AccountingWeb

Panorama and Alchemex spearhead 'analytics as a service' push

The recent addition of a pivot table gadget for Google Spreadsheets signalled the beginnings of an online attack on Microsoft Excel's hold over business analysis. John Stokdyk reports

Google's Analytics Gadget can automatically extract and summarise data into a pivot table and is a great way to construct online performance charts. The gadget comes from Panorama Software, a long-time specialist in online analytical processing that created and then sold to Microsoft the OLAP tools that now power SQL Server's Analysis Services module.

"Now we are building the next generation of OLAP solutions for the new era of cloud computing," said Panorama CEO Eynav Azarya.

Google is acting as an online showcase for Panaorama's PowerApps analytical engine, which will ultimately be able to accept and process any Multidimensional Expression (MDX) data source. The developer is positioning PowerApps as the first "Analytics as a Service" platform into which third party developers will be able to plug their business intelligence tools.

For the past 25 years, Microsoft has built a stranglehold on business reporting through the ubiquitous Excel, but by Panorama's tools could help Google to close the gap.

The OLAP Report's Nigel Pendse published a commentary detailing Panorama's tortuous history and the tightrope it is walking in its relations with Microsoft and Google. According to Pendse, the online processing engine behind the Panorama gadget offrers more sophisticated capabilities than even Excel Pivot Tables.

The apparent generosity of offering the system free to Google Docs users is the first step in new strategy to extend the technology to other web-hosted applications
such as SAP, Salesforce.com and NetSuite that will generate bigger, he suggested. Panorama could also offer an "analysis as a service" capability to users of desktop accounting systems, charged on a small, monthly subscription fee.

If the Google Docs extensions prove successful, it will become a more credible competitor to Microsoft Office. "Panorama is going to have to tread very carefully as it attempts to participate simultaneously in the Microsoft, Google and perhaps even the SAP ecosystems," Pendse wrote.

Hot on Panorama's heels will be another online analytics system, the Excel-based Alchemex Software as a Service. The South African developer announced recently that a beta test version will go live by the end of the year. "We are demystifying business intelligence. It’s very simple, and it’s available to everybody," commented Alchemex managing director Gary Boddington in the company's press announcement.

"We are now extending our offering to a global audience to make good on our promise of delivering business intelligence, simply."

Number of comments: 1

Print Friendly Mail to Friend Post Comment

---

John Stokdyk, 13-Jun-2008

Too good to be true?
I'm sorry to disappoint readers, but I was looking to construct a simple Google pivot chart to illustrate this article, but the beta test system appears to be swamped by demand.

The gadget that you can add straight into your iGoogle page repeatedly timed out before it could generate a chart and when I attempted to use the gadget within Google spreadsheets, the Panorama teaminformed me: "Oops, The system is currently being used by the maximum number of supported users in this beta phase, please try in a few moments again.Thanks for your patience as we work hard to release this product."

I will try again later, at a less popular hour than Friday afternoon. For the moment, I will have to console themselves by looking through the online Panorama tutorial.

John Stokdyk
Technology editor
AccountingWEB.co.uk