Business Intelligence: Finding the Edges

By Rob Paller, Consultant

photo by H. Michael Karshis

When was the last time you did or witnessed something creative? Did you say to yourself, “That’s what happens when you think outside the box!”? Contrary to the cliché, creativity isn’t found by thinking outside the box but from finding the edges and stretching them. Over the past couple years the BI industry has gone through its share of mergers and acquisitions. Many of the big players have been absorbed as the consuming companies tried to round out their offerings and becoming the data equivalent of a Walmart supercenter.

While the big players fight to find room inside the box, start-ups and open source players (OS) are left to find ways to remain on the radars of prospective customers who are otherwise looking for stability in a vendor during a time where VC money is getting harder to come by and the distinction of being open source is losing its sheen. This leaves the start-ups and OS vendors the opportunity to find the edges of the box. That is where these vendors must find new ways to distinguish themselves.

There is a fair amount of discussion going on among the BI tribe regarding their BI predictions in 2009 including how business intelligence can help a company become greener, the impact that SaaS will have on BI, and defining BI 2.0. While these are all great ideas on their own, what is seemingly being lost is the ability for a BI environment to remain nimble once deployed allowing new features to be deployed sooner and enabling knowledge users to stretch the edges of BI within their companies. Toss all of those vendor contracts, licensing costs, and maintenance agreements into in a box for now. (And I don’t mean the recycling container under your desk!) Instead let’s walk around the edge for a minute and see if there is potential to push the boundaries.

Consider Ubuntu, an open source operating system, with its six month release cycle. Initially released in 2004, Ubuntu has adhered to this cycle while also offering a long-term support version providing a stable foundation for business making a long term investment in Ubuntu. Imagine the potential for a BI solution that delivers new features every six months fostering those who thrive on creativity. Is this pushing the edge too far?

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Rob Paller is an expert at business analytics and database administration. Since joining Baseline, Rob has been responsible for developing a case analysis system to streamline the oversight of food assistance benefits, implementing a common citizen data model, and assisting in the rollout of a new public assistance data model integrating data from over 10 years of legacy with a new benefit eligibility determination system.

Comments

[wto-center.org]

Business intelligence involves different strategies. The BI task can be handled with the aid of application software. Application software is broadly categorized under class of computer software that enables a computer to function in accordance with what the user desires.