TIBCO and AI

Have worked with TIBCO / Spotfire  in several enterprises, here indications of their further move to AI driven solutions.   Worth a look.

TIBCO strengthens commitment to providing cloud-native, open, and AI-driven solutions

Product Enhancements Deliver End-to-End, Data-Led Innovation Capabilities to Customers
LONDON, Sept. 25, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- TIBCO Software Inc., a global leader in integration, API management, and analytics, today announced a series of new products, features, and connectivity that help make agile innovation easier than ever before by providing technology freedom of choice, cloud-native deployment, and AI everywhere. Enhancements to the TIBCO® Connected Intelligence platform further accelerate TIBCO customers' time-to-action, enabling them to innovate faster and more sustainably, ultimately turning ideas and investments into business value.

"On the back of digital interconnectedness becoming a business norm, customers are dealing with an unwieldy explosion of data that is largely unstructured and complex. The nirvana of using data to mold and inform critical decisions still escapes many businesses, but it shouldn't when we have fundamental technologies like the cloud, flexible open platforms, and AI at our disposal that can turn data into innovation and impact," said Matt Quinn, chief operating officer, TIBCO. "Our vision for our customers is that when they use TIBCO as their data foundation, they can engage and interact with their data seamlessly."  .... '

Tibco Announces new AI Experiece

Have used Spotfire in several environments,  this would seem to be an enabling direction for better decision making.

TIBCO announces the AI-powered A(X) experience for Spotfire

Augmented Analytics, New Interface, and Native Data Streams Broaden Adoption Across the Enterprise and Accelerate Time to Insights

LAS VEGAS, Sept. 4, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- TIBCO NOW -- TIBCO Software Inc., a global leader in integration, API management, and analytics today announced the A(X) Experience for TIBCO Spotfire®, an industry-first, AI-driven analytics experience that fuses agile data exploration with natural language processing (NLP), machine learning recommendations, and model-based authoring, adding native support for real-time streaming data. This experience will allow users to humanize their data and information, allowing them to make better decisions, faster.

TIBCO's goal with the A(X) Experience was to harness the power of AI to augment users' knowledge, magnify their skills, and thereby simplify and speed decisionmaking. Complementing the Spotfire® product's familiar point-and-click, agile data exploration, the A(X) Experience seamlessly surfaces machine-learning-based guidance, recommending data relationships and uncovering patterns for users as they explore. A user can type a request and Spotfire will not only create visualizations, but also make prescriptive suggestions using the results, such as blending data, marking matched records, or launching analytical tools. Click a value, drag a chart, type a question, and Spotfire will deliver a clear response. The A(X) Experience will be available this fall with the release of TIBCO Spotfire® X. ... "

Embedding Machine Learning in Data Visualization

Via Spotfire: From a survey of work to integrate data visualization packages with machine learning. With the intent to provide easily understood, extensible and standardized libraries of solutions against existing data.

Power BI Community will Soon be Alive

Been examining the Power BI system from Microsoft in Beta.  A free for now and easy to use dashboard data visualization site.    Nicely done,  not a Tableau or Spotfire as yet, but useful for many applications.    Now shortly becoming generally available. They write:

" ... We recently announced that Power BI will GA on July 24th including major updates to Power BI Desktop (currently known as Power BI Designer), open source visuals, the Power BI Android app, and authoring enhancements. 

Our brand new community site is LIVE!  

Although you only see forums  , our vision for the Power BI Community Site is much grander! Stay tuned and visit our forums to ask questions about Power BI. 

Join the BI Community.     ... " 

Tibco Spotfire Review

We were early users of Spotfire, and ultimately it became the standard for BI and analytics on our delivered Business Sphere systems.   Was always impressed with the ease of use of their systems. Also how easily the analytics could be integrated into a system.  Here an extensive review of the latest version.

Following Tableau 9 Beta

This week attended an overview of Tableau 9,0  Nicely done global streamed user meeting.  I have yet to try the Beta myself. Impression based on the presentation.

I much like the use of the phrase 'visual analytics'.   Visualization is analytics, and all analytics should start with visualization of data.

Overall they are basing their changes on the ability to establish 'Flow'  (The psychology theory of Mihály Csíkszentmihályi ) when analysing and visualizing the data.  Good idea, but this depends on the kind and needs of data and decisions being addressed.  I am all for easy of use via Flow.

