data foundation for an AI programme and want to understand how it measures up against an established standard, we’d love to start a conversation.