BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE TOOLS

WHAT IS BI?

Business intelligence (BI) is a set of theories, methodologies, architectures, and technologies that
transform raw data into meaningful and useful information for business purposes.
2

Source: http://www.dashboardinsight.com/articles/business-verticals/environmental-friendly-business-intelligence.aspx
 BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE TOOLS?

• Application software which enables BI

• Facilitates access, analysis of data and presentation of results
• Complement traditional ITs (DW, data mining, transaction processing
systems) to enable 4 BI capabilities
 BI TOOLS TYPES

• TYPE BASIS
• ABILITY TO EXECUTE (ATE)
• COMPLETENESS OF VISION (COV)
• TYPE CLASSIFICATIONS
• LEADERS
• CHALLENGERS
• VISIONARIES
• NICHE PLAYERS
 MAGIC QUADRANT
CHALLENGERS LEADERS
Magic
Quadrant
report for
2014

NICHE PLAYERS VISIONARIES

(Gartner, feb 2014) 5

http://www.gartner.com/technology/reprints.do?id=1-1QLGACN&ct=140210&st=sb
 BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE TOOLS DIFFER
FROM BI CAPABILITIES

• BI CAPABILITIES
• ORGANIZATIONAL MEMORY
• INFORMATION INTEGRATION
• INSIGHT CREATION
• PRESENTATION
 BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE TOOLS DIFFER
FROM BI SOLUTIONS

• BI Solutions
• Utilize BI tools acquired by an organization

• Draw upon existing data from traditional ITs, and other information to support the BI
process by delivering information and knowledge to facilitate decision-making

• The four BI capabilities come together in BI solutions

 BI TOOLS IN RELATION TO BI CAPABILITIES
BI
Product
Data and Information Information (that
(External & Internal;
BI Process leads to knowledge
Structured & and/or enables
Unstructured) decision making)

BI Solution

Organizational Information Insight

BI Capabilities Presentation
Memory Integration Creation

Other
Other
Technologies(e.g.,
Technologies (e.g.,
Source: Sabhewal & Becerra-Fernandez BI Tools Data Warehouse,
Data Warehouse,
DataMining)
Data Mining)
 BI TOOLS CLASSIFIED INTO CATEGORIES

• Reporting, data mining, OLAP (baars and kemper)

• Increasing: cost, functionality, BI complexity & decreasing: # of users (keydata)
• Supports: data, information, knowledge, decisions (olsak and ziemba)
• BI tools and technologies map into four BI capabilities
• Drawn from other arenas to support BI capabilities
• Emerged with development of BI
 CLASSIFYING BI TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGIES BASED ON SUPPORTED
CAPABILITY
Organizational Information
BI Capabilities Insight Creation Presentation
Memory Integration

• Data • Business • Text Mining • OLAP tools

Warehousing Analytics tools • Visualization
• ERP tools • Web Mining tools
• Knowledge • Data Mining tools • Digital
Repositories • Real-time • Environmental Dashboards
BI Tools and • Digital Decision Scanning • Scorecarding
Technologies Content Support • RFID ((Radio tools
Management Frequency • BPM tools
tools Identification)
• Document
Management
tools

Note: The highlighted tools have emerged along with development of BI, whereas the others have been
adapted from other technologies to support BI.

Source: Sabhewal & Becerra-Fernandez

CUSTOMIZATION VS STANDARDIZATION OF BI
TOOLS

• Customization
• Could lead to wasting time on tools rather than business tasks
• Could lead to creating queries that are not useful to all

• Standardization
• Could be overly restrictive
• Could inhibit some of the major benefits from BI
CUSTOMIZATION VS STANDARDIZATION OF BI
TOOLS: RECOMMENDATIONS

• Tools supporting organizational memory capability should be standardized

• Tools supporting information integration should be customized only with respect
to roles
• Tools supporting insight creation capabilities should be customized with respect
to roles and tasks
• Tools supporting presentation capability should be customized with respect to
roles, tasks, and individuals
 CUSTOMIZATION AND STANDARDIZATION OF BI TOOLS
Standardization becomes more important

Customization for users/situations becomes more important

Customization for
Customization for Customization for roles, tasks, and
No customization roles roles and tasks individuals

Organizational Information
BI Capabilities Insight Creation Presentation
Memory Integration

• Data Warehousing • Business • Text Mining tools • OLAP tools

• ERP Analytics tools • Web Mining tools • Visualization
• Knowledge • Data Mining • Environmental tools
Repositories • Real-time Decision Scanning • Digital
BI Tools and • Digital Content Support • RFID (Radio Dashboards
• Scorecarding
Technologies Management Frequency
tools Identification) tools
• Document • BPM tools
Management
tools

Note: The highlighted tools have emerged along with development of BI, whereas the others have been
adapted from other technologies to support BI.