Quite a few new ways to select data points on maps, which for certain kinds of analyses can be very useful.   The selection methods are quite intuitive.

Showed the integration of simple analytic, like regression based forecasting.  Easy to overlay on existing data.    Well done, but still a minimal amount of analytics.  When comparing it to other visualization packages like Spotfire.

I like very much what they have done with being able to derive level of detail (LOD) variables.  This is a very powerful concept, an excellent way to do some kinds of analysis, like Cohort methods.  But at the same time it takes you away from the purely visual interaction with data.  It is nice to know it is there, but it also gets you into the weeds of analysis.  The average non analytic user may be confused. They have a white paper coming on its value and use.  ( Will place link here ) Good

New kinds of data cleanup, meta data inclusion, ability to manipulate the data during its ingestion. Data that is strangely arranged or poorly pivoted in its original form. All good ideas that should prove useful.  Lots of times you just want to get the data in cleanly for ready use with a minimum of effort.

Look forward to getting my hands on this, which should be very soon.

Technical Experience Details

 Franz A. Dill

Substantial Consulting Considered in 2015

Data Decision Scientist.  In particular in application areas that use or combine data analytics, decision processes and cognitive interaction. Experienced in designing,evaluating and delivering systems in the enterprise to executives and decision makers in a Fortune100 company known for Analytics excellence. Experience with R, SAS, SPSS, Splunk, System Modeler, BPM systems, Tableau, Spotfire, Optimization Mathematics (CPlex). Lisp, Expert Systems ...   Managed the design, construction and delivery of dozens of systems that led to hundreds of millions of dollars in confirmed value. A sought out resource for the solution of the most wicked problems.  Consulting with IBM on the application of Watson based Advisory Systems.  A Writer, Explainer, Solver, Innovator.   Multiple University board and advisory connections. More in links below.

Franz A. Dill,   Retired Procter & Gamble

PKL Knowledge Partners LLC -  Data Decision Scientist

Cognitive Systems Institute

Advanced Analytics Consulting

Blog: http://eponymouspickle.blogspot.com

Short Bio: http://tinyurl.com/pabggc2

Phone:  (513) 405 7387

Twitter: @FranzD

Franzdill@gmail.com

Cincinnati, Ohio Area 

On the Key to Future BI

Gartner and Spotfire on Future BI:   It is a key point, what is the data worth, now and in the future?  " ... Many business intelligence (BI) vendors and CIOs have positioned big data analysis to focus on data reporting. They then collect and store as much data as they can hoping someone, a data scientist or a team of specialists, can analyze the data and make sense of it. However, the industry hasn’t been very good at deciding what data to keep and what to throw out. ... "

Use of Alternative Business Intelligence Solutions

Correspondent Doug Lautzenheiser looks at alternative solutions for business intelligence and data visualization. The article includes a visualization of how a number of competitive BI tools are used. Indications are that Tableau software is winning.   Qlikview, Spotfire and Tableau are compared visually, but not R.

TIBCO Spotfire for Developers

Brought to my attention.  TIBCO Spotfire for Developers by Manuel Xavier

Order the book here in various formats.

Looks to be of interest, have yet to see any book on Spotfire, which we used for Business Sphere visualizations. I will review more completely in the coming weeks.

They write:
" ...  An introduction to the TIBCO Spotfire world, covering the main concepts and features of the platform in a very fast-paced style. From the installation procedure to the loading of heterogeneous data and the creation and manipulation of several visualization types, you will gain hands-on experience with this very powerful analytics tool.

Starting by introducing you to the platform and its architecture, this helpful guide will show you how to install a standalone working environment. You will then learn about data loading and visualization creation, using several graph types, and also journey through the features of filtering, data preparation, transformation, and layout definition. Finally, you will master library creation and deployment, as well as web player usage. With this book, you will become familiar with all the required functionalities and concepts to start working with the Spotfire technology.... 

A fast-paced, step-by-step guide to creating, manipulating and deploying analytical visualizations using the TIBCO Spotfire Platform  ... You are expected to know the basics of business intelligence, but no prior knowledge of TIBCO Spotfire is required. ... " 

Last Chance: Analytics for Executives.

LAST CHANCE.  Regional interest talk from successful professional practitioners.  In particular, suitable for executives seeking to understand the practical use of Analytics.

