Last week I attended and gave a talk at Salon BI in Montreal.  Although there were many good presentations, one that I really enjoyed was Jean-Paul Isson’s presentation (he’ll be speaking at TDWI next month).  Jean-Paul Isson, Global VP of BI and Predictive Analytics for Monster discussed the evolution of Monster’s homegrown text analytics solution that matches employers and job seekers based on contextual analysis.  His session highlighted the fact that although text analytics may not be broadly applied within organizations, analyzing text in addition to traditional data analysis is becoming one of the key ways to fully understand the customer.  The general elusiveness of advanced text analytics in many organizations leads to questions about whether businesses are actually using advanced BI applications within their companies, as text analytics and incorporating unstructured data analysis into the overall BI infrastructure should be a logical next step to the overall use of BI. However, one of Isson’s main points that cannot be overlooked is the importance of taking baby steps with any BI implementation.  Hopefully this means that companies are on their way to including text as part of their overall analytics as they move from step to step and adopt more advanced BI applications.

This past Friday I had the opportunity to attend my first Boulder BI Brain Trust (BBBT) meeting remotely with Lyzasoft (here’s a link to their free trial) as a presenter and was impressed overall. One of the things I really like about Lyzasoft specifically is their focus on social media and BI.  By taking analytics, collaboration, mashups, and the like, and putting it together, it enables BI to be used in a new way. As people start to become more dynamic in their use of computers at work, the need for BI to move from a highly structured analytical environment to something more interactive and fresh is what will differentiate innovative and useful tools/applications, from those that may become stale at some point.

Aside from being more forward looking in their approach to business intelligence overall, I think that Lyzasoft’s approach to BI and collaboration provides a view into the next generation of BI and what is needed to move analytics from a tool for super users to one for the masses.

The interest surrounding mobile BI ebbs and flows over time.  Even though many solution providers offer mobile BI solutions, the reality is that adoption remains low.  And even though many decision makers take their work on the road, BI doesn’t seem to be a part of the equation outside of office or use of traditional online access points.  The question of whether devices such as the iPad will change the way users interact with BI remains to be seen.  The question of alerts, however, is much closer to the day to day activities of organizations actively using operational BI.  Do organizations use them and if so, how?

Obviously, the discussion surrounding alerting and the ability to be anywhere and get instant updates related to issues, etc. creates a benefit for people on the go.  How different is this usage from other forms of BI depends upon the way it is being applied and who is being accessed and for what.

Solution providers such as Klipfolio are starting to explore these questions and to identify whether added alerting – to mobile devices, through SMS, etc. – would add value to overall BI use. To participate in Klipfolio’s poll click here.

Klipfolio announced their v5.4 release of Klipfolio Dashboard today – a desktop dashboard focused on providing operational Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).  Some interesting additions to their product are:

• Search – the ability to use search functionality within the dashboards to filter out columns and to identify interesting data points using Boolean operators.
• Drill across – in addition to drilling down to more detailed data, users can also drill through data to identify related data points to identify relevant information. This can include analyzing the relationship between sales and the delivery of inventory, etc.
• New charts, stack bars, win/lose charts, etc. – helps broaden the analysis capabilities.

Many new releases focus extensively on adding features and on increasing interactivity, and Klipfolio v5.4 is no different.  What does differ, however, is the way in which dashboards are delivered to end-users.  Organizations have access to dashboards continuously on their desktops and can interact with and change what they see, making them easy to interact with.  Although not targeted to analytics, the ability to get a view of current performance and targeted metrics enable users to get a continuous view of what is happening within the organization.

Klipfolio provides a good example of operational dashboards and the importance of constantly being in contact with essential metrics to increase overall visibility into performance.  At the same time, it is important to remember that not all companies require operational dashboards or constant updates to information.  Depending on the type of business problems being faced, and depending upon the overall goals and usage of dashboards, different options exist. It’s always important to remember that picking the right type of dashboard extends beyond features and functions towards business goal alignment and data visibility.

Last week I wrote a piece for Dashboard Insight about the convergence of BI and unstructured data.  Over the years the topic of unstructured data keeps poking its head into the realm of business intelligence, but has yet to be seen on a large scale.  Some interesting vendors that I wrote about (please see below: “Enter the role of BI and unstructured data”) show that both can be used to develop a broader BI platform.  Whether or not this begins to happen on a larger scale remains to be seen.  What is interesting, however, is the way organizations are starting to use multiple types of technologies and to look at information – both the types of data available and the way in which it can be transformed into valuable information – to transition from traditional BI uses to more dynamic applications. Operational BI and the integration of external data are providing organizations with more insights into their business challenges and giving them the means to stay competitive within an unstable economy.  Hopefully, BI players will learn from their data integration counterparts that are building platforms for all of an organization’s data management needs and start to develop comprehensive suites for companies that want to look at a full BI solution that does the same.

Enter the role of BI and unstructured data

In two recent analyst briefings, I had the opportunity to get updated on the initiative of both Bi3 Solutions and Datawatch.  Both solution providers approach the business problem of how to tackle unstructured data analysis because of the fact that much of the valuable information that businesses require to make informed decisions reside within unstructured content – whether ready-made reports, documents, contracts, emails, etc. Many organizations struggle with how to access this information, organize it, and gain insights.  Within a traditional BI model, the ability to adequately handle unstructured data and integrate it into an analytic framework is near impossible.  So how do these solution providers do it?

Bi3 Solutions uses a cloud-based infrastructure within a Software as a Service framework.  Their solution extracts relevant information from within content; thereby identifying the structured aspects organizations are looking for within their unstructured content.  For instance, pertinent contract information can be extracted and transformed into structured data to alleviate the burden of having people go through hundreds or thousands of documents, saving time and money in the process.  Afterwards, regular data analysis can occur to identify trends and the like.

With Datawatch and their Monarch BI Enterprise Server, currently created reports and other content are leveraged and transformed into relevant BI content.  Information is pulled directly from the content residing within the organization within heavy data integration requirements.  Organizations can then combine various data elements to gain valuable insights into what already exists within their business.

Until recently, open source solutions were most popular within various developer communities but remained on the fringe of general business intelligence implementations. Over the past couple of years, however, open source BI, data warehousing, and data integration solutions have become more mainstream within the BI market creating a shift in the way BI solution providers.   Now instead of open source providers having to educate the market about the value of their solutions, BI players are looking to mimic general open source principles in order to increase general solution adoption and market share.

Over the past several months, many solution providers have developed free solutions that are similar to open source offerings in the sense that they are free versions of software that can be used as a first step in BI adoption or to explore and compare various solutions at one time.  For instance, InetSoft recently announced their 2.0 version of their free dashboard solution and Tableau has launched an online dashboard that can be used to analyze public information.  Both offer organizations an alternative to traditional dashboards.

As the market continues to diversify and more solution providers adopt this tactic, the way in which BI is adopted may shift.  Currently, organizations are able to deploy free dashboards and get general insights into their business. However, depending on the types of data sources they want to access, the amount of data required, and robust features and functions, they are limited in how they can interact with those solutions. Consequently, free solutions offer companies a first look into dashboards but may not be the way to go when deploying an organization wide or departmental solution.  Even with their limitations, the ability to access free dashboards give businesses a sense of flexibility that until recently was not possible.

In general, while meeting with vendors at TDWI to get updates on products and to identify changes in roadmaps, etc., it becomes possible to identify general market trends and the overall position solution providers are taking to provide their customers with additional business value. Based on my conversations over the past week, here are some of the BI trends within the market at large.

Data warehouse appliances

The appliance market is becoming saturated with new players.  In a sense, data warehousing is developing into its own market as a separate entity from traditional BI.  Now many vendors exist providing hardware and software components to enable data warehouse design. Unfortunately, because of the focus on query performance and the total TBs or PBs supported, it can become difficult to differentiate between various offerings and understand which one best suits any organization.  Many solution providers themselves are lacking in the area of identifying the business value that is associated with a data warehouse implementation.  Teradata and Kalido are two examples of companies that understand that added business value is what should be providing the key differentiations within the market as a whole.

Embedded analytics

In addition to the appliance market expanding, solution providers are focusing more intently on developing and providing an analytic framework within the data infrastructure layer.  Advancements including in-memory, data federation, increased processing speeds, and the like, as well as the increasing popularity in columnar databases create an environment primed for analytics that take place within the database layer.  Conversations such as what to bring into the data warehouse or how many data marts to create may become more obsolete over time as companies can create analyses on the fly without having to take into consideration the structure of the database or what dimensions have been modeled.

Data management platforms

As an extension of the general data warehousing market, the way in which data is managed and integrated within BI infrastructure is changing.  Solution providers such as DataFlux and Informatica are starting to develop a platform approach to data management by combining data integration and master data management solutions.  This way of looking at data management is new in relation to available market offerings but will definitely continue to increase as more vendors expand their data management infrastructures and as organizations look towards a holistic approach to managing their internal and external data.

Robust, interactive dashboards and visualization

Much focus within the world of BI still remains on the data infrastructure and supporting layers.  On the front-end, organizations are starting to look at dashboards and visual analytics as an entry point to BI.  Mid-market companies and individual business units are primed for dashboard deployments that either access operational data stores or that is part of a larger hosted solution.  On the part of vendors, there is a push towards offering dashboards that can be deployed independently of developer intervention.  As more business users look to interact with data and to attain insights on the fly, vendors look towards creating advanced and visually pleasing interfaces that include the ability to design and interact with the solution without the expectation of strong technical skills.

