The Truth About Mobile Business

Intelligence
Five Common Myths Debunked

A White Paper

WebFOCUS

iWay Software

Table of Contents
1

Executive Summary

Myth #1 Mobile BI Requires All Users to Be on the Same Device

Myth #2 A Native Application Is Required for Each Type of Mobile Device

Myth #3 Mobile BI Is Only Consumed on Mobile Phones or Smartphones

Myth #4 Mobile Users Are Always Connected

Myth #5 Mobile BI Users Cannot Perform Ad Hoc or Deep Analysis

7 Conclusion

Executive Summary
Mobile business intelligence (BI) is not a new concept. It was first introduced more than a decade
ago. The reason that it is just now starting to take off, most industry experts agree, is because the
combination of social and technical barriers that held it back are finally starting to crumble.
The architectural frameworks of the most popular BI platforms are now robust enough to support
the information needs of mobile users. Advances in mobile devices are also making it common for
them to handle more than just the most basic data delivery.
Although the underlying technology is now there, and companies are recognizing the importance
of giving mobile users the ability to access and interact with information while they are out of the
office, some still hesitate to embark on a related project. There are many unfounded myths that
imply that mobile BI is too difficult to deploy, too cumbersome to use, too limited in functionality,
or too expensive to provide value.
Companies that buy in to these misconceptions are missing a crucial opportunity to significantly
enhance their operations and gain a competitive advantage. In a May 2010 Aberdeen survey, 23
percent of respondents already had a mobile BI environment in place, while another 31 percent
planned to deploy one within the next 12 months.1 Although this represents significant growth (in
2009 only 17 percent of companies were leveraging mobile BI) close to half of companies have yet
to move forward with this critical initiative.
In this white paper, we will examine the five common myths associated with mobile business
intelligence and uncover the facts about cost, implementation, and capabilities. We will also
explain why companies should move forward with their mobile business intelligence projects.

Borg, Andrew. Enterprise-Grade Mobile Applications: Secure Information When and Where Its Needed, Aberdeen
Group, Inc., November 2010.

Information Builders

Myth #1 Mobile BI Requires All Users to Be on the

Same Device
The Facts
If this were true, only the smallest companies, with only a handful of mobile users, would be able
to deploy a mobile BI environment. Mid-sized and larger companies would find themselves hard
pressed to move their entire mobile workforce onto the same device making the successful
widespread use of mobile BI nearly impossible.
In the past, many companies deployed BI applications specifically for BlackBerry devices, simply
because it was most popular among business users and provided the easiest way of accessing
corporate information. Then, mobile users expressed a preference for iPhones and Android-based
phones. According to Howard Dresner, founder of Dresner Advisory Services, the iPhone was the
preferred device for mobile business intelligence in 2010, while this year the iPad has become
predominant.2 This shift has rendered a BlackBerry-only approach antiquated and ineffective.
Dresner also cites a requirement to leverage existing investments in mobile devices. In other
words, companies already have a variety of mobile devices in use and likely wont embrace the
idea of spending more money to replace a large portion of them, just for the sake of mobile BI.
Most mobile BI platforms do make reporting capabilities available via a wide array of different
devices. However, just because they can do it, doesnt necessarily mean they make it easy or
economical. Many tools require companies to devote a tremendous amount of development
effort to make reporting available on a variety of devices. This not only drains resources, but also
drives up total cost of ownership (TCO).
The web browsers in todays mobile devices are quite powerful and full-featured, eliminating the
need for any software to be installed on the device itself. There are a few world-class mobile BI
solutions, such as Information Builders WebFOCUS BI platform, that take full advantage of these
browsers. These platforms are truly device-independent, providing support for any type of mobile
appliance by delivering BI content in the form of reports, dashboards, and applications directly
to the devices browser.

WebFOCUS content can be developed once and deployed and viewed anywhere.

Dresner, Howard. Mobile Business Intelligence Market Study, Dresner Advisory Services, February 2011.

The Truth About Mobile Business Intelligence

Myth #2 A Native Application Is Required for Each Type of

Mobile Device
The Facts
For many mobile business intelligence tools on the market today, this statement is, in fact, true.
Many offerings lack the ability to exploit each devices native capabilities in a dynamic fashion, and
therefore require companies to build custom reporting and analysis applications for each type of
device in use. Given the wide range of mobile devices used in most organizations today, this can
become extremely time-consuming and cumbersome not to mention cost-prohibitive. With the
pace that smartphones and tablets continue to evolve, developers will be continuously burdened
with updating and enhancing the environment to support new and improved devices as they
become available.
In an enterprise with thousands of mobile users there could potentially be dozens of different
versions of different devices in use at any given time. There will also always be users who are
upgrading their existing appliance or moving to a new one altogether. With the wrong mobile BI
platform in place, keeping pace with these constant changes could be an obstacle that IT simply
cannot overcome.
Not all mobile BI platforms are created equal. There are a few rare, advanced solutions designed to
eliminate the time and effort associated with creating and maintaining multiple versions of various
BI assets for each mobile platform.
For example, mobile reports, dashboards, and web applications built with WebFOCUS have the
ability to dynamically detect what device is being used and automatically transform BI content
into the appropriate format. Unlike other mobile reporting and analysis solutions, this makes
WebFOCUS truly device-independent.