TIBCO Spotfire and the Data Analytics Foundation personally invite you to the Analytics Value Proposition Series – From Mess, to Models, to Insight 

Wednesday, October 30th, 10am-1pm  (complimentary lunch)
Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Plaza
35 W. 5th St., Cincinnati, OH 45202

Register Here NOW .
This seminar takes a unique perspective to analytics and Big Data.  It introduces the full cycle of how analytics can simply and effectively be introduced into business process.  This method not only includes decisions and data, it allows for the integration of analytics into the decision process itself.  Integration can vary from installation into an App used by employees, inclusion in a mobile device, or used as a template for strategic action.   We will describe this approach, and provide a number of real examples of its use.  Examples at the talk will be drawn from supply chain, retail, marketing, financial services, energy awareness, manufacturing and executive information delivery.

Featuring:

Jeffrey D. Camm, Head of Operations, Business Analytics and Information Systems, Founding Director of the Center for Business Analytics, Fellow, University of Cincinnati

Franz Dill, Advanced Analytics Practice Lead, Data Analytics Foundation

Mike Fry, Associate Professor and Linder Research Fellow, Department of Operations, Business Analytics and Information Systems, University of Cincinnati ... 

(If you can't attend this meeting, contact me and we will arrange another session to present it  - Franzdill@gmail.com)

Talk: From Mess to Analytical Models

A few seats left:

TIBCO Spotfire and the Data Analytics Foundation personally invite you to the Analytics Value Proposition Series – From Mess, to Models, to Insight 

Wednesday, October 30th, 10am-1pm (complimentary lunch)
Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Plaza
35 W. 5th St., Cincinnati, OH 45202

Register Here.

This seminar takes a unique perspective to analytics and Big Data.  It introduces the full cycle of how analytics can simply and effectively be introduced into business process.  This method not only includes decisions and data, it allows for the integration of analytics into the decision process itself.  Integration can vary from installation into an App used by employees, inclusion in a mobile device, or used as a template for strategic action.   We will describe this approach, and provide a number of real examples of its use.  Examples at the talk will be drawn from supply chain, retail, marketing, financial services, energy awareness, manufacturing and executive information delivery.

Featuring:

Jeffrey D. Camm, Head of Operations, Business Analytics and Information Systems, Founding Director of the Center for Business Analytics, Fellow, University of Cincinnati

Franz Dill, Advanced Analytics Practice Lead, Data Anaytics Foundation

Mike Fry, Associate Professor and Linder Research Fellow, Department of Operations, Business Analytics and Information Systems, University of Cincinnati ... 

(If you can't attend this meeting, contact me and we will arrange another session to present it  - Franzdill@gmail.com)

Microsoft's Power BI for Office

It has been some time since I looked at any of Microsoft's Business Intelligence offerings.  As MS partners in the enterprise we did see some of their BI acquisitions that work with Access.   New writeup in Nextweb which overviews some of their updates.  One aspect, 3D visualization, in my opinion is only useful for very specialized applications that overlay data atop 3D objects.  As I said previously, I much like their improvements made to BI embedded in Excel.  Their early GIS was developed from a package we also used: Mapinfo.   Did MS lose the war on location intelligence?
Meanwhile other BI player Tibco Spotfire have acquired Maporama to bolster their geo capabilities.

" ... Microsoft today announced an update to Power BI.  For those who don’t know, Power BI is a set of tools that provide data query, mapping, modeling, and interactive charting usually built on top of Excel. Power Query and Power Map were previously known as Data Explorer and Geoflow, if those names ring a bell. ... "  

Tibco Spotfire Acquires Extended Results

TIBCO Software Acquires Extended Results
TIBCO Software Inc. (NASDAQ: TIBX) today announced it has acquired Extended Results, a privately-held provider of mobile business intelligence software and services. Extended Results makes business intelligence personal by presenting up-to-date key performance indicators on virtually any mobile device, whether online or offline.

Extended Results' operational monitoring capabilities are a powerful complement to TIBCO Spotfire® as well as to TIBCO's event-enabled infrastructure, cloud, loyalty and social software platforms..... 

