Lightstone, a real estate investor/developer with 28 hospitality properties nationwide, has implemented Execuvue from Aptech Computer Systems. Execuvue is an IBM Cognos-based ASP enterprise hospitality business-intelligence application hosted at Aptech’s secure data operations center.
“I am responsible for overseeing hotel performance across our 28-property [real estate investment trust] and I am always on a plane,” Lightstone VP of Asset Management Marc Dober said in a statement. “We buy and develop hotels to grow our business. Business is based on numbers; budget, revenue, expenses, [earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization]. The only way we could efficiently manage our portfolio by the numbers as we grew was to automate data gathering, analysis and reporting. Today I have a staff of two and go over the numbers on my handheld while I’m traveling.”
Dober has a handful of reports he evaluates first thing every morning, regardless of where he is.
“Execuvue automatically gathers and analyzes data from our Hilton, IHG, Marriott and Starwood properties at night audit,” he said. “I also review the latest STAR data on my mobile. The system gives me analysis and reporting within minutes to support our business decisions or answer questions on the fly with near real-time data.”
Lightstone evaluates property performance based on brands and management companies.
“We compare [gross operating profits] and other metrics from our hotels and Execuvue factors in monthly STAR numbers to help benchmark our management companies,” said Dober. “A cloud-based BI system is very cost effective. It eliminates the need for hardware and servers and the physical system is secure off-site so I can focus on operating properties. The big plus for me is that I can access our data remotely in a mobile format if needed. This lets me review the reporting I need for my next meeting while I am traveling.”
“We are currently developing six Moxys,” Dober said. “These properties have a unique [food-and-beverage] reporting format. We worked with Aptech to create custom reporting and a data interface with our Moxy property point-of-sale systems.”