BI in Action

"An Englishman in New York" as Sting once sang.

That's how out of context I [as a business intelligence software analyst] probably felt at HP's storage-centric Technology Solutions Group Forum conference this week.

OK, maybe not quite – I'm Indian and the location was Las Vegas. But for someone primarily looking for business intelligence software gems, the trappings at HP were sufficiently "alien".

In case you're wondering what I was doing there – one word will suffice. NeoView. I'd heard from various esteemed analyst writings that HP was gong to be the next bee's knees in BI and data warehousing soon following the recent launch of its quasi-data warehousing appliance, NeoView.

As it turned out I had a better chance of finding Lord Lucan [the English peer that's been AWOL since 1974] jotting down notes on performance considerations for designing LT04 backup systems than finding anyone on the floor willing to speak to about BI or data warehousing for that matter.

Then it occurred to me that I was perhaps at the wrong end of the conference. A couple of gigantic blocks up the famous Strip from the Mandalay Bay was the Venetian was the "Software Universe" event. A quick taxi ride and I was more at home – yet the search for NeoView continued.

It's clear that HP is starting to load-up on software – again. I say again because when HP was just a humble shed in Palo Alto it was a software company that turned into a hardware company. But as it turned out most of HP's new software buzz was honed to its Mercury Interactive quality management and testing suite of products and its Advantage suite of desktop products. The company also timed its acquisition of enterprise security firm SPI Dynamics – two weeks after arch-rival IBM bought Watchfire.

BTW: HP is clearly weary of IBM as its most dangerous competitor. Yet, to my recollection at least, no direct mention was made on Big Blue in any of its keynotes. It was enough for me to consider donning the IBM hat I had picked up at a previous conference!

While there were no direct references or announcements around NeoView – after sort of announcing NeoView last autumn, HP perhaps jumped the gun and decided in May to launch a "hard" 2.0 version in May that hopefully it will talk about more widely.

So I had some outstanding questions that were left unanswered by HP execs. So I’ll take a stab at answering them myself:

• Is NeoView really an appliance? Technically yes. But HP is cautious of pushing NeoView into a niche that it believes it is way ahead of. Instead it likes to believe that NeoView supports a wider range of enterprise data warehousing, mixed query workload environments. That of course puts NeoView in direct competition with Netezza, Teradata, and IBM. Analysts would also (rightly) argue that BI is getting more operationally mission critical. Hence, NeoView's 24x7 operation and mixed user workload capabilities are touted as major differentiators. But isn't that what Teradata's active data warehousing strategy is all about too?

• How well is HP likely to do with NeoView? It's still early days to tell. Much depends on HP's ability to sell software – something that remains to be proven. However HP is loading up on resources. It already has gained considerable BI and data warehousing expertise trough its acquisition of Knightsbridge. Plus it is actively recruiting a specialized sales force to sell NeoView. Of course Mark Hurd's influence in spinning a software angle to sales should also help.

• What ace cards does HP hold? While Hp might be a late comer to the market, it does have the HP-brand clout that counts for a lot in today's conservative IT market. Netezza, while doing business fro several years, is only just about to IPO. NeoView's pricing also takes a pot-shot at Teradata's expensive system, but will struggle to match Netezza and others like Datallegro and Greenplum/Sun. So any price advantages that NeoView might hold are effectively cancelled out.

• Why is HP entering the BI and data warehousing market, and why now? Research shows that BI is still one of the few growth sectors left in the enterprise software sector. And HP has shown that it is more than ready to load up on its software business to augment its core hardware revenue. The personal influence of CEO Mark Hurd also has a lot to do with HP's move into BI and data warehousing. Surely the timing of NeoView is more than just a coincidence, coming as it does a year after Hurd took over the reins.

With the HP brand behind it NeoView is sure to stir things up in the market. But 2007 won't be the banner year for NeoView. HP will probably have to wait until it gets some marquee customers references on board before it starts to blow its NeoView trumpet in a big way.

Funnily enough the company might not have to look far. HP itself is in the midst of a major IT transformation that will modernization of HP's infrastructure and hopefully reduce the percentage of revenue it spent on IT by half (4% to 2%) on an annual basis over a three year period. With over 5,000 legacy applications that's a massive undertaking by any stretch of the imagination.

Part of that involves consolidating over 750-plus data marts scattered across HP's various divisions into a single, gigantic 750-plus terabyte enterprise data warehouse that will eventually support upwards of 50,000 users.

The enterprise data warehouse is of course being built on NeoView with a dash of HP services. The first EDW located in Houston went live in April 2006 and comprises 256 processors, 128 servers and 182 terabytes of storage. A similar-spec EDW is expected to go online in a couple of weeks. And an even bigger 382 terabyte EDW located in Atlanta will mop up the data mart consolidation effort.

HP expects to incrementally eliminate its data marts to zero by the middle of 2009.

If HP gets its right then it already has what could be the "mother of all enterprise data warehouse case studies" – right in its own back yard.

Its not just data warehousing technology that HP is gathering. It's also loading up on skills and personnel as well – on many levels.

For the grunt work, the acquisition of Knightsbridge handed HP a ready-made team of field-hardened and highly skilled BI and data warehousing experts. It almost instantly gave HP some credibility in terms of BI and data warehousing worthiness.

For those that prefer the luxury of stretch-limo length mahogany boardroom tables, HP certainly has an impressive double-act. What was most interesting at the conference was seeing a dual-act of HP CEO Mark Hurd (ex-CEO of data warehousing giant Teradata) and HP CIO Randy Mott (ex-CIO of Wal-Mart and one of Teradata's biggest customers) on the same stage working for the same company. Both men clearly have a shared vision of what data warehousing should be and where it should go.

Then there's Vickie Farrell, now marketing manager of NeoView. Surely not the same Vickie Farrell you was a vice president of marketing at Teradata? Having met and interviewed Vickie when she was a marketing big-wig blowing Teradata's trumpet, its' now amusing for me to hear her talking about "HP plausibly going lower and wider and cheaper than Teradata."

More on NeoView if and when I finally pin down an appropriate HP executive.