Microsoft’s Vision Goes ProClarity
April 4th, 2006 by Adam Cuothe
How many puns on vision can a company named ProClarity make? Today Microsoft bought the ProClarity, hoping to turn its BI offering into something competitive with friends Hyperion, Cognos, etc. The first thing I noticed in the press release was the following comment from Bob Lokken who is (was) the CEO of ProClarity.
“Our focus at ProClarity is to give organizations a simple, powerful and adaptable interface to insight, expanding on the power of the Microsoft business intelligence platform.”
Note how ProClarity’s PR person, who probably authored the official “quotation“, began it with the words “our focus.” My guess is that they try to do that kind of thing all the time. I figured I’d just go back and browse through some old press releases to see what Eye could find. (I also enjoy the idea of buying myself an interface to insight. Mein Gott, this company could put the entire psychiatric community out of work (also, would that interface constitute wetware?)
So here are my findings, from the beginning of the year ’till now.
1. 12 January PR on the company’s Understanding conference includes a “quote” by the company’s Otey, saying “I look forward to sharing my insight on Microsoft SQL Server 2005’s new features as they relate to the enterprise.” One down, plus we get insight and understanding from the same grey gook.
2. 16 January PR on the company’s retail acorns, which goes a little something like this
“The Retail Profitability Analysis solution… utilizes ProClarity Analytics 6 as a simple, powerful and adaptable interface to the Microsoft BI platform, providing retail organizations with valuable insight into operational performance…”
There it is, insight!
3. 18 January PR on customer 8el, buying ProClarity–will they get the insight interface? Let’s see… (note the ellipses in my comment, this is me taking a couple minutes to read the PR, it’s exciting because you can imagine this in real time)
“CallWatch Interactive, leveraging ProClarity software, will further empower 8el customers to make better informed, faster decisions through unprecedented access and visibility of call data combined with powerful reporting functionality.”
They got the visibility buzzword and “insight” appears as part of the company’s standard tagline. I won’t repeat that part–you can click the link to the press release if you want to find it.
4. 8 February PR on a non-recalcitrant endeavor taken with KalSoft to get into Pakistan and other MEA regions. Here, Ali Khan, of KalSoft gets to mention insight, “ProClarity offers a variety of excellent analytic tools for the Microsoft BI platform that allow users to glean valuable insight into corporate data”.
5. 8 February PR finally, we’re up-to-the-current-date, and I know this can’t be that exciting, we get decomposition tree visualizations and a Perspective View add-on.
Well there it is. I checked every press release from the beginning of the year, and they’ve all got something to do with vision or insight. It’s not surprising Microsoft bought them, the company talks about its goings-on with MS in every press release it issues. And anyway, you might argue that visibility is exactly what BI tools ought to be talking about. I wonder, will it run on Vista? Maybe that’s too far off on the horizon to answer.
April 5th, 2006 at 7:51 am
Oh, you’d be surprised by the insight provided by our decomposition tree visualization. We really talk like that. All the time.
April 5th, 2006 at 6:18 pm
:-)
One day at the company-wide meeting a fatherly CEO invited his employees to the boardroom for a silent sit-and-imagine session. His right arm (aka PR) gave the familiar gesture for everyone to imagine themselves in the lushest of lush gardens. By-and-by, an array of hydroponic greenery descended from the micropolkadot ceiling’s well-oiled machinery. Lengthy vines rustled their fronds gently in the air-conditioned breeze. From the center of the meeting table a hidden door slid open and a gnarled rubber tree was elevated to view. The employees watched as the spotlight above, illuminated its leaves. Within minutes, the decomposition began and the shiny leaves turned dark brown. It’s trunk shriveled and the branches fell. The employees breathed deeply while Lokken nodded his head toward the face of Bill Gates, which appeared in the fresh humus of the ol’ rubber tree.