Practical Business Intelligence

The more people I talk to about the BI Tool Vendor Grudge Match we conducted last month, the more interest there seems to be in putting more vendors in the ring for another round. So, I created another poll to get your input. Whether you’re in Chicago or not, I’d like to know …  If you could assemble any three of these vendors in a room to square off in a no-holds-barred confrontation about whose tool is tops in the BI space, who would they be?

• Select any three.
• Feel free to write in an “other”.
• Remember, if you vote for SAP, Microsoft, Pentaho, or IBM then you’re voting to bring these guys back for round 2.  (Read more about the first round with these four vendors: Original BI Tool Vendor grudge match.)

Post 1 in a series of 4, in which I share my thoughts on how our vendors did at the BI Tool Vendor Grudge Match last week, and on the details of their presentations. You might also check out my summary post earlier this week on PBI.

Company: Microsoft
Presenter: Dan Vandercar, Technical Presales
At Microsoft: 4 years
In BI: 15 years
Gift selected: Capstone Hat

Dan’s presentation focused a lot on Microsoft Office as the end-user delivery vehicle for Microsoft-based BI. This has obvious pros–the almost universal proliferation of the Office product, universal look-and-feel/common interface, and extremely advanced analytical features, particularly in Excel and even more so in v2010 than in v2007. And Excel 2010 is going to be even more powerful in this role, as it will support an infinite number of rows, more tools for data mining and cleansing, etc.

But this is actually where my concerns lie as well. I don’t particularly like Excel’s impact on BI. Of course I understand that business users are addicted to it and that it’s very powerful. But when business users export a CSV from their favorite database or tool, roll it into their meticulously crafted Excel spreadsheet, and evolve it over weeks, months, even years … it becomes a source system. Achieving a single source of truth is harder, and integration of these Excel-based “systems” and the business logic they contain back into the data warehouse is extremely difficult. So, if Excel is the big value-add for Microsoft (and it was certainly the cornerstone of this presentation), then I become concerned. They even went so far as to point out that the integrated ETL features of SSIS make it even easier for users to pull data from the data warehouse (where it belongs) into Excel. This doesn’t make me warm and fuzzy.

Dan rightly pointed out that SQL Server has really “grown up,” now in v2008 truly a contender in the large dataset arena. Terabytes in SQL Server 2008? No problem, according to Microsoft. And that’s long overdue. He also mentioned that MS spent $9B in R&D last year. Rock on! I like hearing that.

I like that PerformancePoint is now rolled into MOSS, giving it dashboarding features out of the box. I don’t have much PerformancePoint exposure, though, so maybe someone with more experience here can comment further.

Last, one of the most significant points in this presentation is the number of partners, VARs, consultants, whole companies, etc. that use Microsoft tools to implement BI solutions. That gigantic developer community plays a very significant role in the ongoing evolution of the tool and in the ready availability of the help end users need to be successful with it.

Overall, I grade this presentation:  B

Part 1 of 2:

Part 2 of 2:

BI Tool Vendor Grudge Match

Yesterday’s ITA BI Roundtable was designed to be a face off … cage match … smackdown … between popular BI tool vendors. According to those who observed the carnage first hand, it was a great session. Gene Gladell, a regular participant at roundtable sessions, said that “this totally exceeded my expectations.” That’s good enough for me.

IBM, Microsoft, Pentaho (popular open source BI solution), and SAP were invited to attend. As roundtable chairman, I organized the event on behalf of the ITA and Capstone Consulting.

Thought I’d toss out a bit of a summary of the event. I charged participating vendors with …

Vendor Presentations

Make a brief presentation to the group addressing the question, “Why does your tool yield a greater ROI than the other tools represented?”  We limited them to 12 minutes each, and each laid out their case for being the best business value to their customers. We video taped the whole thing, and I’ll get it posted soon, along with summaries of their most salient points. In the meantime, if you attended the session, you should take my poll on LinkedIn and let me know whom you feel “won the debate.” I gotta say I’m curious what you think. Also, stay tuned for much more info.

Presenters where (in order of their presentations; which was randomly selected before the session):

• From Microsoft, Dan Vandercar, Technical Pre-Sales
• From SAP BusinessObjects: Shawn Blevins, Global Group Director
• From Pentaho: Lance Walter, VP Marketing
• From IBM Cognos: Paula Doyle, Account Executive

Best Breakfast Award

Bring breakfast. Everyone brought eats, and I had attendees vote on who got it right. IBM walked away with the “Breakfast Best Practices” award for the day. Hats off to the IBM Cognos marketing team!

Book Giveaway

Bring books to give away. To the members who brought the most new folks to the meeting (sounds like a 12-step program when I say it that way, doesn’t it? – sigh!), we gave out prizes. Good prizes, in fact. Four attendees walked away with brand-spankin’ new books on implementing BI solutions with each vendor’s stack.  Congratulations to …

• Tim Strudeman got first pick, he selected the Microsoft Data Warehouse Toolkit
• Jordan Martz scored Pentaho Solutions: BI / DW in Pentaho and MySQL
• Our very own Louis Giokis ended up with an IOU from SAP for a book to be named later — gotta work on those guys
• And Joan Matz made off with the IBM Cognos 8 BI Official Guide

Panel Discussion and Comparative Product Matrix

Answer questions from the group. Participants (both before the session and during) submitted a whole heap of questions targeted at our participating BI vendors. Capstone distilled these down to 36 solid questions. We asked 9 of these in a one-hour panel discussion in our session yesterday after vendor presentations. Each vendor was given 60 seconds to respond. They’ve all also committed to answering in writing. Once completed, I’ll be publishing this tomb for reference to the BI community. I think this will be a valuable tool; can’t wait to get it done.

Another Session Required?

There was so much interest and participation in this session that we’re considering doing another one. MicroStrategy, Information Builders, and InfoBright have all already expressed interest, and I think Oracle should be involved at some point. Besides, the only thing better than a comparative matrix of four BI tools is a comparative matrix of eight BI tools, right?  What do you think?  Good idea to rinse and repeat with new vendors? Maybe in the Spring?

Feedback Welcome

If you attended this session, you should post your comments. I’d love to hear your feedback on the Grudge Match, and suggestions on how we could improve it.