Yellowfin Business Intelligence
Encyclopedia
Yellowfin is a business intelligence
(BI), dashboard, report
ing and data analysis software vendor. Yellowfin’s software allows reporting from data stored in relational databases, multi-dimensional cubes or in-memory analytical databases. Headquartered in Melbourne
, Australia
, the company was founded by a team of business intelligence industry veterans.
Yellowfin initially developed a ROLAP
(Relational OLAP) tool for a SAAS
application software vendor. This resulted in an early specialization in providing both embedded reporting capabilities to software companies as well as support for the complexities of multi-tenancy hosted environments.
The first version was 2.1 and released in 2004. This version was fairly basic and provided report writing capability only and lacked the meta-data layer and dashboard components available in later releases.
An open server based architecture and having been developed in Java, provided the basis for subsequent releases to introduce greater levels of functionality. Amongst these was the development of a fully integrated location intelligence
module and mobile BI
platform. Yellowfin is recognized as a leader in the location intelligence space. as it is one of the few business intelligence tools
to have a fully integrated GIS functionality as part of its reporting and dashboard solution. In 2010 Yellowfin announced the release of a major new version 5.0. It includes an integrated in-memory columnar database to support querying of very large data sets and the ability to manage spreadsheet reporting through a centralized repository.
Due to the early association with other software vendors, Yellowfin had also specialized in the embedded business intelligence market providing their solution as a white label product. Yellowfin’s primary business model is growth via channel sales through resellers, software partners as well as industry alliances such as Sybase
. As a result of these partnerships Yellowfin has over 100,000 end users today in over 50 countries across a broad range of industries including financial services, retail, telecommunications, logistics, professional services and government.
In May 2011, Yellowfin, has been recognized amongst the world’s elite BI vendors, outperforming established players and Open Source BI vendors in the latest Dresner Advisory Services "Wisdom of Crowds Business Intelligence Market Study".
The global study ranked vendors on a five-point scale, across 32 criteria, based on: Sales experience, value, quality and usefulness of product, quality of technical support, quality and value of consulting services, and whether existing clients would recommend the vendor and its product to others.
The findings, released mid-May this year and compiled via feedback from eligible respondents (users with first-hand experience with the BI vendors and their product/services), compared 16 of the world’s leading BI vendors and awarded Yellowfin an overall score of 4.23 out of five. Yellowfin outscored big name players including Qliktech, SAS Institute, Microstrategy, Oracle, IBM Cognos, Microsoft and SAP Business Objects along with Open Source offerings Actuate (BIRT), Pentaho and Jaspersoft.
The major theme of release 3.2 was enhanced data visualisation and user interaction, The release included:
Release 3.3 (10th December 2007),
The biggest change in 3.3 was the inclusion of sub queries these permit users to write complex reports via the UI
The release included:
Release 4.1 (25th July 2009)
Release 5.0 (7th May 2010)
Release 5.1 (9th November 2010)
Release 5.2 (10th June 2011), The theme of Release 5.2 was; Making the product even easier to use; Making it faster to get insight from data; Making decisions faster with more accuracy.
Business intelligence
Business intelligence mainly refers to computer-based techniques used in identifying, extracting, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments, or by associated costs and incomes....
(BI), dashboard, report
Report
A report is a textual work made with the specific intention of relaying information or recounting certain events in a widely presentable form....
ing and data analysis software vendor. Yellowfin’s software allows reporting from data stored in relational databases, multi-dimensional cubes or in-memory analytical databases. Headquartered in Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, the company was founded by a team of business intelligence industry veterans.
History
Yellowfin was founded in 2003 to address the need of business users and the growing demand for pervasive business intelligence. Its focus was on the user experience and the development of easy to use web based interfaces.Yellowfin initially developed a ROLAP
ROLAP
ROLAP stands for Relational Online Analytical Processing.ROLAP is an alternative to the MOLAP technology...
(Relational OLAP) tool for a SAAS
Software as a Service
Software as a service , sometimes referred to as "on-demand software," is a software delivery model in which software and its associated data are hosted centrally and are typically accessed by users using a thin client, normally using a web browser over the Internet.SaaS has become a common...
application software vendor. This resulted in an early specialization in providing both embedded reporting capabilities to software companies as well as support for the complexities of multi-tenancy hosted environments.
The first version was 2.1 and released in 2004. This version was fairly basic and provided report writing capability only and lacked the meta-data layer and dashboard components available in later releases.
