Microsoft Takes A Shot at the Business Intelligence Market

Although business intelligence (BI) touts itself as being able to provide analytics to the general user population within organizations, in most instances only a small portion of decision makers actually use BI tools and applications. Generally, applications are implemented in silos across an organization. In some cases, this means implementing various applications and vendor solutions based on the needs identified within individual departments. For example, an organization may implement a Cognos solution to manage its sales force performance, and a Hyperion solution because of its strong financial consolidation functionality within the finance department. As BI has changed to accommodate real-time data analysis, and to provide forward-looking business planning and strategies, the need to bring a single set of analytical tools to every decision maker across the organization has grown.

Enter Microsoft, with its release of Business Scorecard Manager (BSM) in November 2005. Microsoft's goal by adding BI to its platform is to bring BI to the small-to-medium (SMB) market, making it accessible to all decision makers across the organization. Additionally, Microsoft's recent acquisition of ProClarity and its recent announcement of next year's full release of PerformancePoint 2007, an integrated performance management suite, indicate that its focus now includes the BI market. Microsoft's low cost high-volume strategy, and its goal to make its BI and performance management suite as popular as e-mail, will help drive demand for BI in the broader market, and push towards the performance management concept of using software to help drive an organization's business goals.