Earlier this month, the BI vendor world grew just a tad smaller when BI giant Cognos announced it was acquiring performance management vendor Applix for $339 million.
Craig Schiff provided some insights on what the acquisition means to the BI/analytics world here.
Craig, a leading business performance management analyst, observes that the acquisition gives Cognos a leg up in the financial performance management arena, an area it has been angling for in recent years. He adds that "Cognos will now have its own profitability analysis solution. Also, the combined entity will be a force to be reckoned with in the mid-market."
The main negative that Craig sees with the acquisition is product overlap between the two companies. "Although I have not seen PowerPlay and [Applix] TM1 go head to head in many deals and they have very different strengths, the products have been presented in a similar manner from a marketing perspective."
The Applix acquisition may only be the beginning for Cognos. As CFO Magazine's Roy Harris observes, Cognos CFO Tom Manley recently hinted that Cognos is looking to acquire more vendors in the analytics and performance management space. "We want to be the independent supplier of performance management solutions," he is quoted as saying.
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