At Bentley Systems—a developer of CAD software for architects, engineering firms, and construction firms—we try to be as data-driven and analytical as possible. We employ a significant number of people with advanced degrees, particularly in engineering and development roles. They’re all analytically oriented and like every decision to be backed by solid information. About 10 years ago, we made a conscious decision to invest deeper into business intelligence (BI), and established an in-house BI team. Now, about two-thirds of our company uses analytics on a daily basis.
When we started, it was an exceptionally interesting time to be involved in analytics. We used a number of BI tools, including Cognos, SAP, and Microsoft tools. Being that we are an SAP shop for all of our enterprise software, we focused our initial analytics on SAP Business Warehouse (BW). These initial tools left a lot to be desired. In 2011, we decided to re-evaluate the market and embarked on a POC tour, quite literally engaging in a POC or evaluation with every major BI and analytics vendor in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant results.
by Jeff Richardson – Director of Business Intelligence at Bentley Systems