An open server based architecture and having been developed in Java, provided the basis for subsequent releases to introduce greater levels of functionality. Amongst these was the development of a fully integrated location intelligence
Location intelligence
Location Intelligence is the capacity to organize and understand complex phenomena through the use of geographic relationships inherent in all information. By combining geographic- and location-related data with other business data, organizations can gain critical insights, make better decisions...
module and mobile BI
Mobile business intelligence
Mobile Business Intelligence refers to the distribution of business data to mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers...
platform. Yellowfin is recognized as a leader in the location intelligence space. as it is one of the few business intelligence tools
Business intelligence tools
Business intelligence tools are a type of application software designed to retrieve, analyze and report data. The tools generally read data that have been previously stored, often, though not necessarily, in a data warehouse or data mart....
to have a fully integrated GIS functionality as part of its reporting and dashboard solution. In 2010 Yellowfin announced the release of a major new version 5.0. It includes an integrated in-memory columnar database to support querying of very large data sets and the ability to manage spreadsheet reporting through a centralized repository.
Due to the early association with other software vendors, Yellowfin had also specialized in the embedded business intelligence market providing their solution as a white label product. Yellowfin’s primary business model is growth via channel sales through resellers, software partners as well as industry alliances such as Sybase
Sybase
Sybase, an SAP company, is an enterprise software and services company offering software to manage, analyze, and mobilize information, using relational databases, analytics and data warehousing solutions and mobile applications development platforms....
. As a result of these partnerships Yellowfin has over 100,000 end users today in over 50 countries across a broad range of industries including financial services, retail, telecommunications, logistics, professional services and government.
Industry
In 2008, MIS Magazine recognised Yellowfin with inclusion in its top 100 international strategic companies list for 2008In May 2011, Yellowfin, has been recognized amongst the world’s elite BI vendors, outperforming established players and Open Source BI vendors in the latest Dresner Advisory Services "Wisdom of Crowds Business Intelligence Market Study".
The global study ranked vendors on a five-point scale, across 32 criteria, based on: Sales experience, value, quality and usefulness of product, quality of technical support, quality and value of consulting services, and whether existing clients would recommend the vendor and its product to others.
The findings, released mid-May this year and compiled via feedback from eligible respondents (users with first-hand experience with the BI vendors and their product/services), compared 16 of the world’s leading BI vendors and awarded Yellowfin an overall score of 4.23 out of five. Yellowfin outscored big name players including Qliktech, SAS Institute, Microstrategy, Oracle, IBM Cognos, Microsoft and SAP Business Objects along with Open Source offerings Actuate (BIRT), Pentaho and Jaspersoft.
Milestones
Release 3.2 (9th June 2007),The major theme of release 3.2 was enhanced data visualisation and user interaction, The release included:
- KPI Dashboard Tabs
- Improved Charting
- More Flexible Analytic Functions
- Data Annotations – Wow!
- Reporting from Stored Procedures
- Freehand SQL reports – with formatting!
Release 3.3 (10th December 2007),
The biggest change in 3.3 was the inclusion of sub queries these permit users to write complex reports via the UI
The release included:
- Advanced Querying with Sub Queries
- Enhanced KPI and Dashboard Reporting
- Improved Chart interactivity
- Additional Related Report options – tabbed and linked
- SQL Reports with user prompts and source filters
- More Flexible Data Format Options
Release 4.1 (25th July 2009)
- Federated Queries: Allowed users to access more than one data source at a time and combine the results into a single memory table or report.
- Improvements to the analytic dashboards, focusing on using filters for drill down.
- Spatial BI: Allowed users to generate location intelligence via GIS and WMS layering.
- Charts: Introduced a range of new chart types to allow users to express their data in different visual ways (including Z charts, funnel charts, etc).
- Usability, improved look and feel, report previews, improved calculated field builder, recent report listing and improved inbox.
- Filters: Allowed users to store user-prompted filter results in a drop down, so that users can quickly retrieve commonly used filters.
Release 5.0 (7th May 2010)
- An embedded in-memory database for quick data access and manipulation.
- A fully integrated user interface for all development steps.
- Mobile BI: Release of native iPhone application to access Yellowfin reports.
Release 5.1 (9th November 2010)
- Social Media layer: Allows multiple users to annotate, comment and discuss, reports, charts and maps to share insights and drive decisions faster.
- Decision widgets for polling and deciding action.
- Ability to link reports into discussions.
- Yellowfin Connect: Publish reports externally to websites, discussion boards, and blogs via Javascript export.
- Data hierarchies.
- Extensive use of AJAX to improve the user experience.
- New range of data visualization options.
- Mobile BI: Release of native Android application to access Yellowfin reports.
Release 5.2 (10th June 2011), The theme of Release 5.2 was; Making the product even easier to use; Making it faster to get insight from data; Making decisions faster with more accuracy.
- New analytical visualizations that make data analysis easier and more insightful
- New Charts (Box and Whisker, Histograms, Trellis Charts and Heat Maps) & HTML 5 integration
- An upgraded User Interface (UI) for improved navigation and self service reporting
- New Filters
- View Enhancements
- Usage Reports (out of the box)
- Clearer, more intuative UI
- Improved scalability to allow organizations to easily grow as data demands increase
- Improved Clustering
- Security enhancements
- Reduced load times
- Connections to PALO, SAP BW