Today through Wednesday, Spotfire will be at the Gartner BI Summit in Los Angeles. You can follow the event on Twitter with the hashtag #GartnerBI.
In the past two weeks, Gartner reported that business intelligence and data analytics software spending was up 13.4% to US $10.5 billion. This major increase in spending “reflects the BI market’s continued strength throughout the world’s economic downturn, as customers looked to such software to find efficiencies and gain competitive advantages,” writes Chris Kanaracus from International Data Group’s News Service.
Even during the recession when enterprise technology spending dropped nearly 3 percent, BI sales grew “in the low single digits,” Gartner analyst Dan Sommer told Kanaracus.
Four Elements Behind BI Growth
What made BI a standout in regard to positive growth versus negative growth? It appears (from Kanaracus’ report) that four elements were at play:
- Existing users upgrading or adding licenses
- New product releases from major vendors
- A push in the industry to get BI data into the hands of more users
- A drive toward more BI data in the field on portable devices
We’re very interested in how the last two elements have played out and will continue to play out because they have been the focus of the Spotfire product direction in the last year.
Major Industry Drivers: Mobile & Self-Service BI
Mobile and self-service BI are two of the topics in the industry (on Twitter and with analysts) right now. And for good reason. Tablet vendors including Apple and Android are rushing to market with what Forrester Research vice president and principal analyst on collaborative technologies Ted Schadler calls “redefined expectations of what a computer should be.”
Kanaracus’ report mentions a study from Schadler’s team that estimates more than half of the 15 million iPads on the market are being brought to work. The reason? These devices give users portability, instant access to data in a very simple to use format.
In addition, BI vendors are looking to extend BI to more users without the help of IT staff, writes Kanaracus.
If you look at the Spotfire product direction for the past year, you’ll see this trend is right in line with our strategy. For example, last year we released both our iPad app and our intuitive SaaS offering, TIBCOSilver Spotfire. Both offerings put information and tools in the hands of end users.
Stay tuned to the Spotfire blog as we bring you insights and best practices from the Gartner BI Summit this week.
Amanda Brandon
Spotfire Blogging Team
