Breaking Through SME BI Barriers
By Sam Sliman, President, Optimal Solutions Integration
Throughout the ‘90s and late ‘80s, large companies (1,000+ employees) were the predominant buyers of BI and analytics solutions. This is no longer the case. While big businesses continue to represent the majority of BI spending, over the past few years a growing percentage of small and midsize enterprises (SMEs) are embracing BI and analytics -- providing additional fuel to an already sizzling BI market that Gartner predicts will reach $10.8 billion globally in 2011, a 9.7 percent increase over 2010.
SMEs Picking up BI Steam
A survey conducted in June of 2010 by the SMB Group found that for the ensuing 12 months 38 percent of companies with 100 to 249 employees had plans to purchase BI, as did 67 percent of companies with 250 to 499 employees, and 46 percent of companies with 500 to 1,000 employees. According to an IBM report published in June of this year, 83 percent of midmarket CIOs cite BI and analytics as their top IT investment priority.
Forrester also reports an upswing in BI adoption among SMEs, with 21 percent of respondents to a March 2010 survey having already deployed BI, 22 percent of survey respondents planning to expand or upgrade their BI initiatives, and 18 percent of survey respondents planning to implement BI within 12 months.
To get a handle on what’s driving this spike in BI adoption among SMEs, it’s helpful to take a look at the top SME BI barriers, and how SAP’s latest releases of its flagship BI products for SMEs -- Crystal Server 2011(formerly Crystal Reports Server) and BusinessObjects Edge Business Intelligence 4.0 -- break through these barriers.
Breaking Through SME BI Barrier: Cost
Pricing for Crystal Server 2011 and BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 is very palatable for SMEs. Crystal Server 2011 starts at $2,495 for five named user licenses (NUL) and $6,995 for 5 concurrent access licenses (CAL), with an upper limit of 100 NUL or 250 CAL. BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 starts at $12,000 for 10 NUL and $19,000 for five CAL, with a maximum of 250 NUL or a combination of 50 CAL and 50 NUL.
It is important to note that while priced lower than their large enterprise versions, Crystal Server 2011 and BOBJ Edge BI 4.0, which can be purchased bundled or separately, are in no way dumbed down BI solutions. They support 64-bit architecture, providing ample memory access and data processing power; feature the same core functionality as SAP’s BI products for large enterprises; and benefit equally from SAP’s recent, comprehensive upgrade of its BusinessObjects BI platform.
SAP also offers an on-demand version of its BusinessObjects BI solutions, sparing SME customers who prefer a pay-as-you-go model the cost of buying servers, funding an implementation project, and budgeting for ongoing maintenance and support. SAP currently has more than 200,000 subscribers to its on-demand BI service.
Breaking Through SME BI Barrier: Complexity
Early BI solutions targeted large organizations with sprawling IT infrastructures, numerous applications and growing mountains of data -- both structured and unstructured. These early-stage BI implementations were notoriously complex, costly and all too often delivered dubious, or at least difficult to measure, business value.
Despite significant maturation of BI solutions, greatly improved BI implementation methodologies, effective BI (and data) governance models, as well as a substantial and growing library of well documented BI success stories, the perception of BI as complex, expensive and resource intensive lingers among many execs.
According to an Aberdeen study conducted in April of 2010, 40 percent of execs perceive BI implementations a being “long and complex,” and nearly 40 percent cite a “lack of IT resources/bandwidth” as a reason for their inefficient use of BI. Exacerbating the BI necessity/complexity conundrum, 81 percent of respondents to a TDWI survey conducted in July of 2010 reported that their BI group is being tasked to “do more with less” as a consequence of recent economic turbulence.
SMEs face many of the same business challenges as large organizations -- fierce competition, dynamic markets, demanding customers, etc., but they generally cannot match the resources -- money, infrastructure, expertise, staff -- that their big brethren bring to BI implementations.
According to a recent insiderResearch report, technical complexity -- particularly complex integration with multiple applications and data warehouses -- ranks as the number one BI implementation challenge.
The new Business Intelligence Consumer Services (BICS) layer introduced as part of the SAP’s BusinessObjects BI 4.0 upgrade makes it significantly easier to integrate front-end Crystal Server 2011 and BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 tools and back-end transactional applications and data warehouses.
Also reducing complexity, a common semantic layer provides a single point of entry for reporting and analytics across all BI clients; combines multiple data sources into a single, logical view; and standardizes meta-data definitions.
But what is arguably SAP’s most notable move to reduce BI complexity for SMEs is the company’s strategy of letting channel partners spearhead selling and delivering Crystal Server 2011 and BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 to SMEs.
Leveraging deep industry and BI-solution expertise, preconfigured application templates and predefined dashboard views, SAP partners with demonstrable BI experience can complete controlled-scope BI implementations in as few as 12 weeks.
SAP partners currently account for 85 percent of all BI sales to SMEs. SAP’s stated goal is for partners to drive 100 percent of Crystal Server 2011 and BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 sales by 2013, or sooner.
Breaking Through SME BI Barrier: Ease of Use
Gartner reports that ‘ease of use’ is surpassing ‘functionality’ as the dominant criterion when deciding on a BI platform purchase.
Crystal Server 2011 is designed as a self-service BI reporting tool that can be easily used for flexible, ad hoc query reporting and analysis by non-techies such as sales, marketing and other employees that typically lack experience with BI solutions.
With its embedded BusinessObjects Explorer data discovery tool and an intuitive interface featuring drag-and-drop functionality, Crystal Server 2011 makes it fast and easy for virtually any business user -- regardless of technical ability -- to find and interact with data in a way that helps inform an immediate and correct business decision.
BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 ties together multiple data sources and key metrics in concise, simple-to-understand dashboards that leverage compelling and effective data visualization to provide end users with accurate, at-a-glance insight for role-specific reporting, planning and forecasting.
Built-in Event Insight functionality allows SMEs to easily monitor business scenarios in real time, and text data analysis lets SMEs keep in touch with what customers are saying about their products across popular social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.
In addition, BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 supports mobile devices, which no doubt will spur further adoption and use among SMEs.
Breaking Through SME BI Barrier: By the Numbers
SMEs are responsible for nearly 65 percent of the global GDP, represent more than 90 percent of all businesses, and employ over 90 percent of the world's workforce.
Approximately 80 percent of SAP’s 105,000 customers are SMEs, and on average, 22 new SME customers buy SAP software every day.
SAP is a well-established leader in BI, commanding nearly a quarter of the global BI market.
SAP’s goal is to have one billion workers using its software by 2014.
SAP’s latest releases of Crystal Server 2011 and BOBJ Edge BI 4.0 make it crystal clear that breaking through barriers and extending cutting-edge, affordable, easy-to-use BI and analytics to SMEs is a key component of the company's strategy for achieving its goal of one billion end users.
