Mark Smith's Analyst Perspectives

Datawatch Bolsters Data Preparation for all Information Assets

Posted by Mark Smith on Dec 10, 2015 10:26:30 PM

The need for businesses to process and analyze data has grown in intensity along with the volumes of data they are amassing. Our benchmark research consistently shows that preparing data is the most widespread impediment to analytic and operational efficiency. In our recent research on data and analytics in the cloud, more than half (55%) of organizations said that preparing data for analysis is a major impediment, followed by other preparatory tasks: reviewing data for quality and consistency (48%) and waiting for data and information (28%). Organizations that want to apply analytics to make more effective decisions and take prompt actions need to find ways to shorten the work that comes before it. Conventional analytics and business intelligence tools are not designed for data preparation, but new software tools can enable business users independently or in concert with IT to perform the tasks needed.

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Topics: Big Data, Human Capital, Marketing, Monarch, Operational Performance Management (OPM), Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Data Preparation, Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC), Uncategorized, Business Performance Management (BPM), Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Management (IM), Information Optimization, Sales Performance Management (SPM), Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM)

Big Data Research Agenda and Trends are Bolder in 2015

Posted by Mark Smith on Feb 7, 2015 9:46:10 PM

Big data has become a big deal as the technology industry has invested tens of billions of dollars to create the next generation of databases and data processing. After the accompanying flood of new categories and marketing terminology from vendors, most in the IT community are now beginning to understand the potential of big data. Ventana Research thoroughly covered the evolving state of the big data and information optimization sector in 2014 and will continue this research in 2015 and beyond. As it progresses the importance of making big data systems interoperate with existing enterprise and information architecture along with digital transformation strategiesbecomes critical. Done properly companies can take advantage of big data innovations to optimize their established business processes and execute new business strategies. But just deploying big data and applying analytics to understand it is just the beginning. Innovative organizations must go beyond the usual exploratory and root-cause analyses through applied analytic discovery and other techniques. This of course requires them to develop competencies in information management for big data.

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Topics: Big Data, MapR, Predictive Analytics, SAP, Human Capital, Mulesoft, Operational Performance Management (OPM), Paxata, SnapLogic, Splunk, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Cloud Computing, Cloudera, Hortonworks, IBM, Informatica, Information Management, Operational Intelligence, Oracle, Business Performance Management (BPM), Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Dell Boomi, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Management (IM), Information Optimization, Sales Performance Management (SPM), Savi, Sumo Logic, Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM), Tamr, Trifacta, Strata+Hadoop

Ventana Research Technology Innovation Awards Are More Than Cool

Posted by Mark Smith on Aug 31, 2013 1:33:58 AM

In the realm of technology that matters for business and IT, our firm as part of our responsibility continually assesses the latest technology and how it can impact organizations’ efficiency and effectiveness. Our benchmark research in technology innovation found that 87% of participants indicated the importance of increasing the organization’s value through technology innovation. Every year we take our knowledge from research and technology briefings to focus on our Technology Innovation Awards and determine the vendors and products that have the potential to drive change in the market, the competitiveness of an organization’s business and sometimes just how efficiently a company operates. Our firm believes that Innovation can come from any size technology vendor from the smallest to the largest that are measured on a spectrum of attributes that contribute to the specific impact of the technology.

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Topics: Big Data, Datameer, Mobile, Sales, Social Media, Sustainability, Customer, ESRI, Globoforce, GRC, HCM, Kronos, Kyriba, Location Analytics, Marketing, NetBase, Office of Finance, Operational Performance Management (OPM), Overall Operational Leadership, Peoplefluent, Planview, SQLstream, VMWare, VPI, IT Analytics & Performance, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Intelligence, Business Mobility, CIO, Cloud Computing, Collaboration, Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC), Hortonworks, IBM, Informatica, Information Builders, Information Management, Information Technology, KXEN, Location Intelligence, Operational Intelligence, Oracle, Business Performance Management (BPM), Contact Center, Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Financial Management, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Applications (IA), Information Management (IM), Information Optimization, IT Performance Management (ITPM), Johnson Controls Panoptix, Roambi, Sales Performance Management (SPM), Service & Supply Chain, Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM), Upstream Works, Vertex, Workforce Performance Management (WPM), Xactly

Datawatch Acquires Panopticon for Big Data Discovery and Visualization across Business Processes

Posted by Mark Smith on Jun 20, 2013 9:31:17 AM

Business analytics can help organizations use data to find insights that lead to new opportunities and address issues unrecognized before. One player in this market is Datawatch, known for its tools for information optimization and harvesting value from big data including content and documents. I assessed the company earlier this year, and recently our firm recognized its customers’ achievements with 2013 Ventana Research Leadership Awards for Information Optimization with Phelps County Regional Medical Center and Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) with The Fauquier Bank.