Information Builders

Myth #3 Mobile BI Is Only Consumed on Mobile Phones

or Smartphones
The Facts
This statement was true just a few short years ago when the majority of mobile BI consumers used
BlackBerry and Palm devices. Then came the iPhone and Android-based phones. Smartphones
such as these, while ideal for obtaining a high-level view of business operations, arent so great
when it comes to conducting more advanced data analysis. The small screens make it difficult
to analyze a report with dozens of different variables or view an intricate chart. As a result, most
business users leveraged mobile BI applications for little more than the most basic corporate
information, or to stay on top of critical key performance indicators and metrics.
The recent emergence of tablet computers, and their growing popularity, is changing the face of
mobile business intelligence. Tablets, such as the iPad, eliminate the shortcomings of smartphones
making it easier for mobile users to conduct more in-depth analysis. These workers now have the
means to generate ad hoc reports or manipulate data for great detail.
Forrester Analyst Boris Evelson has stated that it is tablets not phones that are driving the trend
toward wide-scale mobile BI adoption. In his blog, he wrote that, Mobile tablet devices are a
different story. Just like Baby Bears porridge in the Goldilocks and The Three Bears fairy tale, tablet
PCs are just right for mobile BI end users.3
In a recent blog post, IDCs Alys Woodward claims that the iPad will take BI to new heights due
to its improved interactivity, compact size, and ability to make the benefits of mobile BI clearer to
executives.4
Mobile BI platforms must evolve to meet these new and expanding end user requirements
by providing not only shallow reporting and analysis capabilities, but also by allowing users to
conduct deep, highly interactive analysis. Most tools available today have not yet incorporated
these capabilities, and still provide only simple data access functionality. Some, such as
WebFOCUS, already offer advanced analytics for mobile users.

Evelson, Boris. Mobile Tablet PCs, Not Phones, Will Create Critical Mass for Enterprise BI Adoption, Forrester Blogs,
March 2011.

Woodward, Alys. Will the iPad Take BI to a New Dimension, IDC Insights Community, November 2010.

The Truth About Mobile Business Intelligence

Myth #4 Mobile Users Are Always Connected

The Facts
Many mobile BI solution vendors mistakenly assume that users are always connected to the
Internet or a corporate network. With this in mind, they design solutions that lack features to allow
users to perform reporting and analysis even when they are disconnected.
There are times when Internet connections particularly Wi-Fi may be rather slow. This can
frustrate users, forcing them to disconnect from the web, but they may still need to gather
important intelligence on their way to a meeting or a customer visit.
That is why it is so important for a mobile BI solution to enhance the user experience by tapping
in to each devices native capabilities and empowering them to work in disconnected mode. A
recent report issued by Aberdeens David White claims that, when it comes to mobile BI, the top
performers are over twice as likely to be able to use mobile BI when disconnected.5
While this capability is not available in the majority of platforms on the market today, world-class
solutions such as WebFOCUS do offer it. WebFOCUS Mobile Favorites allows users to trigger
reports to be dynamically sent as attachments that can then be viewed and worked with offline.
WebFOCUS Active Technologies makes advanced data analysis functionality accessible to mobile
users working in disconnected mode. Data and interactive capabilities are bound together in a
single, self-contained HTML file and delivered to mobile devices, allowing disconnected users
to not only view content while in transit, but to manipulate it into diverse permutations by
performing sorts, filters, calculations, rollups, visualizations, and more.

WebFOCUS Active Technologies reports and dashboards can be saved on any

mobile device. The built-in analytic engine allows users to interact with them
while disconnected.

Borg, Andrew and White, David. Mobile BI: Actionable Intelligence for the Actionable Enterprise, Aberdeen Group,
Inc., December 2010.

Information Builders

Myth #5 Mobile BI Users Cannot Perform Ad Hoc or

Deep Analysis
The Facts
Many companies shy away from mobile business intelligence because their users need the ability
to interact extensively with data from their smartphones and tablets. These companies have been
mistakenly led to believe that mobile BI solutions simply dont offer that kind of functionality, so
they choose not to invest in something they believe wont meet their needs.
For many of the mobile BI tools currently on the market, this myth is true. The majority of available
solutions only offer access to static data and basic reports. Users have little or no ability to analyze
information in great detail.
For more advanced mobile BI platforms, this statement is completely false. WebFOCUS Active
Technologies allows organizations to deliver completely interactive reporting and analysis to any
mobile device without the need for specialized software. It leverages the native capabilities of
any mobile browser to empower mobile workers with analytic functionality that can be applied to
virtually any data from any enterprise source.
This device-independent solution works by combining data and interactive capabilities into a
single document such as a list, report, or dashboard that can be distributed to mobile devices.
From there users can perform advanced manipulations, such as filtering, sorting, calculating,
charting, and more.
WebFOCUS Mobile Favorites offers a fully device-agnostic environment that enables instant report
generation and dissemination across devices. Users have the ability to customize BI content on
demand by running parameterized reports and drilling down for further details. Reports can then
be immediately distributed via e-mail to other users, allowing for unhindered information sharing,
regardless of device, platform, or browser.

The Truth About Mobile Business Intelligence

Conclusion
WebFOCUS debunks all the myths highlighted in this paper.
In spite of the abounding myths, mobile business intelligence doesnt have to be expensive, hard
to implement, or difficult to use. In fact, companies that choose the right solution, with the right
capabilities, will realize low TCO and rapid ROI, while empowering their mobile users with the
ability to access and interact with timely, complete corporate information anytime, anywhere
from any smartphone or tablet.
Unlike mobile BI tools that offer little more than simple data access, WebFOCUS makes powerful
capabilities guided ad hoc reporting, advanced analytics, write-back and transaction processing,
and real-time BI readily available to virtually any mobile device, including smartphones
(BlackBerry, iPhone, Android-based phones) and tablet computers (iPad). With a pure browserbased (thin-client) architecture that relies entirely on web technologies to deliver mobile
applications, organizations can rapidly expand the number of applications and the content
available on mobile devices without changing their underlying architecture.

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