MicroStrategy upgrades BI platform for visual analysis, Hadoop
MicroStrategy is set to unveil an array of enhancements to its BI (business intelligence) software platform, covering areas such as visual data-exploration and the open-source Hadoop data-processing framework, during the MicroStrategy World conference in Amsterdam on Tuesday.
The new features in MicroStrategy 9.3 include an updated version of the vendor's Visual Insight interface, which is aimed at helping business users work through data. Additional visualization tools have been added, including density maps and network diagrams, according to a statement.
MicroStrategy has also sought to make the toolset easier to use. One new feature automatically suggests which types of visualizations users should choose for various data sets, and the system's drag-and-drop functions have been made "smoother," MicroStrategy said. Read more...
Enterprise BI models undergo radical transformation
About two years ago, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield implemented a self-service business intelligence platform to aggregate and analyze vast amounts of data from multiple repositories scattered throughout the company.
The technology, from Palo Alto, Calif.-based QlikTech, was brought in as a supplement to a project management product from CA Technologies. So far, it has saved CareFirst $10 million in project costs and helped the health insurer reduce the number of outside contractors it uses by 25%.
Activities that used to take up to 18 months are now accomplished in less than two days. Moreover, the project management office no longer has to depend on its centralized analytics team to run BI reports. Read more...
BI must become part of broad IT strategy
Companies that tie business intelligence capabilities to broad IT performance management practices and strategic goals can gain a significant strategic advantage, said analysts and IT managers said at the Gartner BI Summit being held here this week.
Most enterprise BI systems today are still inward-looking, using mostly past performance data such as revenue, profit and costs to support efforts to improve operational efficiencies and decrease costs. Read more...