Increasing focus on using BI to drive business value

One of the overarching focuses within the market, whether on the back-end or within the visualization side, is the increase in target of business users or of focusing on the business value of what solutions provide.  Unfortunately, because of the extensive data focus of BI in general, the ability for lay people to understand how analytics, data warehouses, etc. can help them solve their business problems has been elusive.  Luckily, solution providers are starting to slowly understand that the only way they will continue to provide customers with concrete business benefits is to sell the business in addition to IT experts.

Every now and then I speak with vendors’ customers to get a different take on solutions being used and what companies really think about products that are marketed with only a positive spin. I also enjoy hearing about the business benefits and value mid-market companies are achieving through their use of BI. As a bonus, I hope to get some insight into any snags or negatives about the product or overall BI project – which customers generally like to share once they start talking.  The negatives are a great tool that can be used to provide insights to other companies evaluating solutions in the market place and help them learn from other companies BI initiatives.

In this case, my “victim” of sorts, was Anna’s Linens, a retailer focusing on home fashions with over 258 stores across the United States.  They are a mid-market company and have been using SAP Business Objects Edge BI for a couple of  years. And to my disappointment (even though I’m glad that they are getting a lot of benefit out of their solution), their Crystal use has been nothing but positive – very positive actually!

While transitioning from being a regional to a national retailer, Anna’s Linens needed to consolidate information across various locations. Their goal was to find a way to look at marketing, store operations, and merchandising data holistically.  Additional considerations included the viability and current install base of a vendor, product ease of use, and the ability to deploy to multiple users within the organization. Once choosing SAP Business Objects Edge BI, the implementation was seamless and several reports were developed with the goal of creating a single view of operational data and moving away from data silos that existed within the organization (specifically in relation to marketing, store operations, and merchandising) . Anna’s Linens was able to extract data and create analytics that provided additional insights into sales, customer conversions, and the effectiveness of advertising specific products.  In addition, due to the new visibility and centralized view of overall performance, Anna’s Linens implemented traffic counters to identify foot traffic and its relation to customer transactions, units per transaction, marketing performance, etc.

Overall, Anna’s Linens provides a great example to other mid-market retailers of the advantage of implementing BI. For some reason, retailers have generally remained behind the curve on BI adoption but are slowly beginning to understand the immense value of data. But beyond simply implementing BI, retailers need to understand how data visibility can be tied to continual improvement and how to relate sales data to actual performance.  In Anna’s Linens’ case, they have taken BI to the next level by enabling each department in the company to develop their own metrics – for instance, the measurement of customer service levels – and by creating a cross-functional steering committee to help build and manage BI reports and processes within the organization.

For a mid-sized retailer, Anna’s Linens provides a good example of how other companies can take advantage of analytics within their organizations to gain broader insights into performance and to create a cohesive view of operations and customer focused data.

Earlier this week I had a briefing with Visual Mining to learn about their new release, NetCharts Performance Dashboards (NCPD) 2.0. Aside from being impressed with their demo, one of the things that I noticed was their focus on the business user. Their key target is mid-market CFOs, but with that comes the realization that in order for dashboards to be successful within mid-sized organizations, they need to be easy to use, to develop, and to customize at the individual user level.  Otherwise they defeat the purpose and can’t provide great business value to business users. In addition, they back their new solution with a risk free money back guarantee.  This means that in addition to providing a dashboard solution that is easy to interact with, they are giving mid-market companies a way to engage in dashboard deployments without the risk inherent in a high cost project with variable returns.

Due to the increase in free software offerings that give companies free access to software, solution providers are starting to develop alternative ways to compete with these free offerings while giving future customers added value.  Mid-market companies are now able to evaluate solutions and deploy dashboards or business intelligence solutions without having to worry about failed projects and wasted budget allocations. Overall, it is interesting to see the increasing focus of dashboard design that targets business users as well as provides dollar value to the overall organization.  This combination will help the role of dashboards expand within the organization both in terms of usage and popularity.

Last week Jaspersoft announced their latest release 3.7 and Enterprise addition.  Overall, the expansion of Jaspersoft’s Enterprise addition to the mix of traditional open source BI highlights the direction of the BI market overall. Companies are starting to look for alternative solutions that provide strong features and functionality but that do not require large implementation and maintenance costs (in comparison with some traditional BI offerings).  Although open source continues to remain free for the developer community, because of the ability to develop solutions more quickly, open source BI providers are starting to focus on commercial offerings to give companies the benefits of continual improvements to solutions and easy maintenance. And on the side of organizations, many are beginning to evaluate open source BI within the mix of their overall business intelligence software evaluations.

Here are some of the highlights of Jaspersoft’s announcement:

• configurable in-memory, allowing end users/IT to define where the processing gets done
• new features including partial pivots, advanced sorting, dynamic slicing and filtering, etc.
• advanced visualizations and animations using Adobe PDF and HTML
• extended Web services
• online/hosted context sensitive help