Why Open Source Business Intelligence is a Good Idea

More and more companies that are interested in improving the way they do business are adopting open source business intelligence. They are choosing open source for a variety of reasons, but primarily they have their eye on the bottom line. Because open source business intelligence gives companies options, they are able to save money on their business intelligence (e.g. Actuate, Pentaho, Jaspersoft) system. It also gives them the ability to improve the system they are working with as business intelligence technology grows and changes, instead of investing in a completely new platform. Because of this flexibility and forward motion, these companies are seeing opportunities for their businesses that they would have missed with an outdated system. Open source can also help your company get the best BI applications for your business.

Plenty of Options

Open source allows for adoption across application servers, in particular, Java-based applications because they are standardized and easy to merge with open source solutions and tools. Your company can choose the solutions that fit the business intelligence needs. Because you can pick and choose what you want to adopt, you aren’t saddled with an unwieldy system that does more or less than you need.

Right Price

The ability to have options will help your company save money on business intelligence solutions, but you will also see cost benefits of having a software infrastructure that permeates all the way through the application layers of your technology package. Your company can adjust your tech budget to reflect real world purchasing ability. You’ll also see financial rewards when the IT team is able to dedicate their time to more important issues than generating reports once you’ve invested in an open source reporting tool.

Innovative Technology

Because of the pricing structure of open source business intelligence, it is far easier for companies to upgrade their business intelligence systems as the technology improves. Updates will allow you to get the full benefits of your business intelligence program. Because you and other consumers will be more active in looking for ways to improve their systems, the competition among business intelligence providers to provide new technologies will increase, spurring innovation and creating new choices for consumers.

Finding the right business intelligence solution can be tricky, but open source technology makes it much easier for your company to find the right tools to generate the information you need. Open source business intelligence is becoming more and more beneficial to consumers as time goes by and because of your ability to get updates, you won’t have to wait for the next version of the tool you need to start reaping the benefits of having a business intelligence system.