Business Objects Trailblazes On-Demand Territory

Information OnDemand will offer customers prepackaged industry data ready for use in Business Objects' applications and dashboards, as well as new templates, scorecards, and other data delivery tools customized for the on-demand data feeds. For example, a partnership with Dunn and Bradstreet will make available that company's trove of corporate records, which customer will be able to import into their own business intelligence (BI) applications and use to create benchmarks and comparisons against their peers and competitors.

Customers can already create such analytical reports, but Business Objects found that the manual work involved deterred many from taking advantage of that capability, according to Steve Williams, Business Objects' OnDemand senior product marketing manager. Its hope is that prepackaging that data and making it available for quick, on-demand delivery through an online store will spur deeper BI use and penetration.

Business Objects, based in San Jose, Calif., and Paris, is partnering around Information OnDemand on several fronts. It's contracting with industry data providers like Dunn and Bradstreet to develop data packages. It's looking to work with domain-expert partners create customized templates and applications for specific industry verticals. And, finally, it eventually plans to work out a reseller strategy to enable partners that want to resell or OEM the data packages to do so, Williams said.

Slated to enter beta shortly and launch in the third quarter, Information OnDemand expands Business Objects' on-demand portfolio, which began with its year-ago launch of its hosted CrystalReports.com service and expanded in November through its acquisition of SaaS platform maker Nsite Software. Partners said they're not yet seeing much sales traction for CrystalReports.com, but they expect it to pick up as customers get more comfortable with the idea of on-demand BI offerings.

"I think as we start seeing successes, we'll start going from mindshare to market share," said David McCrabb, general manager of software products for BI services firm Saama Technologies in Campbell, Calif.

Saama is working with Business Objects to develop Crystal Reports templates that Business Objects will sell as part of its Information OnDemand push. In the year since CrystalReports.com launched, Saama has sold the offering to a handful of its customers, mostly for proof-of-concept projects tied in to Salesforce.com deployments, McCrabb said. For now, he sees customers trying on-demand BI solutions for initiatives that are important but not mission-critical, the kinds of projects on which a success will be valuable but problems or delays won't be disastrous.

He thinks momentum is about to start building: "This time in Q3 or Q4, we'll have a good sense of how steep the ramp is," McCrabb said. "I feel like it's going to be a pretty steep acceleration."

One solution provider that specializes in on-demand offerings, Xperianz in Milford, Ohio, said customer buying right now is focused on core ERP applications and hasn't yet spread to subsidiary areas like BI.

"The end of the dot-com/Y2K hangover, coupled with merger mania, is leading to a lot of ERP work," said Steve Shoemake, Xperianz's national practice leader of enterprise technology.

Xperianz was an Nsite channel partner before Business Objects bought the company, but it didn't end up doing any deals with Nsite.

"I do view Business Objects as a credible product, and the fact that we haven't collaborated much with them is more a reflection on the market demanding ERP applications," Shoemake said.

BI vendors are still dipping their toes in the SaaS waters. Informatica is retooling some of its products for on-demand delivery, and Cognos recently acquired SaaS dashboards developer Celequest.

Saama works with a broad spectrum of BI vendors, and McCrabb said that in his view, Business Objects is furthest along on the on-demand curve among top-tier vendors.

"They've stepped out and set the bar," McCrabb said. "Business Objects has made a statement and backed it up with products and acquisitions much more than anyone else has, at this point in time."