June 2012

Mobile BI: The next frontier in

Business Intelligence
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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION 2

LEVELS OF ENGAGEMENT IN MOBILE BI 3

MOBILE BI: PARADIGM SHIFT 4

EVALUATING THE NEED FOR MOBILE BI 5

DEFINING A MOBILE BI ROADMAP 6

CHOOSING THE RIGHT MOBILE BI PLATFORM 6

FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS 7

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 7

INTRODUCTION
Over the last few years we have witnessed unprecedented changes
in how the world lives, communicates and interacts. The advent
of the internet has disrupted well established business models by
enabling new channels to get information, shop and communicate
almost instantaneously from any computer screen. In a matter of
years email and the web went from being niche tools, primarily
for academic institutions to being tools at the service of the entire
population. Reuters estimated that the number of internets users
would exceed 2 billion by the end of 2010. However, Reuters did
not factor-in that the PCs would be outsold by mobile devices
by 2011. As of 2012, there are over 1.2 billion mobile web users;
with this number only expected to grow as more of the 5.9 billion
mobile subscribers upgrade to smart phones (85% of the phones
sold in 2011 were smart phones).
This new connected world has changed how consumers shop for
products and services establishing the need for businesses to provide
a consistent experience regardless of the channel – web, mobile,
brick-and-mortar, telephone, email – which the consumers use
to interact with the service provider. Many of these empowered
consumers are taking their devices to work and expect their firms
to provide support for these devices for them to perform tasks that
require access to sensitive or secure company information. Further,
companies are looking to leverage this new symbiotic relationship

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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

between individuals and mobile devices to provide their employees

with enhanced information services that enable them to make
better decisions regardless of location or access device. This need for
information to be ubiquitous has created a discontinuity that many
companies will have to bridge to stay competitive, the purpose of
this whitepaper is to help these companies understand this new
paradigm and ease their journey into the next frontier in Business
Intelligence: Mobile BI.

LEVELS OF ENGAGEMENT IN MOBILE BI

As organizations start exploring this new frontier, they will begin
by exploring the territory, mainly in the form of enabling mobile
access to their existing BI implementations. The next step in the
journey will be to start leveraging the very nature of the mobile
platform for their employees to engage, collaborate and share.
Mature organizations in the Mobile BI space will have mastered the
new possibilities enabled by built-in mobile features such as GPS.
The diagram below illustrates this concept and provides a better
definition of the levels of engagement in Mobile BI.

• Enables new use cases

Enablement of new for BI on the spot (geo
applications powered by location)
Mobile BI capabilities • Empowers users to take
immediate action

Establishing Mobile
• Establishes a platform
BI as a collaboration
to engage, collaborate
platform & share
• Results in higher
acceptance and usage

Porting of
existing BI • Provides information
capabilities available anytime from
into Mobile anywhere
• Defines a simple,
easy, intuitive, natural
navigation

1. The porting of existing BI and Information Management

capabilities so they can be accessed through a mobile
device
Most companies start their inroads into Mobile BI by enabling
the mobile access of their existing reports, dashboards and
information querying capabilities. This is the fastest way to get
started as there are many Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS)
products that can be leveraged to Mobile enable the existing BI
Infrastructure. This approach can help an organization achieve
benefits faster by providing a simple, easy and intuitive way of
navigating the information free from the limitations of a mouse
and keyboard from any location where the mobile device gets
connectivity.

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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

2. The establishment of mobile BI as a new platform to

engage, collaborate and share
The next level of Mobile BI is tapping into the social nature of
the mobile devices; the mobile devices were designed with the
intention to enable communication and collaboration regardless
of the physical location of the person. When these native concepts
are applied to BI we start seeing new users accessing the system,
being pulled in by other users in the context of discussing a
revelation within the “aha! Moment“.
3. The enablement of advanced BI features through Mobile
(E.g. geo location)
The highest category of engagement for Mobile BI is the
enablement of new use cases or applications leveraging the
location awareness capabilities of today’s mobile devices. In
addition to empowering users to take immediate action, these
new capabilities enhance the experience by providing a default
context setting for the BI applications. For example, if a user
is visiting a particular store, the application would detect the
location of the user and provide specific reports for that store
when the application is opened.

MOBILE BI: PARADIGM SHIFT

Mobile BI demands a different approach and mindset in
conceptualizing and executing BI solutions.

Traditional BI

Mobile BI Applications

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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

From: Traditional BI

The traditional paradigm for BI is centered on Reports and

Dashboards that will be accessed through a web browser from a
computer. The user will interact with these components using a
combination of keyboard and mouse to identify the areas of interest
that will most likely be eventually printed, emailed or downloaded
in Excel format for further manipulation. Typically many reports
require the answering of multiple prompts before the user can access
the information and few very users will leverage all the advanced
data analysis features that modern BI suites provide.

To: Mobile BI

Mobile BI still leverages reports and dashboards, but these are usually
arranged following a story board. Because of the space limitations
on mobile devices the information is segmented in screens that are
linked between them, enabling the users to follow-up their thought
process from generic to specific using a few “gestures” on the
touch screen interface. Mobile devices have the benefit of having
intrinsic/ built-in features that enabled a more natural interaction
with the BI application. For example the built-in camera that most
mobile devices have today can be used as a scanner and quickly
capture information from a bar code (rather than the user typing
the UPC number), also the GPS feature can be leveraged to default
the application to a particular view based on the most common
view of the information from that location. Further, given the very
nature of mobile, decisions can be made right on the spot; a big leap
from a generation ago where the decision maker had to take notes
and then wait to be in front of a computer to execute.