Source: Sabhewal & Becerra-Fernandez

FOUR BI MEGA-VENDORS

• ORACLE (INCLUDING HYPERION)

• SAP (INCLUDING BUSINESS OBJECTS)
• IBM (INCLUDING COGNOS AND SPSS)
• MICROSOFT
SIX MAJOR INDEPENDENT BI VENDORS

• SAS
• MICRO STRATEGY
• INFORMATION BUILDERS
• TIBCO (INCLUDING SPOTFIRE)
• QLIKTECH
• ACTUATE
OTHER NOTABLE BI VENDORS

• TABLEAU
• TERADATA
• HP
• ARC-PLAN
• BOARD INTERNATIONAL
• PANORAMA SOFTWARE
 LATEST DIVISION OF BI VENDORS
• On-premise full stack products
• IBM cognos
• Microsoft BI
• Microstrategy
• SAP business objects
• Sisense
• Open-source full-stack products
• Actuate (commercial product built on
open-source technology)
• Pentaho
• Jaspersoft (acquired by TIBCO in 2014)
• Cloud full-stack products
• Good data
• Birst
• Domo
• Micro-strategy secure cloud
• Microstrategy analytics desktop
• SAP businessobjects lumira
• Tableau online, desktop & server
• TIBCO spotfire
 CASE STUDY ORACLE

• Business intelligence tools

• Standard edition
• Enterprise edition
• In review - platforms
 ORACLE BI STANDARD EDITION

• OPTIMIZED TO WORK WITH

AN ORACLE ENVIRONMENT!!

Common Component Architecture

• Oracle BI Discoverer
• Oracle BI Warehouse Builder
• BI Spreadsheet Add-in
– Oracle BI Discoverer
– Discoverer Portlets
– Spreadsheet Add-in
– Leverage Oracle DB built in
analytic and pl/sql functions

• Oracle BI Beans

• Oracle Reports

Source: Zanett Oracle BI Tools

ORACLE BI ENTERPRISE EDITION

Oracle business intelligence suite

enterprise edition (OBI-EE) offers the
complete spectrum of BI capabilities.

• Designed for use by anyone

• Provides intelligence across virtually
any data source
• Based on a proven, modern, web
services-oriented architecture
• Delivers next-generation business
intelligence capabilities
Source: Zanett Oracle BI Tools
 ORACLE BI ENTERPRISE EDITION
ENABLES CONSISTENCY, SECURITY, REUSE, FLEXIBILITY
Presentation Layer

• User roles, preferences

• Simplified view  Multi-layered
• Logical SQL interface
Semantic Object Layer Abstraction
• Dimensions  Separation of physical, logical and
• Hierarchies presentation layers
• Measures  Logical modeling builds upon
• Calculations complex physical data structures
• Aggregation Rules
• Time Series
 Logical model independent of
Physical Layer physical data sources, i.e. can be
remapped to another data source
• Map Physical Data quickly
• Connections
• Schema

Source: Zanett Oracle BI Tools

 ORACLE BI ENTERPRISE EDITION
ENABLES CONSISTENCY, SECURITY, REUSE, FLEXIBILITY
Presentation Layer
• Role-based views of the information
• User roles, preferences
• Simplified view
• Logical SQL interface
Semantic Object Layer • Consistent definition of business
• Dimensions measures, metrics, calculations
• Hierarchies
• Measures
• Calculations • Model once, deploy anywhere
• Aggregation Rules
• Time Series
Physical Layer
• Across any data source!!!
• Map Physical Data
• Connections
• Schema

Source: Zanett Oracle BI Tools

 IN REVIEW - PLATFORMS
Description Standard Edition Enterprise Edition

Platform Oracle Centric. Separation of:

End User BI Tools
Business Metadata
Data Source

Heterogeneity Oracle Centric – effort required to Enterprise BI Platform; Source

integrate non-Oracle data sources. Independent (Oracle and Non-Oracle)
(Still Oracle DB Centric for Query Intelligently Combine Data
Submission) - Multiple DW(s), OLAP, and Apps
- Historical and Real Time
Disconnected /Off- No Yes
Line
MS Office Integration Excel Excel, Word, PowerPoint

Report Distribution Limited Alerting, Report Distribution, “BI Delivers” – full support for
and Workflow Support scheduling and distributing reports
Development Limited support of open APIs and Advanced Web Services Integration
Integration Integration Capabilities (SOA/BPEL)

Source: Zanett Oracle BI Tools

QUESTIONS?