How is Business Intelligence evolving?

Over the last few years Business Intelligence (BI) has evolved dramatically and it continues to do so, as businesses are in constant search for new and innovative ways to gain insights from their big data. Thanks to the increased use of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning models businesses can analyse large amounts of data and uncover patterns and insights that may not be easily accessible or apparent through traditional methods.

Cloud computing and Internet of Things (IoT) allow organisations to analyse data from a wide range of sources, such as social media or other devices, while BI self-service helps businesses democratise data and empower them to make better decisions.

Trends in Business Intelligence

Let’s look at some specific examples of the latest trends in Business Intelligence.

Trend 1: Artificial Intelligence in BI

As organisations collect more data, they need more sophisticated tools to analyse and interpret it. Some of the ways AI is used in Business Intelligence include:

• natural language processing used to develop BI tools, allowing users to query data using natural language instead of complex SQL queries,
• predictive analytics methods used to develop predictive models that allow businesses anticipate trends and make better decisions,
• automated data preparation including data cleaning, normalisation and feature engineering which without AI are both time consuming and error-prone,
• data visualisation that helps users better understand complex data sets.

Trend 2: Collaborative & Integrative BI

Collaborative and integrative BI involves integrating data and insights from multiple sources and collaborating with various stakeholders to ensure insight are actionable and valuable.

Trend 3: Edge Computing

Edge Computing is a trend of processing data at the edge of the network, closer to where the data is generated, helping organisations to reduce latency and increase the speed of processing data.

Trend 4: Data Proactivity

Data proactivity is an attribute of BI software that easily incorporates company data and gives business insights faster.

Trend 5: Real-Time Business Intelligence

Real-time Business Intelligence involves using real-time data to quickly make decisions and take actions.

Trend 6: Headless BI

Headless BI is all about separating the presentation layer from the data and logic layers of BI applications, enabling businesses to use data and insights in apps and devices. It also means a variety of technical improvements making the data more accessible, safe and easier to model.

Trend 7: Data Governance

Data governance means establishing policies, procedures, and standards for managing data quality, privacy, and security. Due to the growing privacy issues around LLMs the industry and legal bodies are becoming more attentive on how companies handle data, making data governance more important than ever.

Trend 8: Cloud-based BI

Cloud-based BI tools offer flexible deployment options, easy integration with other cloud-based services and the ability to handle large amounts of data.

Trend 9: Data Quality Management

Data quality management means making sure data is accurate, consistent and reliable – an aspect that is crucially important in times when data becomes more central to business operations than ever before.

What impact does BI have on business users?

The impact of Business Intelligence on business users is significant as it provides them with actionable insights and enables them to make data-driven decisions, allowing for:

• faster decision making, by analysing data quickly,
• fast feedback meaning faster understanding of the company’s doings,
• improved accuracy thanks to accurate and reliable data BI provides them with,
• better collaboration among users by providing a single source of data,
• improved productivity, freeing up time to focus on strategy and high-level tasks,
• improved customer satisfaction by giving insights on customers’ behaviour and preferences, facilitating personalised experiences.

How to get ahead of your competition using data analytics and BI?

Data analytics and BI allow companies to gain a competitive advantage by enabling them to make data driven decisions and identifying new opportunities for growth.

It allows businesses to identify trends and patterns, optimise operations, improve decision making processes, use predictive analysis to anticipate future trends and customer behaviour, and use competitive intelligence to get insights into their competitors’ strengths, weaknesses and strategies.

Business Intelligence and data analytics are not something that can be overlook or underestimated. They are powerful tools each business has to take advantage of if it is to become successful and competitive. In the nearest future it will be a standard, definitely worth investing in.