WebFOCUS
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WebFOCUS is a business intelligence (BI) platform and the flagship product of Information Builders. (Through their iWay Software subsidiary, this New York-based company also makes software for system integration and Service-oriented architecture (SOA).) As a result of consolidation in the business intelligence industry, it is one of few remaining independent BI vendors.
Information Builders deployed WebFOCUS in 1996, making it the first major Web-based BI platform. (For example, Cognos Reportnet launched in the fall of 2003[1], and Business Objects introduced WebIntelligence in 1997.) From its first release, WebFOCUS used a purely Web-based architecture with no plug-ins.
Information Builders claims that WebFOCUS enables a different approach to BI, focusing on BI applications and embedded BI rather than tools. "BI tools – report design, ad hoc query, and OLAP tools – ...are not, however, what business users need.... BI applications...are much simpler to use than BI tools."[2] This mentality is encapsulated in the slogan "Everyone Makes Decisions".
To further this message, Information Builders claims that WebFOCUS "empowers the largest business intelligence deployments in the world...with deployments to millions of users"[3] and is "the most widely utilized BI platform".[4]
Gartner notes this difference in philosophy in its February 2008 Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Platforms[5], noting that Information Builders shows a consistent ability to execute "particularly in very large extranet applications, with a high number of 10,000-plus seat deployments" but cautioning that "Information Builders has been more successful at giving customers the ability to build analytic applications than it has at delivering end-user analysis tools."
In addition, WebFOCUS differs from its competitors through its use of iWay Software's integration middleware. The wholly owned subsidiary's technology "makes Information Builders' BI platform one of the best connected in the market, and much better suited to supporting operational reporting than most other vendors."[6]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ "Cognos Strengthens ReportNet Integration". http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Database/Cognos-Strengthens-ReportNet-Integration/. Retrieved on September 26 2008.
- ^ "Worst Practices In Business Intelligence". http://www.informationbuilders.com/cgi-shell/products/whitepaper/whitepaper_form.pl?Whitepaper_Code=WHTWorst. Retrieved on September 26 2008.
- ^ "Information Builders Responds to IBM's Acquisition of Cognos". http://www.informationbuilders.com/cgi-shell/press/intpr/f_intpr.pl?intpr_code=11_14_07_ibmcognos. Retrieved on September 26 2008.
- ^ "About Us". http://www.informationbuilders.com/about_us/index.html. Retrieved on September 26 2008.
- ^ "February 2008 Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Platforms". http://mediaproducts.gartner.com/reprints/microsoft/vol7/article3/article3.html. Retrieved on September 26 2008.
- ^ "February 2008 Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Platforms". http://mediaproducts.gartner.com/reprints/microsoft/vol7/article3/article3.html. Retrieved on September 26 2008.
