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IBM Cognos 10 – moving beyond traditional BI
Tuesday, October 26, 2010 by Helena Schwenk
Yesterday IBM finally took the wrappers off Cognos 10 during the company’s Information-on- Demand event in Las Vegas. This is an important release for the company as it demonstrates IBM’s on-going commitment to Business Analytics and the Cognos brand. In particular it builds on the success of the company’s existing BI and PM offering whilst incorporating a broader range of functionality from other aspects of the IBM software portfolio to widen the audience appeal.
Cognos 10 is a multi-version release
Before delving into the details of the release it’s worth explaining a little about the scope and naming conventions used. IBM Cognos 10 isn’t a new BI platform release (in the same guise as Cognos 8) – instead it represents a series of major releases designed to focus on different capabilities of its expansive Business Analytics portfolio, and the first of these releases is IBM Cognos BI version 10.1. As an umbrella brand Cognos 10 represents a substantially broader, bigger and bolder release over previous incarnations of Cognos software.
Significantly 10.1 is IBM’s first major BI release since it acquired Cognos in 2007 and the first new generation of Cognos software since C8 was initially released in 2005. And if you’re wondering why the numbering jumps from eight to ten, then this is to keep alignment with Cognos TM1 (integrated within Cognos 10.1) which is currently in version nine.
Extending the scope of BI
This is a very important release for the company not least because it moves the Cognos software portfolio beyond its traditional BI and PM roots to incorporate a wider set of Business Analytics functionality including collaborative decision making, integrated statistics, and a deeper focus on real-time and mobile BI. In other words Cognos 10 is designed to allow organisations to not only analyse and report on information, but connect with people, deliver information to a wider range of mobile workers, monitor real-time information and incorporate predictive and what-if planning capabilities. To deliver on these aims IBM has deepened integration of the Cognos platform with other parts of the IBM portfolio including SPSS, WebSphere (Portal and BPM), Lotus (Connections and Mashup Center) InfoSphere (Metadata workbench and Business Glossary). All of which is underpinned by a service-oriented architecture (SOA) platform for centralised administration and management. The key highlights from the release can be summarised as follows:
- Redesigned user experience – IBM has introduced a common BI workspace called Business Insight that allows users to view, assemble and organise BI, analytic and planning content from a unified interface, without the need to switch between interfaces. The idea is to allow users to gradually increase functionality to more advanced features without having the disruption of changing tools.
- Closer focus on analytics– Cognos 10.1 now integrates the SPSS statistical engine within Cognos Report Studio, its report-authoring tool, allowing users to incorporate and consume statistical information within reports and dashboards. In addition the platform now integrates with SPSS Modeler allowing users to view predictive results in Cognos 10 or use data sourced from the platform within the SPSS modeling tool.
- Social networking features- by embedding Lotus Connections software and integrating with InfoSphere, Cognos 10 now supports capabilities such as adding annotations, creating communities, connecting people, and capturing the lineage and best practice of decision making.
- Expanding the reach of BI - Cognos 10.1 introduces ‘active’ reports allowing users to receive interactive reports via email without needing to install software. This supports the distribution and consumption of BI information to more users including mobile and offline workers. In addition the software supports real-time monitoring, akin to business activity monitoring, allowing managers to understand the current status of the business and analyse trends and patterns to determine the root cause of issues. Likewise 10.1 includes support for a broader range of mobile devices including Symbian, Blackberry, Windows Mobile and Apple iPhones and iPads.
- Platforms enhancements– IBM has implemented several new features to improve the IT administration and management of the platform. These include workflow-driven modelling, optimised query generation and enhanced lifecycle management that allows multiple versions of the Cognos platform to co-exist during an upgrade.
In summary the Cognos 10 release (and its subsequent take-up) will demonstrate IBM’s ability to successfully integrate Business Analytics and Information Management assets with Cognos technology whilst still maintaining the brand, essence and design principles of a flagship BI and PM platform. IBM will be keen to ensure its builds on its growth in BI and PM, (especially since Business Analytics revenue across both software and services groups was up 14% year-on-year for 3Q 2010). Part of its success can be attributed to IBM’s decision to keep the Cognos team intact after the acquisition, under the continuing leadership of Rob Ashe – now IBM’s General Manager of Business Analytics. Something we believe has helped maintain continuity and stability for customers, employees and partners alike.
We will be providing a more detailed analysis of the Cognos 10 release in an upcoming Vendor Insight report – so watch this space. For now if you have any questions or want to let me know what you think of the release drop me a line at helena@mwdadvisors.com.
Posted in Analytics, Information Management