January 1, 2004

Companies to Watch 2004

Intelligence | Integration | Infrastructure | Collaborative Business

Intelligence

by Michelle M. Young

While performance management is clearly the rising star among BI and analytics vendors in 2003, integration received almost as much attention, as customers demanded real-time visibility into existing systems for better intelligence.

1. SPSS Inc.

HQ: Chicago
CEO: Jack Noonan

Best known for its survey and statistical tools, SPSS's Clementine 8.0, Cleo 2.5, and OLAP 4.1 are well worth a second look. And now the company is moving to the next stage with predictive analytic applications taking a central role by releasing PredictiveMarketing and Predictive Web Analytics.

2. ProClarity Corp.

HQ: Boise, Idaho
CEO: Bob Lokken

Still one of the fastest growing private companies in BI, ProClarity continues to thrive and be applied to new types of applications, including performance management, and has recently acquired the right to expand into the U.K. market. The latest release of its Analytics Platform offers a new ProClarity Business Logic Server and increased abilities to create and manage key performance indicators.

3. ClearForest Corp.

HQ: New York
CEO: Barak Pridor

With valuable business intelligence buried in unstructured data, research intensive companies are beginning to realize the value potential of analysis of large document collections. ClearForest's cutting-edge ClearTags and ClearResearch are becoming must-haves for government agencies and pharmaceutical companies alike.

4. Coremetrics Inc.

HQ: Burlingame, Calif.
President: Robin Williamson

Coremetrics has taken a strong lead in the online customer behavior intelligence software market thanks to its strong reporting and proven scalability for major retailers, such as Victoria's Secret and Eddie Bauer. Not content to rest on its laurels, Coremetrics acquired WebCriteria for its Scenario Optimization Services to help business boost sitewide conversion rates.

5. Geac Computer Corp. Ltd.

HQ: Markham, Ontario
CEO: Charles S. Jones

The original performance manager provider stays strong in the space with nine consecutive profitable quarters. The successful integration of Comshare's planning, budgeting, forecasting, and financial consolidation will help Geac continue to gain customers looking for help complying with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002.

6. Celequest Corp.

HQ: Redwood Shores, Calif.
CEO: Diaz Nesamoney

With Diaz Nesamoney, one of the original founders of Informatica, at the helm, Celequest has instant BI credibility. But when you're competing against such industry veterans as Microsoft, BEA, and even Informatica in the newly emerging business activity monitoring space, it helps to provide a single integrated environment for BAM processing for increased operational efficiency.

7. Actuate Corp.

HQ: South San Francisco, Calif.
CEO: Pete Cittadini

In another example of the marriage of integration and intelligence, Actuate's assimilation of Nimble Technology Inc.'s open, XML-based data integration technology into its Information Application Platform will help it integrate readily with a broad range of XML-enabled systems - a must in the "do more with what you have" corporate environment.

8. Databeacon Inc.

HQ: Ottawa
CEO: Andrew Coutts

The Web reporting and data analysis software developer is going after the largely untapped - and underserved - mid-market with an expanded global presence and solutions that target the must-haves of rapid deployment, low total cost of ownership, and applicability to specific problems.

9. Applix Inc.

HQ: Westborough, Mass.
CEO: David Mahoney

No matter how much IT departments would like to eliminate spreadsheets for more consistent data and centralized administration, Excel remains one of the top tools of the business user. Applix's TM1 Web manages to combine the best of both worlds as organizations strive to introduce performance management throughout the enterprise.

10. Netezza Corp.

HQ: Framingham, Mass.
CEO: Jit Saxena

Led by the former founder, chairman, and CEO of Applix, Netezza has doubled the performance and tripled the capacity of its Netezza Performance Server configuration. As it gains traction in the high-end data warehousing market with its low-price strategy to use an open-source database and operating system in a box, the start-up seems poised to challenge NCR Corp. subsidiary Teradata's dominance.

11. Silvon Software Inc.

HQ: Westmont, Ill.
CEO: Mike Hennel

With performance management the trend du jour, Silvon's Stratum 4.0 suite is reaping the benefits of a supply-chain background with new functionality that targets manufacturing and retail trouble spots of inventory replenishment and management.

12. Spotfire Inc.

HQ: Somerville, Mass.
CEO: Christopher Ahlberg

Spotfire DecisionSite 7.2 continues to turn heads with its attractive combination of data mining, visualization, and collaboration functionality - especially in the hot biotechnology markets. Spotfire is digging deep into this goldmine with new customer and reseller wins.