Analytics
News, events, thought leadership and more.
The 2014 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Core BI Platforms and the inaugural 2014 Advanced Analytics MQ have both recently been released. While it is always interesting to see how vendors land or shift in placement from year to year, this year's findings seem to point to something far more relevant than Alteryx being named as Visionaries on both. Don't get me wrong, we are really excited to be honored with the visionary placement on both MQ's, being the first to have ever been honored with this 'double visionary' designation. But there is something far more important happening here than where we landed – it is more important where you the customer can now land. That was the double take I had after reviewing the MQ's.
It seems pretty clear to me that the generational shift in enterprise computing that has been marching through software sectors like Grant taking Richmond, is now impacting what has arguably been referred to as the nirvana of business intelligence: predictive analytics or what I like to refer to as the power to know what to do next. The mere fact that there are now two MQ's, one for Core BI Platforms and one for Advanced Analytic Platforms, along with the handful of companies who made it on to both is a telltale sign of how much the market needs have changed, how the center of power has shifted from IT to the Line of Business, the laser focus enterprises have on advanced analytics and what is likely to result in the coming quarters. Here are some things I see happening in the market and how these thoughts seem to be reflected in the MQ's.
I am by nature a sales guy so I go on lots of meetings to hear about the challenges companies face in the pursuit of growth, improved profitability and hence industry leadership. In recent months, regardless of industry, there has been a universal theme resonating from these customer meetings. IT and business leaders are all seeking to 'modernize' their BI and analytic capabilities. I have never seen so many 'innovation' teams hell bent on altering the status quo. They do not want tuck in technologies from their incumbent providers, they cannot spend a ton of time in implementation or training and it cannot cost a bloody fortune. They also want more capabilities in fewer tools and they want them in the hands of people closer to the line of business. The mere fact that several data discovery, agile analytic and visualization vendors made it to the Core BI MQ, which has been traditionally dominated by the previous generation BI stack vendors, should be the first indication that the power center has shifted and 'modernity' is in full bloom. You should not be surprised to see 'modernity' and 'legacy' battle for the hearts and minds of business leaders though the lens of the Gartner Core BI MQ. One does not have to look past the massive disruption Salesforce.com caused in the CRM space to figure out the likely winners.
The second realization should be that this shift in the power center for BI and analytics has given incredible rise to the data analyst; the mere mortals in the line of business who are closer to where the questions are being asked. These are the real heroes of business. And no they are not generally PhD statisticians, and with modern tools they need not be. Contemporary questions in business (especially those involving Big Data) need contemporary software and this software need to be closer to the question, in the hands of analysts, if contemporary answers are to be the norm. Fundamentally I believe that in the 21st century, you should not have to write SQL statements, create Python scripts, perform V lookups or learn SAS code to get contemporary answers to business questions. Moreover, you should not have to sacrifice fidelity or quality of the answers in the process. Hence, enter the inaugural Advanced Analytics Platform MQ for 2014 – and only 5 vendors appear on both MQ's which is rather telling.
Let's face it, advanced analytics is at the top of the value chain of business intelligence. After all, knowing what happened carries far less importance than knowing what to do next. The advanced analytic platform players like Alteryx now have a clean line of demarcation from the traditional BI/analytic vendors allowing your 'modernization' efforts to move from hindsight to foresight.
Most research indicates that analytics is the #1 factor driving business performance today. So, if advanced analytics are at the top of your corporate initiative list, you can gain all of the fidelity and sophistication needed, but now available to analysts in the line of business. Imagine a single platform for data blending and advanced analytics…now imagine it in the hands of analysts who are able to drive deeper insights in minutes not hours. You can test drive modernity with the Alteryx Designer right now and when done, I suspect you will have the same double take we did.
You can download the two new Magic Quadrants here:
