ASI Unveils New Web-Based BI Suite: ASI Inquire 4.0
ASI Business Solutions, Inc., the Delaware Valley-based provider of software, business consulting and IT services, has announced October availability for a major upgrade to its suite of Web-based enterprise business intelligence (BI) products. ASI Inquire 4.0 seamlessly integrates Web and client/server architectures allowing an enterprise to deploy the same system in a completely flexible manner. Several new features support the creation of information portals that can integrate knowledge management with business intelligence.
The ASI Inquire 4.0 business intelligence suite consists of the following major components:
"Our product announcement today culminates over a year of intensive R&D effort and extensive customer testing," stated David Menzies, Vice-President, Global Technology Services. "We believe this release delivers on the promise of Web-based applications in an enterprise context and provides the perfect platform for Gartner Group's vision of the information democracy. Specifically, our management, security and administration tools allow for the deployment of advanced reporting and analysis on an enterprise basis. Enterprise policies for data access can be easily implemented either directly or via directory integration."
One of the main challenges in wide deployment of BI is the varying skill levels of target users. Building on its experience in large-scale implementations, ASI has incorporated several features to provide additional guidance and knowledge-management facilities.
Report linking allows analysts to create "chains of analysis" in order to guide report consumers through a specific analysis scenario. Reports can be linked together to present them in a specific order, guiding the viewer through a virtual report book. Viewers can, of course, drill down and further explore any specific report in the chain to gain valuable insights.
ASI Inquire 4.0 Client continues and expands on ASI's tradition of providing advanced-feature technology for both desktop and mobile users. At less than 2 MB, the lightweight client OCX (OLE custom control) is substantially smaller than many popular plug-ins such as Acrobat Reader 3.x. At the same time, it provides a complete set of OLAP analysis features in a connected and/or stand-alone environment. The ASI Inquire 4.0 Client can also be presented to OLE-compliant applications as an OCX, exposing contents of the underlying data mart through an industry-standard API. Using this feature, designers can integrate individualized BI content with other Web or non-Web content to provide a dynamic, context-rich knowledge management environment.
New mapping facilities allow users to explore their data mart in a geographic context. Reports are presented in maps using industry-standard coordinate data. Geo-coded data can be easily visualized and quickly analyzed using this intuitive new facility.
ASI Inquire 4.0 Server provides scalable multi-dimensional database query services allowing deployment in a Web or client/server architecture. The Server supports symmetric multi-processing (SMP) under Windows NT or Windows 2000, allowing users to scale the system by adding more processors. Additionally, multiple query servers can be added and the system provides automatic load balancing. Consequently, ASI Inquire 4.0 can support a virtually unlimited number of simultaneous queries in critical enterprise deployments without suffering degraded response time.
The ASI Inquire 4.0 Server is designed to provide high-performance access to very large data marts. Through advanced data optimization techniques, the Server can achieve average data reductions of between 4 to 1 and 10 to 1. Unlike conventional OLAP systems, ASI Inquire 4.0 Server achieves data reduction rather than data explosion. This enables ASI Inquire data to be easily deployed to remote users, such as mobile sales forces, so that they don't have to rely on being connected to the Internet or a network in order to access business intelligence analysis.
An important component of enterprise BI deployment is system management, security and administration. ASI Console 4.0 provides a number of new features designed to facilitate enterprise deployments. ASI Console 4.0 provides a zero administration environment for deployed clients. Software, meta data, report templates and data can all be distributed to the desktop automatically without user intervention.
A new user interface provides simplified operational management support. System alerts can be transmitted via e-mail or pagers to help streamline operational support.
ASI Console also handles the apportioning and distribution of business intelligence reports to end-users. The reports can be generated through a new batch control language and delivered in a variety of forms, including electronic distribution via CD-ROM or via the wire, as well as hardcopy reports.
AIM provides a visual-editing environment for developing ASI Inquire meta data. ASI Inquire uses this meta data to define corporate business rules and standards and as a way to map difficult-to-read data labels to standard business terms for user presentation. ASI Inquire's meta data model is also extensible through standard programming tools, allowing for substantial flexibility in source data customization. ASI intends to integrate AIM with evolving meta data standards as they become available.
Shipping this October, ASI Inquire 4.0 is priced based on the number of clients deployed. Typical configurations begin at $75,000 for an EIS implementation to $300,000 for a 200-user management reporting system.
ASI Business Solutions provides software and services to help organizations leverage their business intelligence across the enterprise. Its products include ASI Inquire, the revolutionary business intelligence tool as well as a complete suite of services to help IT organizations align their technology infrastructure with their company's business needs. Additional materials can be obtained by contacting ASI Business Solutions at info@asi-solutions.com or via the Web at http://www.asi-solutions.com.