September 2, 2008
Location Intelligence where to from here?
Most people have heard of location intelligence tools such as Google Maps, or Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Indeed, mapping technology is used everywhere and can be accessed easily online, from a phone, and on the road. But can these applications be used successfully in a business information and reporting context? The short answer is yes.
Although it is early days, the marriage between location and business intelligence software is being seen by many commentators as a highly productive long-term relationship, rather than just a temporary fling.
What is location intelligence?
Traditionally, businesses can spend days, or even weeks physically compiling data from customer surveys and site visits. Location intelligence software can drastically reduce this process by mapping data electronically, thereby freeing up time for other activities.
How does it do this?
Basically, by using common data sources, such as GIS, aerial maps and even customer records, location intelligence technology can present data spatially – such as an interactive map format. This is much easier for our brains to process than traditional charts and tables. For example, by clicking on a map, managers can quickly gain an insight into any number of location-based business operations.
There are obvious benefits to this technology, such as tightening up business processes, improving customer relationships and even boosting performance and results.
Who uses it?
The applications are endless:
• telecommunications organisations use it for network planning and design and market analysis;
• Government uses it for many purposes, including census updates, urban planning, weather forecasting and emergency services;
• retailers use it for site selection, store performance analysis and demographic research; and
• media organisations use it for target market identification, media planning and demographic analysis.
But until recently, using this technology as part of a business reporting process has mostly been the preserve of experts. This is because it has operated on a stand-alone basis, rather as part of an organisation’s business intelligence platform. By converging the two technologies, a whole new level of data analysis can become available to the everyday user.
Yellowfin and location intelligence
The team at Yellowfin has acknowledged the popularity of location intelligence as a business reporting tool by incorporating the technology in its latest release, Yellowfin 4.0. This means organisations can now introduce location-based reporting into the business-decision making process without requiring GIS expertise.
Yellowfin 4.0 enables a variety of mapping visualisations to be used, including Google Maps, Heat Maps or fully-enabled GIS data-type rendering.
Of this latest trend in BI software, CEO Glen Rabie says: “With Yellowfin 4.0, we have taken two mature technologies (BI and GIS) and combined them. One of the most exciting aspects of our latest software is that even the casual business user can use this technology. This is one of the underlying principles of our Yellowfin products.”
www.yellowfinbi.com
Posted by Justin Hewitt at 4:30 PM | Comments (0)
August 16, 2008
Sybase Dives Into Partnership With Australian Business Intelligence Developer, Yellowfin
New alliance will market Australian-developed BI solution to wider corporate community
Sybase Australia, a leading provider of enterprise infrastructure and mobile software, today announced details of its Australian and New Zealand technology partnership with Australian Business Intelligence software company, Yellowfin.
Sybase has entered into a sales alliance with Yellowfin to co-sell its market leading column-based database, Sybase® IQ, with Yellowfin providing the front-end BI presentation layer and easy-to-use interface.
Sybase IQ is a highly optimised analytics server designed specifically to deliver faster results for mission-critical business intelligence, data warehouse and reporting solutions on any standard hardware and operating systems. Its column-based architecture works with diverse data – including unstructured data – and diverse data sources to deliver unsurpassed query performance at the lowest price available.
Yellowfin is a flexible 100 per cent Web-based solution for reporting and analytics, providing a full range of data access, presentation and information delivery capabilities. Yellowfin enables any individual comfortable using a web browser to quickly visualise data through the use of charting, trending, dashboards and alerts.
“This alliance is highly strategic for both Sybase and Yellowfin,” said Steve Dolan, Director Channels & Alliances in A/NZ for Sybase. “Using Yellowfin’s presentation layer as the front end of Sybase IQ provides organisations with an all-encompassing business intelligence solution to very quickly find and analyse valuable corporate information. In today’s rapidly changing business environments, information and performance management is an important competitive differentiator.”
The partnership has already resulted in a successful outcome with Yellowfin and Sybase IQ jointly implemented at Paymark, New Zealand’s leading payment transaction company. Transactional data and reports are now loaded and produced in real-time for Paymark’s executive team.
For Yellowfin’s Chief Executive Officer, Glen Rabie, the partnership with Sybase is testimony to its technology capabilities and business development goals.
“We have specifically focused on tailoring the Yellowfin solution for Sybase IQ to link an extremely fast analytics server to a BI solution that makes mass data deployment easy and cost-effective. Sybase retains the relationship with its corporate client base who now benefit from a more user friendly front-end interface whilst Yellowfin gains a much larger potential revenue pipeline with such a significant partner. This deal also confirms our belief that Yellowfin is worldclass product with enormous global potential,” Rabie said.
