Approximately a year ago I was analyzing our implementations success rate with Business Intelligence. It was evident that too few of our projects were able to take advantage of BI in Phase 1. This was typically due to the cost to implement the out of box BI functionality that Dynamics AX. Additionally we find that most of our customer base are currently running with a skeleton IT staff and did not have the resources or knowledge set to maintain the BI solution moving forward.
This poses a difficult situation as the true value of an ERP implementation is its ability to data mine the integrated solution to find previously unknown value or issues.
In order to solve this issue, our Practice began to evaluate the various BI tools on the market. We participated in demonstrations, discussions on implementation approach, success rates, resource pools, average time to train, average time to implement and typical ROI/TCO of their solutions.
In the end we found;
1. Similar Display Methods
Most solutions had a very similar “end user experience”. In that the charts, graphs, KPI’s all more-less performed the same and displayed the same. Essentially they all provided the nice graphical views of data, drill and/or linkage to additional data sets or graphs. Nearly all BI tool sales teams concentrated significantly on this part of the presentation and very few had a competitive advantage here.
2. Variations on how the end user accessed the data.
Some solution required a middleware tool or and additional server to access the BI data and reporting. Additionally the end user could access the solution differently from tool to tool including; Proprietary software, web browser and others focused on leveraging Excel.
In the end what was important to our AX Practice was a solution that required no additional hardware or servers and could leverage the existing investments in SQL SSAS while eliminating the requirement for additional clients. Essentially this would reduce the implementation hours but leveraging existing technologies while providing an interface to users they already understand and use daily.
We really liked ZAP BI’s approach to the end user. Essentially as long as the user had access to a browser they could create, edit and view the reports. The added benefit being that any reports viewed could also be integrated into the AX Role Centers. Furthermore there were no additional requirements for servers and their data warehouse solution worked with SSAS. In addition to these benefits they also enabled the ability to drill down with-in the Dynamics AX data but also right to the source record by linking it to the record ID in Enterprise Portal.
3. Synchronized Security
The challenge with any data warehouse and Business Intelligence tool is that you typically have to maintain two security models. , one in the source system and one in your data warehouse. Given the extensive time it takes to setup security, segregation of duties and ongoing maintenance of security roles and duties, it was important that this be as easy as possible.
ZAP BI was one of the few products where the AX Security Model is inherited into the BI Cubes as well. That means if Joe in accounting does not have access to view HR salaries in AX – he also can’t see that data when he run’s reports in ZAP BI. This of course greatly reduces the TCO as well as assisting auditors in their security evaluation of the ERP and BI tools.
4. Access to Multiple Data Sources
While we like to believe that Dynamics AX can cover all requirements for a company we realistically know that this is not the case. So in order to support true reporting for the organization we will need data from other data sources.
Again most solutions were limited to either the Dynamics line of products or simply AX. Where ZAP BI again stood above the rest was their ability to integrate with nearly all ERP products on the market (supporting hub-spoke models) as well as other “external” data sources. Western has successfully utilized this capability to upgrade customers from NAV to AX, over a global rollout when NAV is still operational – we would feed the data from NAV to BI and then switch it to AX to BI once Dynamics AX was rolled out. Additionally where there may be multiple instances being installed due to ITAR requirement or other regulations you can continue to integrate data into one BI solution.
5. Delta vs. Full Loads
With large scale deployments with plenty of data, the length of time to perform full data refreshes nightly or weekly is not an option. Our selection criteria required the vendor to be able to support delta loads into the SSAS environment. This is where you can separate those who truly understand BI and those who are playing the smaller market space. It was surprising to find that very few solutions supported delta loads.
Again ZAP BI was able to provide the delta loads we required.
6. Single Hypercube vs. Segregated Cubes
I once heard someone say that you spend a ton of money implementing ERP products to unify your systems under one roof, and then you end up segregating your data into multiple cubes by functional area. Why would you segregate your data when you need cross functional reporting? Most solutions required you to create another cube to link the data together. Again adding additional services dollars and increasing the complexity of the solution.
The solid solutions out there understood the value of “Hyercubes” while still supporting the ability to have multi cubes if still required. The only time we see an advantage on a separate cube is if you want to have a small subset of data that you want to refresh frequently throughout the day to report in more “near real-time”.
Once again ZAP BI fundamentally supports the Hypercube capability
7. Scheduling & Emailing Reports
One question you always get with reports (I believe this is left over from “we’re just used to it this way”) is the automatic emailing and scheduled emails of reports. Most solutions supported this as well.
However – ZAP BI added an additional feature which allows “triggered” emailing of reports. Let me explain. When you schedule a report to be emailed every week and the report consistently reports values that do not cause any concern, the recipients begin to ignore those emails. So the day comes when there is an issue – they ignore the email and no action taken. Cleverly ZAP BI will allow you to only send a report when a metric is below a certain range or based on criteria you setup. This alerts the recipient to take action because they got an email.
8. What if Analysis
Virtually no solution provided the ability to conduct What-if scenarios. ZAP BI approached this by adding the ability to put in factors to the reports which allow the user to adjust those factors and the resulting data will get updated. For instance, if we had an increase of sales by 20% – what would my purchasing cost look like?
9. Creation of the Cubes
What really puzzled me about most BI vendors out there is that very few spent any or very little time explaining how cubes are created and maintained. Fundamentally this is potentially the biggest portion that affects the TCO.
We were looking for a tool that would allow us to very easily map data, create relationships between data elements and update new elements easily.
ZAP BI has a tool called Cubexpress. This tool automatically understands the relationships between data elements in AX and creates the relationships in the Cube. It also provides a % ranking on each data element based on the number or records, related data records and other factors which helps you narrow down the data actually required in the cube. This makes the cube creation and updating extremely easy.
10. Creation of Reports
As mentioned in point #1 above – most solutions have the same tool set to choose from, Grid Reports, Charts, Graphs, KPI’s, Traffic lights, Trending etc.
Most tools also have the concept of measures or data that you can tally, calculate or apply data ranges etc.
The major different was its ease of using these data elements. This section will come down to personal preference – most were similar, however when I gave or BI team the various solutions to play with it was evident they were able to create reports faster and with more functionality with the ZAP BI tool.
They found the interface intuitive and after a day and a half of training we did they were able to install and create reports on their own with no assistance from ZAP. Pretty impressive for such a small window of training.
One of the issues we find with most reporting tools is knowing what data is related so that when you add data elements to a report you actually are rewarded with values. ZAP BI is smart this way, when you add a measure or field to a report it automatically shorten’s the list of other metrics or data elements available to the end user that it is related to. This ensures that users will always derive values on their reports correctly and removes the need for the end users to know the full data model.
11. Report Packs
Nearly all solutions came with preconfigured report packs or bundles by industry. Some had an online catalogue you could download, others allows you to select packages as part of the purchase.
There was only 1 company however that offered to co-design report packs for the industry verticals that our company has specific IP in. This is a strong sign of commitment to their partners and willing to work to effectively deliver a strong partnership with mutual benefit.
I’ve written this post as I’m asked many times how we arrived at this decision and hope I have been able to summarize accurately for you our reasons for selecting ZAP Technologies and their ZAP BI solution.
The AX Practice is leading with ZAP BI as our tool of course on all new business deals.
For more information;
· ZAP Technology and Western Computer announce Strategic Partnership
timothyharris.me 