When BI started being industrialized in the 90s, it was largely considered an IT topic as it required fundamental technical expertise. As such, centralizing competence to provide stable service was the obvious move to make. By centralizing competence and standardizing tools, cost advantages were expected. What was lost along the way was the flexibility businesses required to freely analyze and visualize data in new ways that are fit for quick decision-making.
This brought about the rise of shadow BI, which was initially powered almost exclusively by Excel. Change came a decade later with the advent of user-friendly self-service BI and visualization tools. Early resistance was largely overcome when these tools were embraced as an opportunity to eradicate the bottlenecks created by cost-oriented BICCs. Unfortunately, a general lack of governing capabilities, originally perceived as guarantors of flexibility, and the dissemination of analytics into all corners of modern companies overstrained the approach.
To overcome the defects of earlier generations of analytics and BI software, vertically integrated data and analytics software couples the flexibility required for quick insights with governance features for scaling decentralized self-service and blending it with central delivery. This technology has been available for some time now and has penetrated many areas. Various developments over time have combined to makde them the powerhouses of companies successfully deploying analytics to unearth the value of their data treasures.
