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IDC: Third Wave of Business Analytics on the Brink of Delivering Pervasiveness and Predictability

09 Apr 2010 - Auckland, New Zealand and Sydney, Australia. Research from International Data Corporation (IDC) reveals that the competitive value of business analytics (a set of technologies and processes that encompasses data warehousing, Business Intelligence tools, and advanced analytics) is increasingly being recognised amongst Australian and New Zealand organisations.

CIOs, with a point to prove in terms of delivering quick ROI and value to their businesses, are considering investments in this area to help address some of the challenges that they face while operating in today’s uncertain economic environment.

“Organisations across A/NZ have spent a lot of time and money on capturing, storing and managing data. Moving forward, these companies need to start developing this data into meaningful 'intelligence' by offering it to a broader spectrum of users, as well as leveraging forward-looking predictive analytics to drive competitive advantage in their respective market,” said Ullrich Loeffler, Country Manager, IDC New Zealand.

According to IDC, the move of Business Analytics into broader mainstream adoption can be attributed to three key drivers:

• Business intelligence has become more pervasive. The performance, availability, and user interfaces of BI solutions in the market have improved significantly over the years. This enables deployment of decision support and automation functionality to a broader spectrum of users. In turn, it has raised the visibility of BI across various departments and most importantly, at the boardroom level, which has helped to break down the “information silos” that tend to persist in organisations moving down this path.
• The CFO's office has been one of the key stakeholders in the evolution of Business Analytics. The finance department is starting to see the benefits of budgeting and planning tools as part of a broader performance management framework to drive operational efficiency throughout the organisation.
• More advanced and sophisticated forms of analytics solutions such as risk management, resource optimisation, and demand forecasting are actively being implemented by certain organisations in the region. Some of these deployments are embedding components of the analytical functionality into operational applications in what IDC sees as early signs of a shift towards its vision of Intelligent Process Automation – enabling front-office employees with better decision-making power to direct increase revenue and cut costs.

IDC research identified a set of six specific indicators that define the level of pervasiveness within an organisation, enabling it to benchmark itself against its peers and competitors. The research further discovered five key factors as having the strongest influence on achieving BI pervasiveness including degree of training, design quality, prominence of governance, prominence of performance management methodology and non-executive involvement.

These indicators, factors and more will be addressed at IDC's ANZ Business Analytics for 'Fact-based' Decision Making 2010 conference. The event will be held in Auckland on Tuesday, 13th April 2010 and Sydney on Tuesday 20th April. See www.idc.com.au or www.idc.com/nz for more information.