SAS and Oracle emerge as BI market leaders

Its report, ‘Decision Matrix: Selecting a Business Intelligence Vendor’, says that although the market leaders are well placed to maintain their position, “the BI space is replete with others vendors that could challenge the current leaders.” And in what Datamonitor expects to be a market worth $7.9 billion globally by year-end 2012, the stakes are high. Nevertheless, SAS and Oracle emerge in its report as BI market leaders. “Based on their technology assessment, end user sentiment and market impact, SAS is the clear BI market leader,” says Datamonitor. “SAS offers a great portfolio of both basic and advanced functionality, backed up by a dependable support capability. Its stable financial footing, superb vision and lead in advanced analytics all imply SAS is well placed to continue as the BI market leader,” it adds. Datamonitor’s Decision Matrix is aimed at helping manufacturers to select software and service vendors based on their technology strength, reputation and impact in the market. The company says that its conclusions are based on a quantitative assessment of end-user sentiment, the capabilities of the business intelligence solutions on offer and technology features. “BI has been transformed from a specialist technology to a ubiquitous tool deployed at the operational frontline.” says Vuk Trifkoviæ, Datamonitor technology analyst and author of the study. “This puts a premium on vendors’ ability to provide a comprehensive solution that is able to serve a single version of a BI solution through a myriad of channels and to all levels of an organization.”