We have seen some significant shifts in the business intelligence market in the last year; the predicted convergence is happening and sorting out the market.
Microsoft acquired ProClarity last year and announced the release of Performance Point, clearly stating its intention for this market sector.
Oracle purchased Hyperion, although Hyperion was pretty much up for grabs. SAP acquired PeopleSoft and when the organic growth slows and growth is by acquisition, it is a sure sign companies are looking for a helping hand.
Cognos, Business Objects, which has just acquired Inxight, and SAS remain as the large independents, and the platform players, Oracle and Microsoft, have made their intentions and strategies clear. Oracle is only concerned about SAP, so it will be interesting to see what it does in this sector.
SAP's offering has not enjoyed the credibility it expected and it seems to be behind the curve.
Microsoft's strategy is two-pronged: protect the desktop space, and grow the SQL Server base.
The latter it has done incredibly well, the former has still to materialise, but the acquisition of ProClarity by the Office team should be a convincing play. IBM has released its new OLAP engine, and may yet enter the front-end or applications space with an acquisition.
SAS remains well protected in its niche, but this will change very quickly over the next year.
Microsoft's pricing strategy with Performance Point will be a market changer. The other vendors will be feeling the effects of commoditisation already, but this will only gain momentum by the middle of next year. The shifts will be huge.
This makes getting a shortlist easier for the market - all of the big businesses in the country will be doing business with at least two of the above players, probably more. So who to believe? The person who controls the data in the back-end? The person who controls the front-end? The person best able to tie the two together with the most complete CPM offering?
These are the questions all clients are asking. The shortlist is easier to define, but distinguishing between the offerings on the shortlist is harder than ever before.
One thing the acquisitions do show though, very clearly, is that ISVs which think they can enter a market by developing their own products for a market sector they have not traditionally played in, such as BI, can't. They try and then end up acquiring competitors to drive growth. It will be interesting to see if this holds true going forward as consolidations continue.
On the soapbox
I am now going to get on one of my soapbox issues. When all the Gartners, IDCs and Forresters of the world do an analysis of the BI/CPM market, why do they never mention or rate the largest BI tool globally: Excel.
The proliferation of data in Excel clearly shows the failure to date of the BI market. Why do most of the business decisions that are made in the world come from data that resides in, or has been manipulated by, Excel? This is what the business users want. This gives them the flexibility and control they want. If you don't give it to them in Excel, they will put it in Excel.
The proliferation of data in Excel clearly shows the failure to date of the BI market.
Keith Jones is the MD of Harvey Jones Systems
The BI purists in the market will be howling, saying: "It's not true BI if it's in Excel" (I used to be one of them), and to be honest, I would be inclined to agree. From a purely intellectual and functional point of view, it is not the right tool. But this, like all markets in the world, is driven by the habits of people, and there is one thing all people in the world are good at: resisting change.
So when faced with all the big vendors with state-of-the-art offerings that do very clever things, be sure to go back to the business and ask them what they want and what they would be comfortable using. Their choice has nothing to do with Gartner Magic Quadrants or choosing the visionary partner for the future; it has to do with how many hours there are in the day and how they can get to the data they want, quickly, easily and then allowing them to do what they want to it.
They may not understand the BI market, and they probably won't care, but they are the ones who have to use it on a daily basis, and they will, consciously or subconsciously, decide if the product presented to them succeeds or fails.
This does not mean that it is a one-horse race by any means, only that the market of the future will be a race to Excel. I do think one or more of the large BI independents will be acquired this year; which one will be shown by their organic growth (or lack of it). When this starts to slow and they start to show the market the promised growth figures by acquisition, it probably means they will be next.
SAP will make a convincing play for the front-end market, and the new "in memory" niche players will continue to gain traction in the low end until they are acquired by the larger players or the larger player release offerings of their own in this space.
* Keith Jones is MD of Harvey Jones Systems.
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