Tibco and Teradata and Real Time Event streams

TIBCO and Teradata Enable CIOs to Extract Actionable Insights From Real-Time Event Streams to Deliver the Two-Second Advantage

Event Processing within the Teradata(R) Unified Data Architecture(TM) enables analytics for any user - to discover insights and put into real-time action.
  ...  announced TIBCO Spotfire® event analytics as a key component of the Teradata Unified Data Architecture™ (UDA). This inclusion of TIBCO real-time event processing and analytics will enable some of the world's largest enterprises to capture the full value of big data by simultaneously analyzing historical data (data at rest) and real-time events (data in motion). The Unified Data Architecture combines powerful technologies to provide closed-loop processing of big data by facilitating the collection, analysis, and modeling of real-time event streams. The insights extracted from the architecture enables business leaders to anticipate future events and take immediate automated action, providing them with the two-second advantage®. ... 

The value of the Teradata UDA to customers is the ability to leverage the tight integration of Teradata data warehousing, Teradata Aster discovery platforms, and Apache™ Hadoop. This workload-specific architecture enables business users to gain competitive advantage through deeper insights from any data source. Now, combined with the Spotfire analytics platform, data scientists and business analysts can harness the best-in-class analytic capabilities of the Teradata and Teradata Aster engines and convert their discoveries into a guided operational application for line-of-business decision-makers. ... " 

How P&G Presents Data to Decision Makers

In the HBR:  This effort started long ago as a method to deliver data and models to executives, and has evolved much more broadly for many employees.  And has finally resulted  in what they call the Business  Sphere.  Note also the emphasis in using data visualization to simplify pattern recognition for users.  Later versions included the ability to include simple analytic methods like regression, clustering and forecasting.    Tom Davenport writes:

" ...if you work in a large organization and want it to make better use of data visualization, I'd argue that commonality is more important than creativity. If you can establish a common visual language for data, you can radically upgrade the use of the data to drive decision-making and action.  The best case I can cite for this argument is Procter & Gamble, which has institutionalized data visualization as a primary tool of management. Working with visual analytics software vendor Tibco Spotfire, P&G has put visual displays of key information on desktops — over 50,000 P&G employees now have access to a "Decision Cockpit" ... " 

The heat map shown is an interesting choice to emphasize.  See the article link for a full readable version. In general, heat maps distort comparisons between data, so they are readily scan-able, but are not a good means for interacting with complex data.  Other graphics shown in the article are more typical dashboard visualization styles.

Tibco Acquires Maporama

I see that Tibco Spotfire has acquired Maporama.   " ... a privately-held, cloud-based provider of location intelligence and geospatial analytics solutions ... " .   They are holding some upcoming webinars on the implications and integration of this capability.  More about this here.

UC Data Visualization Day

Reading with pleasure Stephen Few's book "Show Me the Numbers: Designing Tables and Graphs to Enlighten",  Second Edition.  It was good to see that Stephen Few will be speaking at the University of Cincinnati on Thursday January 24, 2013.  I will attend and report here on the meeting.  Join me.

Data Visualization Day
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Tangeman Center, University of Cincinnati

World renowned author Stephen Few will be the keynote speaker. We will also hear from Andy Walter, VP of Business Intelligence at Procter and Gamble and Jeff Shaffer, VP, Analytics and IT, at Unifund.  In the afternoon, we have limited seating for hands-on training with data visualization software including JMP, Spotfire, and Tableau.

You may register and get more information by clicking here.

UC Data Visualization Day: January 24

I have been reading Stephen Few's book "Show Me the Numbers: Designing Tables and Graphs to Enlighten",  Second Edition.  It was good to see that Stephen Few will be speaking at the University of Cincinnati on Thursday January 24, 2013.  I plan to attend and report on the meeting.  More:

Data Visualization Day

Thursday, January 24, 2013
Tangeman Center, University of Cincinnati

World renowned author Stephen Few will be the keynote speaker. We will also hear from Andy Walter, VP of Business Intelligence at Procter and Gamble and Jeff Shaffer, VP, Analytics and IT, at Unifund.  In the afternoon, we have limited seating for hands-on training with data visualization software including JMP, Spotfire, and Tableau.

You may register and get more information by clicking here.

A Temporal Forecasting Story

Connecting methods to provide forecasts.  Forecasts based on semantically rich text data, such as that based on blog entries, news posts, or tweets. Today I met Brand Niemann of the Semantic Community at the first Recorded Future users conference, who informed me of work going on that has successfully connected semantic forecasting methods like RecordedFuture and the data visualization package Spotfire.   See the link above for the detailed example.   For a broader view of the conference see my tweet stream at #rfun2012 .