82 Solving Operational Business Intelligence with InfoSphere Warehouse Advanced Edition
4.1 Start with the business problem
In a true business intelligence environment, the objective of a data warehouse is
not to provide the means of holding large amounts of data, or even to provide an
efficient platform for processing queries. These are, in reality, the requirements
needed by a data warehouse to achieve its main goal of providing the means to
answer questions such as the following about your business:
Did our business grow from last quarter or last year?
Will we have sufficient stock in key regions?
Which stores are making a profit or have a loss?
It is these kinds of questions that are important to the business. When you start
to plan ...