Business intelligence must address an expanded set of data needs, with a convergence of different technologies.

There’s an interesting buzz in the business intelligence (BI) industry, where more and more clients are starting to ask what BI of the future looks like. I think there are a few factors that drive this question.Vendors’ messaging to their target market is definitely a strong driver that’s causing users of their technology to start wondering. The typical messages from vendors are that BI is dead and analytics replaces it. Depending on the vendor’s own internal strategy, it might either be pushing for cloud platforms for analytics like the big four (SAP, Oracle, IBM and Microsoft), or some of the more niche players are punting visualisation or advanced analytics as if it’s the be-all and end-all of the ‘new BI’. And if the market is not confused yet, they’ll throw words like search and text analytics, self-service, in-memory, or agile into the mix.