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Topics: Big Data, SAP, GRC, Office of Finance, Operational Performance Management (OPM), Panopticon, Analytics, Business Intelligence, Information Management, Operational Intelligence, Business Performance Management (BPM), CEP, Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Discovery, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Applications (IA), Information Management (IM), Information Optimization, Sales Performance Management (SPM), SAP HANA, Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM)

Datawatch Enables a New Generation of Information Optimization

Posted by Mark Smith on Apr 5, 2013 11:42:57 AM

When organizations need to optimize their business processes and improve operations and decisions, the often speak of having the right information at the right time, but don’t always make that a priority. This information optimization is often thought to be expensive and time-consuming, especially with advent of big data and disparate data sources across cloud and on-premises environments, as I have articulated. Datawatch can help business get to information of any variety or volume at any time through its access and integration tools. When I published my last analysis of Datawatch, it had made significant advancements in its platform, with enterprise-class reliability and support for business analytics through its data discovery and virtualization processes. Over the last year Datawatch continued to grow its business worldwide, and through investments into its marketing, sales and product efforts is finding more potential from existing and new customers. The company’s energized product efforts earned it our 2012 Technology Innovation Award for Information Applications for its Information Optimization Suite.

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Topics: Big Data, MapR, QlikView, Cloud Computing, Information Management, Uncategorized, Datawatch, Information Optimization

A Decade of Research at Ventana Research

Posted by Mark Smith on Nov 16, 2012 1:47:44 PM

I’m happy to say that Ventana Research celebrated its tenth anniversary at our recent Business Technology Innovation Summit in San Jose at the Tech Museum. This location was fitting, since at the event we introduced and presented our first-ever Technology Innovation Awards and seventh annual Leadership Awards. If you did not get a chance to attend, we have the live webstream available for replay at no cost; thanks to Splunk for sponsoring this to let everyone enjoy the sessions.

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Topics: Big Data, SAP, Social Media, Operational Performance Management (OPM), Peoplefluent, Planview, Research, Splunk, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Intelligence, Business Mobility, CIO, Cloud Computing, IBM, Location Intelligence, Operational Intelligence, Business Performance Management (BPM), Ceridian, CFO, CMO, COO, Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Applications (IA), Information Management (IM), IT Performance Management (ITPM), Saba, Sales Performance Management (SPM), Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM), Technology, Workforce Performance Management (WPM)

Datawatch Enables Business Analytics through Data Discovery and Virtualization

Posted by Mark Smith on Apr 30, 2012 1:34:00 PM

Thanks to Datawatch, businesses may find themselves buying and deploying fewer new business analytics and business intelligence tools. As I noted in my analysis last year, the company’s new management has begun to transition it to a more appealing market position in which it helps enterprises use analytics to improve operational efficiency and decision-making. The Datawatch products focus on data virtualization – that is, accessing data from multiple sources not usually seen as accessible for analysis, such as reports and documents in Adobe Acrobat format, production systems, streams coming from cloud computing or print output, or even legacy systems. The value of this lies in reducing the time it takes to access such data and integrate it with other data to create enriched information and analytics.

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Topics: Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Business Technology, CIO, Cloud Computing, Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC), Information Applications, Information Management, Information Technology, Business Performance Management (BPM), Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Applications (IA), Information Management (IM), IT Performance Management (ITPM), Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM)

Datawatch Offers Shorter Path from Data to Information

Posted by Mark Smith on Apr 21, 2011 10:45:55 PM

Turning data into information for taking actions and making decisions has bedeviled businesses throughout the computer age. Many organizations have data in dozens of applications and legacy systems along with many reports in various business intelligence systems. The challenge is to get data from each of the reports and assemble it into contextualized views of information for particular business needs. In our benchmark research on what we call information applications, only 11 percent of organizations said they are satisfied with their existing efforts to do this; more than half of organizations see the current process as too slow and not adaptable to the changes that necessarily occur in assembling actionable information.

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Topics: Operational Performance Management (OPM), Reporting, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Cloud Computing, Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC), Information Applications, Business Performance Management (BPM), Customer Performance Management (CPM), Datawatch, Document Management, Financial Performance Management (FPM), Information Applications (IA), Information Management (IM), IT Performance Management (ITPM), Sales Performance Management (SPM), Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM)