Consolidation and change maybe rife in the BI and data warehousing sector, but so is growth. So there’s still plenty of smart money on Business Intelligence, writes Tracey Caldwell.

In the ranks of serious business technologies, Business Intelligence (or BI) is very nearly a unique recruit. Its code isn’t drastically different. Neither is the way it is packaged, marketed or sold. Neither are its manufacturers enamoured of an especially exceptional approach.  
No, the main reason for BI’s uniqueness is that, unlike virtually any other strategic IT implementation you care to name, the principles and the business benefits behind it are pretty clear, compelling, and obvious to even the most die-hard luddite. 
Who wouldn’t want faster, more accurate, better-informed decision-making? What business wouldn’t value the ability to unlock the powerful information hidden in plain sight in its data silos? Who wouldn’t benefit from having a greater insight into the most and least profitable areas of their businesses; their seasonal patterns, their costs, their logistics?
On the face of things then (ironically enough) BI is a bit of a no-brainer, and a lot of smart money has certainly been placed on the value good BI can deliver. Almost inevitably though, things aren’t that simple – in fact, so complex and taxing can BI become that one industry commentator was recently driven to liken the average BI project to “standing in the rain ripping up £100 notes”.
So what’s the drama? What mental block is stopping BI realising its full potential? According to John Kitchen, senior VP and chief marketing officer with BI vendor Datawatch, it boils down to the fact that too many BI solutions remain too costly, too complex, too logistically demanding, and too disruptive.

“Traditional BI involves a great deal of effort – in configuration, in customisation, in building out the database, in integration. Users – especially those in SMEs – want to spend their time using BI to make better decisions, not struggling with the technology.”



In the ranks of serious business technologies, Business Intelligence (or BI) is very nearly a unique recruit. Its code isn’t drastically different. Neither is the way it is packaged, marketed or sold. Neither are its manufacturers enamoured of an especially exceptional approach.  
No, the main reason for BI’s uniqueness is that, unlike virtually any other strategic IT implementation you care to name, the principles and the business benefits behind it are pretty clear, compelling, and obvious to even the most die-hard luddite. 
Who wouldn’t want faster, more accurate, better-informed decision-making? What business wouldn’t value the ability to unlock the powerful information hidden in plain sight in its data silos? Who wouldn’t benefit from having a greater insight into the most and least profitable areas of their businesses; their seasonal patterns, their costs, their logistics?

On the face of things then (ironically enough) BI is a bit of a no-brainer, and a lot of smart money has certainly been placed on the value good BI can deliver. Almost inevitably though, things aren’t that simple – in fact, so complex and taxing can BI become that one industry commentator was recently driven to liken the average BI project to “standing in the rain ripping up £100 notes”.
So what’s the drama? What mental block is stopping BI realising its full potential? According to John Kitchen, senior VP and chief marketing officer with BI vendor Datawatch, it boils down to the fact that too many BI solutions remain too costly, too complex, too logistically demanding, and too disruptive.

“Traditional BI involves a great deal of effort – in configuration, in customisation, in building out the database, in integration. Users – especially those in SMEs – want to spend their time using BI to make better decisions, not struggling with the technology.” 

Also, perhaps in part because of the very benefits BI promises to deliver, many BI solutions are still being touted around and (more worryingly) commissioned by people with little real idea of what they’re doing or why.

Seems that having the intelligence to see the value of business intelligence isn’t enough. You need to gather business intelligence intelligence first. Because only once you have that intelligent intelligence can you implement business intelligence intelligently.

Nice and clear? Great, then let’s move on. Because, apparently undeterred by the complexity and upheaval involved, businesses are still putting BI at the tops of their shopping lists. Indeed BI is now spread wider and deeper within organisations’ systems than ever; moving beyond specialist BI enclaves and IT teams and directly into the hands of management and individual end users.
“I’m seeing ever-increasing activity in the BI market”, says Forrester analyst Boris Evelson, citing two major reasons for the upsurge. “First, BI isn’t just about reporting any more. It’s moving from back office to front office and becoming a major competitive differentiator. Those enterprises that have already squeezed every last ounce out of their product and services costs now need to compete by making better decisions than their competitors, or even by making the same decisions but faster.”

