CPO Blog

The Wall Street Journal had two articles on the business impact of BI.  The content is nothing profound for those of us in the industry, but the placement of these two articles in WSJ only emphasizes the key role of BI in overlapping business and technology.

The first article talks overall about business intelligence and sites some product references. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119023024488632729.html

The second article is all about HP NeoView in the role of creating the centralized warehouse.  The article paints data marts as the root of all evil, which I have a hard time swallowing.  The federated approach (Hackney)  to warehousing was probably too complex for this article, but federation is still one of the most successful enterprise strategies for warehouses. BTW: My commentary is that it is a little to much of an infomercial for HP’s products.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119023027984432736.html

I have been avoiding the acquisition rumors and only commenting when the deal happens.  But with the nearly acknowledged rumor of BO retaining Goldman to look for a suitor, I feel obligated to provide a link for you to decide.

Read this analysis and draw your own conclusions.

Acquistions continue even when nobody really knows much of the companies.  Longview, a lesser known CPM player was purchased by Exact Software.  I know, who? who?  Longview has been around for a while in the midmarket CPM competing with the likes of Applix and OutlookSoft (Now Cognos and SAP).  Exact Software, even less known that Longview, is a Dutch software company.

Probably has little impact on the market, but goes to show that while the big companies such as SAP and Oracle make purchases, the middle players like BO and Cognos continue to acquire, and it happens at this level even. 

Read the press release here.  Exact Software.

Using hospitals as an example, the tight integration of process mapping and data management is obvious.  As you move through a process, there are data waypoints where data is collected for immediate or future consumption.  Read the article in DM Review, where I outline the concept of data waypoints and hospital systems.

BO continued its purchase into the data quality space with Fuzzy Informatik.  Besides a name that brings a chuckle, Fuzzy Informatik is an attempt to fill in a data quality hole.  Read more at http://www.businessobjects.com/news/press_release.asp?id=20070905_006559.

Cognos announced the acquisition of Applix today.  Applix, whose technology has held a niche in finance, had mostly fallen off the map of the major BI or CPM players.  Part of the first generation of proprietary OLAP tools, TM/1, with its spreadsheet interface was a favorite of Excel power users.

As Cognos has moved futher away from proprietary cube technology, it remains to be seen how the core Applix technologies will come into play in the combined company.