The data industry is changing. As Game of Thrones grows in popularity, it seems the data industry is trying to follow trend with many mergers, acquisitions and takeovers one after the other. Over the past couple of months we have observed:
- Salesforce’s acquisition of Tableau
- Google’s acquisition of Looker
- The merger of Sisense and Periscope
- Logi Analytics buyout of Zoomdata
What does this mean for the rest of the industry and its customers?
To some degree, we knew this was going to happen and will continue to happen. When we observe explosive growth of solutions within a single category, consolidation is always an eventuality.
Whilst for some this can rejuvenate and improve their companies productivity, not all joining of forces happens easily. Once companies begin to cobble together, the difficulty of figuring out how to work as a team and architecturally make two completely different companies work seamlessly together creates a risk to both sides. How successfully this match-making will be remains to be seen.
We have already seen major questions and lawsuits brought forward by stockholders of Tableau who were not happy with the all-stock acquisition by Salesforce. Yet, as predicted by Knowi CEO, Jay Gopalakrishnan in ‘Coffee with Knowi ep. 1’, those suits turned out to be nothing more than noise as the $15.7B deal closed in just 2 months.
Why is all this relevant?
The movement in the market, mainly by what we consider Generation 2 companies- those born around 2008-2012- sets up the Analytics industry for the future. And a big part of that future is the implementation of Artificial intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning into virtually every aspect of our lives. Just as it’s been elsewhere, it’s implementation into the data industry is revolutionary. This feature takes data beyond what any human has ever been able to do, combining hindsight and foresights to take action from anomalies, trends and other data uses that have been missed in the past. The machines can detect patterns in the data that would have been missed otherwise, and will give businesses the ability to transform moving into the future.
Combined with Business Intelligence (BI) and the ability to question your data in a Google-like fashion using Natural Language Processing (NLP) on a single platform, data is going to change the way business is done all over the world.
Where does this leave Knowi?
As a Generation 3, multi-functionality platform, Knowi already has all the necessary tools to provide an end-to-end experience for its customers. The implementation of AI, BI and NLP to it’s platform creates an additional layer that accentuates the customer experience beyond what has been possible in the past, and allows real-time viewing of data insights with the ability to create visualizations that fit any need. With all the technology in the palm of our hands the future is bright. There is no better time than right now to jump on board and experience the beauty of a multi-functionality platform that can take you into the future.
Learn More: Check out CEO, Jay Gopalakrishnan and COO, Ryan Levy talking all things acquisitions and mergers here. Or, to sign up for a free 21 day POC click here.
