BI In The Cloud? Yes, And On The Ground, Too

Slowly but surely, with lots of criticism and skepticism, the business intelligence (BI) software-as-a-service (SaaS) market is gaining ground. It's a road full of peril — at least two BI SaaS startups have failed this year — but what software market segment has not seen its share of failures? Although Forrester does not see a stampede to replace traditional BI applications with SaaS alternatives in the near future, BI SaaS does have a few legitimate use cases even today, such as complementary BI, in coexistence with traditional BI, BI workspaces, and BI for small and some midsize businesses. Forrester provides business process and applications (BP&A) and information and knowledge management (I&KM) pros with a structured approach to analyze the current cloud BI SaaS offerings and match them to the business requirements. Finally, best practices will help to define the right BI architecture and get the most out of traditional tools and a cloud subscription as a combination or as an alternative to traditional BI software.