About Yellowfin
Yellowfin is an Australian Business Intelligence company whose BI solution can be easily integrated into any third party application or delivered as a stand alone enterprise platform. Yellowfin is an innovative and flexible 100% Web-based solution for reporting and analytics, providing a full range of data access, presentation and information delivery capabilities. www.yellowfin.bi
About Sybase
Sybase is the largest global enterprise software company exclusively focused on managing and mobilising information from the data centre to the point of action. Sybase provides open, cross-platform solutions that securely deliver information anytime, anywhere, enabling customers and partners to create an information edge. The world's most critical data in commerce, communications, finance, government and healthcare runs on Sybase. Sybase ANZ is headquartered in Sydney, with offices in Melbourne and Wellington, New Zealand. For more information visit www.sybase.com.au or www.sybase.co.nz.
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For media enquiries contact: Lucy Tildesley, Marketing Manager Sybase ANZ, 612 9936 8827 lucy.tildesley@sybase.com, or Isabel Wagner, LEWIS PR for Sybase, 612 9409 3100, isabelw@lewispr.com or Shuna Boyd, BoydPR, for Yellowfin 612 9418 8100, shuna@boydpr.com.au.
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Sybase is a registered trademark of Sybase, Inc. or its subsidiaries. All other company and product names mentioned may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.
Special Note: Statements concerning Sybase’s new business relationships and related products are by nature forward-looking statements that involve a number of uncertainties and risks and cannot be guaranteed. Factors that could cause actual events or results to differ materially include shifts in customer demand, rapid technological changes, availability and quality of third party products, competitive factors and unanticipated delays in scheduled product availability. Some of the risks are detailed from time to time in Sybase’s U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings, copies of which can be viewed on Sybase’s web site at www.sybase.com.
Posted by Justin Hewitt at 5:30 PM | Comments (0)
July 9, 2008
Yellowfin Business Intelligence R4.0 Announced to Industry
(CDT) Tue Jul 1, 2008 10:45am -- Announced today, the next release of Yellowfin Business Intelligence, 4.0 is scheduled for the end of July. Whilst most of the activity in the BI space has been busy with merger and acquisitions, Yellowfin has continued focussing its efforts to develop web Business Intelligence software that is not only an enjoyable user experience but also delivers insight through advanced data visualisation.
One of the key motivators for Yellowfin has been addressing the BI industry’s aura of complexity. Business Intelligence does not have to be complex, and Yellowfin is making it easy. In release 4.0 Yellowfin has turned its attention to Location Intelligence. Google has certainly made map-based querying a household concept, however, the application for Geographic Information Systems (GIS) within Business Intelligence is still one that is viewed as overly complex and too specialised for the average business user. Well, according to Justin Hewitt, Yellowfin's COO, with Yellowfin 4.0 it isn’t!
With map visualisation organisations can free themselves of the usual constraints of traditional charts and table concepts and explore data based on spatial elements. Yellowfin enables a variety of mapping visualisations to be utilised, either Google Maps, Heat Maps or fully enabled GIS data type rendering.
“With Yellowfin 4.0,” explains Hewitt, “we are able to take two mature technologies and combine them, creating a unique symbiosis that generates new ways to visualise data. Most importantly though, we have opened this rich functionality up to the casual business user who can now discover what value location-based reporting can bring to business decision making. You no longer have to be a GIS expert to gain location based insights.”
Yellowfin Business Intelligence has been creating a quiet revolution with its easy to use, web dedicated, embeddable Business Intelligence software. “Release 4.0 is a major release for us and is one that we are thrilled about,” says Hewitt. “Although there are a host of new functional elements a huge emphasis is to continue to improve the existing application. Whilst there is a tendency in the industry to cram a new release with additional bloat-ware, a large part of 4.0 has been focussed on improving existing functionality by altering the user interface. To this end we have completely redesigned the view builder using the latest in AJAX techniques to provide a truly ‘wow’ factor to what is generally perceived as a mundane task.”
This continued investment in the user interface is indicative of Yellowfin’s development philosophy. “We don't believe in technology that you have to read the manual to use. Our goal has always been to refine the user interface with a highly intuitive workflow so as to guide the user through what is traditionally seen as complex processes,” explains Hewitt, “Yellowfin release 4.0 is another leap forward for us and we are excited about the benefits that it will deliver to our customers, providing them with additional capability to explore, mine and visualise their data.”
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Posted by Justin Hewitt at 5:15 PM | Comments (0)
