IBM's Cognos Express hits the tracks with new BI solution

Peter Dinham
Tuesday, 15 September 2009 07:46

IT Industry - Market

And, one of the early users of the Cognos Express BI - Wendy’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers franchise in New Zealand – has deployed the solution in its 15 outlets across the country, and the company’s financial controller, James Irwine, said today that “in the quick-service hamburger business, our success depends heavily on understanding what our customers want, then tailoring our operations accordingly to keep them coming back again and again. This is only achievable if you have the right access to information and fast and efficient means of communicating goals to the fields.”

“IBM Cognos Express, with its deep analytics capabilities, is helping midsized companies like ours quickly glean daily sales, marketing and operations information and make the right business decisions to remain competitive.”

According to Neil Morgan, president of one IBM Business Partner, BrightStar Partners, IBM is the “first to truly deliver a solution that is right-sized in terms of both cost to purchase and cost to implement without sacrificing capabilities.

“IBM Cognos Express represents a terrific opportunity to help us provide our clients with a simple solution that will allow midmarket business executives and employees to make truly informed decisions based on data and not simply gut feel.”

IBM says its new solution, through its self-service environment, allows clients to easily build reports, analyses, dashboards and multi-dimensional plans on their own, “saving time and ensuring they remain responsive to competitive pressures.”

“Instead of waiting for the IT department to funnel reports that are often outdated by the time they are received,” IBM says “individual retail store managers can now immediately tap into Cognos Express to build their own daily store sales reports,” which Ben Plummer says “enables them to forecast sales against corporate objectives, and adjust promotions and inventory levels accordingly. This immediate access to critical business information better positions them to maximise revenues and stay one step ahead of their competitors.”

According to IBM, the solution also comes with an in-memory analytics server that allows clients to centrally manage data, business rules, and calculations, and by ensuring business information is accurate and consistent across an organisation, its Cognos Express solution gives midmarket managers the confidence to focus their efforts on managing the business, instead of questioning the data.

Built on an open platform, IBM says its Cognos Express portfolio includes three products that can be purchased together or individually to meet a specific need.