Business Objects Outlines Revamped Product Road Map

Computerworld - MIAMI BEACH—Business intelligence software vendor Business Objects Americas Inc. last week unveiled long-term plans to enhance the collaborative nature of its software and to enable users to more easily align it with their business goals.

At the San Jose-based company's international user conference here, executives outlined a new architecture called Sundance that's designed to create reusable, rules-based business intelligence processes. In a keynote speech, CEO Bernard Liautaud explained that Sundance will capture best practices and embed them within the business intelligence applications. Users will access Sundance through a role-based dashboard interface; groups of users will be able to insert messages in the portal screens to facilitate collaboration.

Sundance is also designed to measure performance goals, such as sales or marketing targets, and generate reports and alerts to help users monitor their status. If an unexpected event, such as a major drop in sales, interferes with reaching the goal, an alert is triggered. The system then gives the appropriate person multiple recommendations of what to do.

"You get to a situation and there will be three to five next steps [offered] to handle the problem," said Dave Kellogg, senior group vice president of worldwide marketing at Business Objects. The Sundance architecture isn't ready for commercial deployment; Kellogg said more details will be announced before the end of the fourth quarter.

User Reaction

Some users at the show expressed cautious interest in Sundance. Etoi Moore, an IT consultant at the Florida Lottery in Tallahassee, said she's interested in beta-testing Sundance because of the way it builds in workflow for process control and improvement, which would lessen the need for customization. The Florida Lottery has deployed Business Objects WebIntelligence thin-client analytical software to 40 users.

David Rewerts, IT system analyst at Principal Financial Group, said the concept is interesting, but it might be best suited to small and midsize businesses. In large corporations, the groups trying to collaborate might prove to be too large, and the process could become cumbersome, he said. Principal, a financial services company in Des Moines, Iowa, uses WebIntelligence 2.6.3.

Business Objects also provided some details on the next generation of its thin-client WebIntelligence product, dubbed Tosca. Among the new features will be beefed-up reporting and analysis capabilities and a portal that users can more easily customize, company officials said.

The product will go into beta testing this week and will be generally available by the middle of next year.

NEW PRODUCTS

Business Objects Last week the company said it will release the following tools: A collaborative, rules-based business intelligence architecture called Sundance. A workforce analytics module geared toward helping human resources managers with employee hiring, retention and training. It's available now. The next generation of its WebIntelligence thin-client application, with enhancements that include a more customizable portal. It will go into beta testing this week.