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The Core Performance Management Vendors for 2008

Published: February 20, 2008

The BPM Pulse survey conducted by BPM Partners identifies vendors worthy of special recognition for their performance management solutions.

Every January the research team at BPM Partners sorts through a year’s worth of vendor analysis, field data and BPM Pulse survey results to identify vendors worthy of special recognition. These vendors are then identified as core vendors, noteworthy vendors, best new vendor, or mid-market vendor of the year. In this article, we will cover the core vendors for 2008. The other categories will be addressed next month.

What does it mean to be a “core vendor”? We define it as the subset of the 100+ performance management vendors we track. At a minimum, the core vendors are those that address most of the business performance management (BPM) basics (budgeting, consolidation, scorecards/dashboards), have a focus on BPM, appeal to a wide range of prospects, are proven in the field and possess a satisfied customer base. This usually results in a list of 10 or less vendors. The core vendor list is a good starting point for anyone considering a full-blown BPM project. While these are not the only vendors to consider, this list will surely provide a handful of good candidates for more in-depth research. Now let’s get to this year’s list.

There are 9 vendors on the core list for 2008, same number as last year. This may surprise some people after all of the mergers and resulting consolidation of 2007. The fact is that some vendors that were not on this list before have now made it because of their acquisitions. Therefore, while the number is the same, the names of the vendors on the list have changed quite a bit. In addition, some smaller vendors that have been around for awhile have broadened their product set or customer base or both and now merit inclusion. Here now, in alphabetical order, are the core performance management vendors for 2008.

Adaptive Planning joins the core list for the first time. They offer an easy-to-use budgeting, forecasting and reporting solution intended for both small and mid-market companies as well as divisions of larger corporations seeking an alternative to existing spreadsheet-based planning and budgeting applications. The solution is available in both on-demand (hosted) and traditional on-site deployment versions. Our research notes a high degree of customer satisfaction within their customer base.

Clarity Systems provides web-based budgeting, consolidation and reporting applications that can be deployed upon several different multidimensional and relational database platforms. Clarity’s Financial Statement Reporting capabilities support multi-user collaboration and facilitate creation of reports to meet external statutory or regulatory reporting requirements. After all of the 2007 mergers, Clarity stands out as one of a handful of remaining vendors that can lay claim to being unified and independent.

IBM/Cognos offers comprehensive performance management and business intelligence (BI) solutions that include sophisticated planning, budgeting and consolidation applications along with extensive reporting and analysis functions. In 2007, Cognos continued expansion of its performance management solutions to support operational reporting and analytics through real time operational reporting solutions and their acquisitions of Celequest and Applix.

Infor is a leading provider of performance management, business intelligence, ERP and accounting solutions. The company recently completed integration of the former Geac/Extensity BPM solution with the BI solution acquired from U.K.-based Systems Union Group. This solution includes comprehensive planning, financial consolidation, reporting and analytics that make extensive use of the Microsoft Business Intelligence platform.
 
Longview Solutions offers a fully integrated solution for strategic planning, budgeting/forecasting, performance management reporting and analysis, and comprehensive financial consolidation and reporting along with tax provision planning and compliance reporting. Longview was acquired by Exact Software in 2007 but operates as a stand-alone division. Longview remains as one of the few unified BPM solutions.

Microsoft joined the core list this year as it further established itself among the leaders in the performance management and business intelligence market with the long awaited release of PerformancePoint Server 2007. PerformancePoint Server is a single, integrated performance management application that provides comprehensive functionality including planning, budgeting, consolidation, analytic reporting and scorecard/dashboard monitoring leveraging the Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Business Intelligence platform as well as new Microsoft Office 2007 capabilities.

Oracle, new to the list this year, with the acquisition of Hyperion is now one of the leading providers of comprehensive performance management and business intelligence solutions. Oracle provides strategy management and planning, budgeting/forecasting, financial consolidation, profitability management, pre-built business intelligence applications (e.g., sales, marketing, HR, financial, supply chain, call center analytics) along with a comprehensive business intelligence foundation, reporting, analysis tools and transactional systems.

SAP, also new to the list this year, significantly expanded its performance management applications and tools offerings in 2007 with the acquisitions of Pilot Software and OutlookSoft, in addition to an OEM agreement with Acorn Systems for Profitability Management. SAP has also just completed their acquisition of Business Objects. They now offer leading solutions for budgeting, planning, consolidation, strategy management, profitability optimization, governance, risk and compliance, as well as business intelligence and transactional systems.

SAS offers comprehensive BPM and BI solutions that allow companies to formulate, communicate, measure and monitor strategies and plans with integrated planning, budgeting, financial consolidation, reporting, and robust scorecard and dashboard reporting solutions that leverage predictive modeling and analytic capabilities. SAS also offers profitability analysis and activity-based management solutions as well as operational analytic applications in IT, sales, marketing, human resources and other departments.

Some of the vendors on the list offer just performance applications, others add in business intelligence tools, while still others also provide the underlying transactional systems. Hopefully this list can help you identify one or more vendors worth considering for your own BPM project. For more information, you can replay our webcast on this topic.

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