The second important driver, says Evelson, is the sheer amount of organisational data that enterprises now keep, process, and analyse – a metric that is still growing at a dizzying speed, with Petabyte (1000 terabyte) data warehouses emerging “left and right”. “What businesses were able to analyse with spreadsheets and desktop based file systems is no longer enough.”

With the big boys tussling to get a bigger slice of the BI pie, the last couple of years have been a time of great upheaval, change, and consolidation in the BI vendor community too. SAP snapped up top-of-the-table BI vendor Business Objects to add a small and mid-sized enterprise offering to its stable, while IBM’s acquisition of Cognos gave it a first foothold in the BI sector. Microsoft too is building out its BI portfolio, looking upmarket as it seeks to plug the gaps in its enterprise offering; building extra BI capabilities into its recently launched SQL Server 2008, and buying up graphical and geographical tools technology from smaller companies. 



Also, for now at least, the BI space still counts many hundreds of smaller suppliers in its number – from rising mid-market contenders to small systems integrators offering point solutions. Indeed, the next year or two could even see the sector expand further, with many organisations choosing solutions outside those on offer from the ‘big four’ – i.e. IBM, SAP, Oracle, and Microsoft – and looking for specialised point technologies.
A number of newcomers are emerging too. HP, as Gartner analyst Andreas Bitterer puts it, isn’t even on most business’s BI radars, and yet it’s suddenly offering something called Neoview – an enterprise data warehousing platform.   

He also cites a “whole set of vendors” that could enter the market moving forward. Sun through its MySQL acquisition strategy, for instance, and even Google, which he describes as “a wild card”. 
The market leaders are distinguished by very different approaches, notes Evelson. SAP Business Objects, for instance, tends to concentrate on including the best tools (sometimes at the expense of integration, some would say) while IBM Cognos takes the opposite tack – focusing less on trying to deliver every feature and function and more on strong integration.
Another key force at work in the sector is that while BI has, historically, been the preserve of the larger business, several factors – straitened budgets, longer refresh cycles, competitive pressure, Excel creep – are now forcing mid-sized companies to adopt BI. Here especially, with people’s familiarity with Office and particularly Excel providing a natural jump off point, Microsoft will fancy its chances. 
“In the credit crunch people are going to be looking at what they have already and how it can be maximised”, says David Hobbs-Mallyon, SQL server product manager at Microsoft, not “developing systems where they have to learn whole new tools.” “A lot of people who bought SQL Server haven’t done analytic work or data mining and there’s a lot they can be doing creatively.” 
Accordingly, companies need to wise up in their attitudes to business intelligence, says Bitterer, who cites a “rather gross misconception” among organisations that (BI) is easily accomplished. Many, he says, are falling into a trap of arbitrarily going out, buying some technology, deploying it – and entirely missing the point.
BI should be about unearthing information that benefits the business in lowering costs and risk and increasing margins and so on. If it doesn’t do that, says Bitterer, what’s the point?
While it may sound obvious then, BI has to be approached intelligently. As such, says Matt Denyer, project manager with Maconomy, which focuses on project-based BI at mid-market and large companies, businesses have to understand that if BI is to deliver maximum benefit, it needs their input.
“Customers need to put in an awful lot of work themselves to get value. Ask suppliers about scalability. It is important to get key reporting capabilities out quickly, get people using them and then work with users to ascertain their needs.”
In the end, he says, it’s all about quick ROI and that means using BI to focus on all your logistical and human assets, not just the directly financial ones. Are all your people effectively allocated, for example? 

This is perhaps the central point where BI is concerned – the best implementations put business strategy first and technology last. Decide exactly what it is that you want from your data and understand your end game and the right supplier and solution will emerge.