Want to get started with Business Analytics? – Look no further…

Early last week, we released our latest Smart Analytics System aimed at the Mid Market and emerging businesses. After last week’s rant about certain Mid-Market ‘appliances’ (Seriously have no idea how a Database Appliance ships with out a database in it – Should be termed as a Database Assistant or something…) I thought it would be a good opportunity to introduce our 5710 model more formally.

The Smart Analytics System 5710 was designed from the ground up to acknowledge the high entry cost for many organizations new to data warehousing and analytics. At around a ~$50K or so (US$) list price the 5710 delivers a single server solution complete with data warehouse, server hardware and tuned storage and a starter pack of 5 user licenses of Cognos 10 BI – All in the box! I’m pretty sure there is nothing out there on the market that is packaged so complete at such a compelling price.

Keeping it simple – The Smart Analytics 5710 comes in 3 sizes:

• Small 1.5 TB User Data (COMRESSED)
• Medium 5.4 TB User Data (COMRESSED)
• Large 13.2 TB of User Data (COMRESSED)

And what I mean by compressed is that this is post compression – so in essence you can have much more user data at your disposal. For an explanation of how this works see here.

In the coming weeks you will hear more about analytical workloads and a number of different ‘types.  Rest assured that the Smart Analytics 5710 handles all analytical workloads (including operational analytics – ie the Operational Data Store (ODS) ). This enables the 5710 to be used at both ends of the spectrum – From a focused departmental data mart – all the way to supporting complex real-time data warehousing across your organization. With the 5710 – your choices are endless. (..and you get single call support!)

As with all Smart Analytics Systems, the 5710 is a ‘workload optimized’ system that is built around our InfoSphere Warehouse Software. For those not familiar with this, InfoSphere Warehouse is IBM’s DB2 based Data Warehousing software and is a leading choice for enterprise data warehouses across the globe. The reason why? – Well because you get: Cognos 10 BI, OLAP, Data Mining, Availability, ELT and more all in the package!

In summary – the 5710 is the perfect starting point for any business getting into data warehousing and analytics. When paired with the InfoSphere Warehouse Packs, you get even more functionality and immediate answers to your most pressing business problems out of the gate. (ie understanding lets say what product sells best with leading product xyz? – ala market basket analysis).

The IBM Smart Analytics 5710: Analytic Performance – Simple and Complete …all at an attractive price point that wont break the bank.

For more detailed information on the offering: IBM Smart Analytics System 5710

ps. – I’ll save it for another day – but the guts of a 5710 can also be deployed via a VM image …yeah, pretty cool.

pps – For more information on the financial benefits of TB pricing – Check out ITG’s webcast this Thursday with Information Week.