The Dozen 2004Microsoft Corp.Redmond, Wash.They're coming. You can ascribe the BI industry consolidation to a number of important factors, but Microsoft's growing presence cannot be ignored. Microsoft has been beta testing SQL Server Reporting Services and expects to release the first version of the product in early 2004, joining other elements of the "Yukon" SQL Server rollout. Just as the entry of Analysis Services shook up the OLAP server market, Reporting Services is sending competitors scurrying. Of course, it's not just Reporting Services itself that is reshaping things; Microsoft's BI thrust is merely a facet of a larger platform upon which the company is endeavoring to integrate portals, visualization, project management, and various specialized forms of analysis. Also key to the success of Reporting Services is Visual Studio.Net, within which users can customize BI implementations with help from a services-based architecture. However, as if BI, performance management, and sophisticated analysis didn't themselves take some explaining, Microsoft could face challenges in not encumbering business users with having to know too much about its evolving software universe. Nonetheless, if Microsoft can keep its mind on the matter amid all the distractions of antitrust cases, hacker attacks, spam deluges, and open source competition, the company's efforts will open the door for an enormous range of business enterprises to prosper from intelligence.
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