The biggest problem when it comes to business intelligence (BI) is the rate at which modern businesses now operate. By the time a BI application is set up to provide an answer to a particular question, no one can remember why it was asked in the first place.
To reduce the amount of time it takes to actually collect the data needed to answer a particular query, TIBCO Software has partnered with Composite Software to integrate a data virtualization platform within the TIBCO Spotfire BI application.
According to Greg Goldsmith, director of global alliances at TIBCO Spotfire, existing TIBCO middleware is optimized for event-driven applications. Composite Software provides TIBCO with an integration platform that can be used to more easily integrate data that resides in multiple applications.
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Rather than taking days or sometimes weeks to set up that integration, Goldsmith says the Composite data virtualization platform leverages object-oriented adapters to present data residing in multiple applications as one integrated, federated information resource.
Cisco just completed its acquisition of Composite Software as part of a larger thrust into enterprise application development and integration that includes a previous acquisition of SolveDirect for integrating applications and workflows via the cloud. By partnering with Composite, TIBCO is positioning Spotfire as a BI application that can leverage both TIBCO and third-party middleware platforms equally well.
In general, data virtualization represents the next level of integration under which the borders between different applications become increasingly blurred. Rather than taking an application-centric approach, data virtualization allows IT organizations to treat different sets of data as logical entities regardless of where any subset of the data may reside.
As data virtualization continues to gain traction, it becomes a lot easier to develop complex composite applications; the whole concept of an actual enterprise mashup may become a lot more common. In fact, once more organizations appreciate the fact that they can pull in any new piece of data using defined application programming interfaces (APIs) within a couple of hours regardless of whether that data resides inside or out of the enterprise, the possibilities become almost endless.
