IBM launches new software to break down data silos

IBM has announced a new software designed to assist enterprises in breaking down data and analytics silos and hence allow businesses in making data-driven decisions faster. 

The company said that IBM Business Analytics Enterprise, as it is called, is a suite of business intelligence planning, budgeting, reporting, forecasting, and dashboard capabilities intended to provide users with a full view of data sources across their entire business. 

The suite also offers customers a new IBM Analytics Content Hub to help improve how users discover and access analytics as well as planning tools from multiple vendors in one dashboard view. 

It is designed to allow users to view planning and analytics dashboards from several vendors. This includes tools such as IBM Cognos Analytics with Watson and IBM Planning Analytics with Watson, among others. 

In addition, the content hub includes algorithms that can recommend role-based content in order to help users’ create new stories, reports, and dashboards from across the organisation to help with decision-making, the company said in a statement.  

In other words, with this announcement, IBM Cognos Analytics with Watson also now offers new integration capabilities as well as enhanced forecasting to enable users to take multiple factors and seasons into account in their trend predictions. 

Lastly, IBM Planning Analytics with Watson is also expected to be available as-a-service on Amazon Web Services (AWS) later this year. 

Dinesh Normal, general manager of data, AI and automation at IBM said that the new suite of product “offers a way to bring together analytics tools in a single view, regardless of which vendor it comes from or where the data resides”. 

According to an August 2022 Forrester report, organisations that are ‘insights’ or ‘data-driven’ are 1.6x more likely to report using data, analytics, and insights to create experiences, products, and services that differentiate them within the market when compared to those who do not use these tools.  

However, Boris Evelson, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester, noted that most companies continue to face a highly dynamic operating environment where they must navigate unpredictable events such as supply chain disruptions, labour and skills shortages, evolving regulations, and more. The complexity of storing data across disparate silos can make this more challenging as teams collaborate across different analytics and business intelligence tools.  

“To become data-driven, businesses can differentiate themselves by creating an enterprise-wide strategy that enables them to bring together their tools and put insights into the hands of decision makers,” he said.