EVALUATING THE NEED FOR MOBILE BI

While the advent of Mobile BI can bring substantial benefits to an
organization, it can also be highly disruptive. The recommendation
is for every organization to evaluate the readiness to start a Mobile
BI roadmap, across three major perspectives: People, Process and
Technology. The chart below illustrates some of the key questions
that most be answered when planning to start on this Journey.

1. Are your users already using mobile devices

(e.g. Smart Phones, Tablets)?
PEOPLE
2. Does your organization allow the use of mobile
devices at the workplace?

1. Does your business processes allow for out of

office execution?
PROCESS
2. How you evaluated the new users of in spot
access to information and execution?

1. Does your infrastructure allow the use of mobile

devices (e.g. Do you currently have Wi-Fi across
TECHNOLOGY all locations of interest)?
2. Is your BI infrastructure ready for enabling
real-time information?

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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

DEFINING A MOBILE BI ROADMAP

Once the organization has decided to start their journey into
Mobile BI, there will be a need to create a roadmap that answer such
questions as: What do we want to achieve, Where do we want to
go with this technology? While these questions might seem trivial,
there is a large number of companies which started their journey
into Mobile BI, committing million of dollars in Mobile equipment
buys, that had to put their initiatives on hold because they realized
they did not have a strong business case.
Typically the best way to start the roadmap exercise is by identifying
a business sponsor and aligning the Mobile BI strategy to their
information needs. The next step will be to identify what technology
(combination of device & software platform) will be best suited to
address the needs of the business sponsor. Subsequently, there will
be planning and prioritzation exercise to align people expectations
and set the context of what can be realistically achieved given the
timeline and program constraints.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT MOBILE BI PLATFORM

The most critical technical element of the Mobile BI Roadmap is the
selection of the Mobile BI platform. While there are many offerings
in the market and at first glance, all of them seem similar, the
recommendation is not to rush into a decision, but rather conduct a
formal tool selection exercise, including a POC. The tool selection
exercise needs to start with the definition and endorsement of the
Mobile BI reporting requirements from Business Stakeholders.

Design mock Mobile

Design use cases BI dashboard Consensus building
to arrive at desired report templates on design of
functionalities – Ease that business Mobile BI reports
of use & Ease of stakeholders would and desired
Implementation like to view on functionalities
defined frequency

Mobile BI Dashboard Report Layouts

Pre- 3-D
Select 2/3
liminary analysis: Manpower
Tool Mobile BI
Mobile R-Fit, Cost Planning
Selection tools for
BI Tool & Imple- &
Criteria further
Evalua- mentation Budgeting
analysis
tions Time

Mobile BI Tool Selection Process

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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS
The author hopes that this whitepaper has met its goal of assisting
organizations to better plan their journey into Mobile BI. It is indeed
a journey full of potential but also plagued with many obstacles that
will test the most experienced BI practitioners. The possibilities
enabled by the new advanced mobile technologies are indeed vast
but the benefits will only be realized by aligning both business and
IT to meet well defined organizational objectives. Welcome to the
new Frontier and best of luck on your journey!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Noe Gutierrez is a Practice Director in the Business Intelligence
Solutions group, a 2000+ practice dedicated to Information
Management, Reporting and Analytics at HCL. Noe comes to
HCL with domestic and international experience in Business
Intelligence consulting and a strong industry background.
He has played strategic roles on practice leadership, business
development and practice delivery at other global consulting
organizations. He has helped many multi-nationals to grow and
mature their BI/IM practices and expand them globally, including
Latin America, Canada and Europe.

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Mobile BI: The next frontier in Business Intelligence | June 2012

About HCL
About HCL Technologies
HCL Technologies is a leading global IT services company,
working with clients in the areas that impact and redefine
the core of their businesses. Since its inception into the
global landscape after its IPO in 1999, HCL focuses on
‘transformational outsourcing’, underlined by innovation
and value creation, and offers integrated portfolio of
services including software-led IT solutions, infrastructure
management, engineering and R&D services and BPO.
HCL leverages its extensive global offshore infrastructure
and network of offices in 26 countries to provide holistic,
multi-service delivery in key industry verticals including
Financial Services, Manufacturing, Consumer Services, Public
Services and Healthcare. HCL takes pride in its philosophy
of ‘Employee First, Customer Second’ which empowers our
82,464 transformers to create a real value for the customers.
HCL Technologies, along with its subsidiaries, has reported
consolidated revenues of US$ 4.0 billion (Rs. 19,412 crores),
as on 31 March 2012 (on LTMbasis). For more information,
please visit www.hcltech.com

About HCL Enterprise

HCL is a $6.2 billion leading global technology and
IT enterprise comprising two companies listed in India -
HCL Technologies and HCL Infosystems. Founded in 1976,
HCL is one of India’s original IT garage start-ups. A pioneer
of modern computing, HCL is a global transformational
enterprise today. Its range of offerings includes product
engineering, custom & package applications, BPO,
IT infrastructure services, IT hardware, systems integration,
and distribution of information and communications
technology (ICT) products across a wide range of focused
industry verticals. The HCL team consists of over 90,000
professionals of diverse nationalities, who operate from
31 countries including over 500 points of presence in
India. HCL has partnerships with several leading global
1000 firms, including leading IT and technology firms. For
more on HCL, please visit www.hcl.com

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