Do GIS Companies Like ESRI Need BI In Their World?
Posted by Chris Ovens on Mon, Feb 23, 2009
I just wrapped up attending a two-day commercial summit that ESRI hosted for its current and potential business partners. The objective of the summit was to arm partners with the knowledge and capabilities to go after the for profit business sector. Makes perfect sense. The event was well put together and provided the attendees with ample potential opportunities in a myriad of directions.
As a "lowly BI guy" in the room, I had my head spinning as incredible geo-spatial capabilities were showcased that would provide invaluable information business insight across various industries. I think I'm starting to understand why GIS folks are so passionate about their solutions. However something was gnawing in the back of my mind; why would companies utilizing these capabilities need BI? Demo after demo, we were shown staggeringly powerful capabilities that delivered all the information anybody could ask for. Why was I in the room? Who in their right mind would want my crosstab - let alone my simple list...
But then in started to don on me; almost every demonstration started with the desktop power-tools. Jokes were made during presentations about "chained up GIS developer in the dungeon". Even when presenting the web-based server tools, the thrust of the presentation was on the analytical capabilities. There are a ton of potential buttons to press and levers to pull. I was starting to formulate a theory...
And then were uttered, in the final session of the final day of the summit, words that reinforced my growing suspicion; "it's all about getting this information beyond the analysts....". The thrust of point was not about leveraging BI solutions like IBM Cognos, but about building web application to present mapping capabilities.
Aha!!! I'll do you one better than your custom web apps. How about we deliver the spatial capabilities with the same vehicle used to disseminate the rest of your business information. What if we use the enterprise BI security model to control access to your maps. Maybe we augment the map with a layer or two based on the BI data. Heck, let's get the whole thing working together with interactive capabilities allowing the user to click on the map and affect the tabular view - or use the map or a report prompt control.
It's not the sexy side of the information game, but the key "so what?" about BI solutions for GIS capabilities could very well be the administration and dissemination capabilities. On the flip side, even a simple interactive map in a report gets your average BI guy into a tizzy - very sexy! This simple map also seems to cause disdain and scorn from GIS folks, "that's just dots on a map".
Fine by me, will focus on mapping capabilities for the "low brow" BI masses. We'll leave you to your power-tooled enable dungeons!