Cirrus Shakeri, SAP Labs
In this talk we will report on using semantic technologies in implementing tools for enterprise information management and decision support systems. We have built proof-of-concept software tools that assist knowledge workers in making sense of information within the context of some business processes.

The OWL ontology language is used to implement domain-independent as well as domain-specific models for guiding the process of gathering and filtering relevant information. RDF is used to represent a complex data structure for organizing and arranging relevant information. A semantic query and inference engine is used in formulating hypotheses about possible ways that the information gathered may explain the situation at hand. Alternative hypotheses are compared and ranked via probabilistic reasoning. The combination of these capabilities result in assisting knowledge workers in making sense of large volumes of information, connecting the dots, explaining events, and making informed decisions.