The changing face of BI

PowerDesigner 15 from Sybase

Today Sybase has announced the release of PowerDesigner 15, its modeling and design tool for use in streamlining data and business processes across the organization. Getting its origin as a data modeling tool, PowerDesigner has become a tool designed to increase enterprise architecture agility. Although not fully related to BI, PowerDesigner has the ability to build the metadata layer and integrate data modeling with process flows to bring together different resources across the organization and increase alignment between data management and process management. This helps increase the ability of organizations to manage their data enterprise wide as opposed to within various silos across the organization. Some new features include -

- a new layer of metadata

- tools to implement framework with tools - i.e. Zachman

- traceable visual impact analysis using diagrams

- Web-based repository that resides in a browser

- the ability to import Visio information into diagrams

- improvement of data flow models

- support of all major databases

Is there a difference?

The role of business intelligence applications within organizations will continue to increase as organizations move towards operational BI and start to adopt non-traditional methods of deploying BI. However, as many companies move along a BI maturity model, other organizations that are beginning to consider BI don't know where to start.  

In addition to the sheer number of solutions available, as solutions can be customized to offer the required features and functionality to target unique requirements, the ability to identify key  product differentiations seem minimal at best. This only adds to general confusion about where organizations should start and what they should be looking for.  

For some reason there is an assumption that organizations are already aware of what options are available.  Generally, vendors play to this view and market themselves to compete with their competitors, but not to help increase awareness of the intrinsic value of BI, how it can help organizations, and where they fit in the full spectrum of the market.  

Mid-market leaders

As I plough through the mid-market survey results, I am beginning to see that certain vendors are really ahead of the pack in terms of actual awareness.  Although it is possible to attribute this to general branding, it seems as if certain vendors - such as Cognos, Business Objects, and Microsoft are leading the pack in relation to mid-market awareness and usage.  On the one hand, these solution providers probably have an unfair advantage over their competitors in terms of their general market positioning, being leaders in their respective spaces, and having abundant resources to get their marketing message across. On the other hand, one would think that with the number of newer entrants to the market and the increase in product diversity, other offerings would start to become more mainstream.  Due to the relative youth of this market, it remains to be seen whether widespread adoption actually takes place outside of these three solution provider offerings or if they continue to lead the pack when looking at the mid-market.  

Mid-market musings

In a few weeks I will be coming out with the survey results of the BI for Mid-Market survey that was distributed through various online outlets to assess what is going on within mid-market companies regarding their use and awareness of business intelligence solutions.  Included in the questions were the awareness levels of vendor offerings targeted specifically to the mid-market and current use of business intelligence in general.  Although not surprising that top vendors used by respondents were Microsoft and Business Objects, what was surprising was the lack of general knowledge about solutions in the market place.

Even though a multitude of offerings exist that compete at lower price points or that offer alternative deployment such as on-demand or that are downloadable from the Web, it seems as if many of these solutions are going unnoticed by potential customers.  Either that, or solution providers like Microsoft, Business Objects, and Cognos are leading the pack in getting their mid-market message out there. Either way, there is a general gap between what is out there and what is being identified as potential solutions for organizations.