The New Era of Enterprise Business Intelligence: Using Analytics to Achieve a Global Competitive Advantage

Chapter 1. Introduction to Business Intelligence Today

Business intelligence is defined as “mission critical” by many senior executives today. The emphasis and interest in BI, as we will often refer to it, has placed it in the forefront of the list of major corporate objectives. This adjective is quite valid because the value of unlocking critical information held in corporate and external data sources can be a significant game changer. At the enterprise level, BI is often just a stated goal with little actual practice other than perhaps setting a standard for a suite of tools. Having an enterprise goal and set of standards does not end with creating an approved vendor list—it is just the beginning. BI at the enterprise level suggests that ...