Newsletter - November 2007
IBM acquires Cognos acquires Applix
Last week in a much anticipated move, IBM announced that it will acquire Cognos for $5 billion. This news comes only weeks after Cognos completed their acquisition of Applix. Until the acquisition is completed (expected in Q1 2008), we will have to wait to see what IBM plans for the acquired Cognos & Applix technology portfolio. IBM now has a number of different products in its BI portfolio. DB2 OLAP (from its AlphaBlox acquisition), Cognos PowerPlay, Cognos Now! (from Celequest), Cognos Planning (from Adaytum) and TM1 (from Applix). IBM also has a strong partnership with Business Objects (recently acquired by SAP). In October IBM announced an agreement bundling Business Objects’ BI technology with its IBM DB2 and IBM DB2 Warehouse. Every software acquisition involves a significant amount of inward focus. As with acquisitions of this nature, the vendor faces a significant (in this case enormous) task to determine what to do first. We would anticipate that IBM will support all of their acquired technologies into the future but which product(s) will be considered strategic remains to be seen. We will be monitoring the progress and developments closely over the next couple of months. Current expectations are that the Cognos (incorporating Applix) will run as a separate business unit within IBM. Users of TM1 need to be satisfied that the application will remain strategic to IBM, that the long run return on investment remains very positive and that they can continue to access the support they need to run their applications successfully. We believe these to be secure. As the largest and longest standing partner in Australia, in this time of flux at the vendor level, SPF’s firm commitment to support the success of all of its TM1 clients remains unchanged. We are always available to discuss these or any other strategic issues you may have. In-Cell Charting for Visual AnalyticsNew from Calumo Labs - CALUMO In-Cell Charting (aka Sparklines) presents data in an intensely meaningful way, by combining charts and data together in a table. These micro charts provide Line, Axis, Bar, Bullet, Grid, Strip & Arrow charts in a single spreadsheet cell.
Imagine the application of these in business, where a single page transforms and concentrates large amounts of corporate data into a dashboard of KPI's for rapid and effective review and fast comprehension. Click on this link to read more about the sparkline example above. TM1 Server Capacity Planning GuidelinesFor anyone managing TM1 Applications, did you know?
About Improving Performance @ Newcrest MiningAt the TM1 User Conference last week we were proud to stand beside our client Newcrest Mining Ltd as they presented their case study titled “Improving Performance through effective business and IT collaboration”. Newcrest's BI and performance management project was a major IT project by any measure and we’ve been working with Newcrest throughout the process. Armand Mizan, from Newcrest Mining, provided insights on their achievements including overcoming significant corporate disbelief and bringing the project in on-time, budget and scope. Armand spoke passionately about choosing SPF Asia Pacific as their TM1 Partner and the importance of extensive qualifications and a highly professional team to the success of the project. Please click the link to view or download the Newcrest presentation. Executive Dashboards & Presentation-class ReportsJust for fun we re-created the AFL ladder using CALUMO to illustrate two of our business intelligent in-cell charts. For example this bar chart Click here to see the AFL Dashboard and read more about how CALUMO sparklines provide an intelligent visual way of presenting large amounts of meaningful data for identifying trends, comparing data and highlighting exceptions. Exception Reporting at CPA CongressAt the CPA Congress in Sydney on 24 October 2007, we were invited to present "Exception Reporting - Extracting the Opportunities from a Data Rich Environment". This presentation provided insights on why business intelligence applications are top priority for CIO's in 2007 (per Gartner) and included current trends in exception reporting with examples of dashboard gauges, alerting & conditional formatting. Please click the link to view or download the complete Exception Reporting presentation. TM1 Design PracticesBrenden Russell is our Professional Services Director, and he is always delighted to talk about helping with your TM1. Contact Brenden on 02 8904 9000 or email at brussell@spfplus.com SPF Professional Services brings a wealth of knowledge and excellence in TM1 to any project. From initial design, to skills transfer, training, support, maintenance, even “TM1 Best Practice” workshops. We are able to draw from a deep pool of more than 30 experienced consultants including vertical industry applications such financial services, mining, infrastructure, professional services, manufacturing, telco, energy, pharma, property, local government, retail and hospitality. No matter how complex an assignment gets, you can always break the issues down into simpler building blocks and apply the three core design principles until we find a suitable solution. The three core design principles are:
The broad objectives are straightforward. The skill comes in satisfying these competing objectives effectively to ensure a successful project outcome within the constraints of time and budget. These three principles are often in conflict with one another. For example, providing certain functionality in particular ways will have an impact on performance. How do you design for future requirements, when often initial requirements aren’t even clear? It’s at times like these when it is a huge comfort to rely on a consulting team that has done it many times before.
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represents the visual win/loss fate of Collingwood over 22 rounds of the AFL season.