MicroStrategy Reviews

We actually have two industries we service. We service the transportation industry, as well as the healthcare industry. We typically do patient transports for emergency and non-emergencies. We do them by helicopter, that is our airmen division. We have a number of other businesses that we serve, like alarm system companies and the like, but primarily we use our analytics to look at patient transport counts and volumes, by the day, by the week, and by the month.

We also look at specific parishes (we call them battalions) to see how we can expand businesses out in Texas and Louisiana. We have a large market in Louisiana, Mississippi, and the surrounding areas. Therefore, we do a lot of proof of concept reporting as well, and we use the Enterprise Manager for other things as well.

We literally have some issues with the high-end users using the data and trusting the data. A lot of it gets dumped into certain areas, therefore we made a central repository for it. Then MicroStrategy reports off of that central repository, so we can validate the data relatively easily. Thus we can say, "Look, this is what we are seeing for Louisiana. This is what you guys have from the communication center. It matches one for one."

It builds a lot of rapport between the top end users and us. When I say that, I am referring to the "C" levels, the executive committee people, and other high end users.

MicroStrategy self-service is on the horizon. We have a couple of groups of people that we are trying to test out self-service with right now, specifically, our quality improvement group and our business development group. The problem for us is we do not want self-service to become this thing where there are reports everywhere and we can't manage it, so we are trying to develop some auditing processes to make sure that we are not throwing ourselves to the wolves. However, the plan is definitely to move towards self-service. We want the users to be able to be intelligent enough to make what they need and see what they want.

Dossiers are going to change the name of the game for us. We want to be able to have the executive committee go into a meeting and tell a story. We want them to tell us a story, not us. I do not want to go in as an IT guy and say, "Hey, this is the story." We really want the executive committee to be able to understand that this is a way of telling a story with data, because data without information is useless. If we can get them to that point, which I am confident that we can, then MicroStrategy will have done a great service to us, and rendered time back to us to go spend on other places. 

That is really what we are shooting for. Dossier is a big thing for us. Geospatial analytics is huge for us. Anything that we can do with self-service is big for us. Those are the top three goals for 2018, in general.

The one thing that we have wanted to get more into, and we have touched a little bit of, is the Esri out-of-the-box: Esri mapping geospatial analytics. In fact, our presentation includes a piece of how we were able to leverage placing that airmen station in Texas for the first time, based upon transports from a geospatial map. 

There also are a few others that we have taken advantage of recently. I think the chat feature inside of 10.10 is huge, especially if you are doing collaborative dashboarding.

We mostly do MicroStrategy, so we prefer the single platform for analytics capabilities. There are some use cases to do multi-platform. We just have not been at a point where we can overutilize it yet, or even utilize it at all. The cases for us that come up, they are so far and few between that we really have to take advantage of it and spend a lot of time on it, so that we can sell it. I imagine in the future that we probably will have multi-platform stuff.

We have some mobilize licenses right now. We have a small amount: 25. We built a couple of mobile apps. We have not jumped on the mobile bandwagon just yet. We have some use cases for it. We have not really identified where we can get the most bang for our buck. I imagine 2018 might have some of that as well, as a minor goal, possibly 2019. This being a huge issue for us, our getting into it, because a lot of our trucks, our medics, our people who drive on our trucks, and do the transfers, they all have iPads. If there is something that we can give them which says, "Hey, avoid traffic here," or do something to make a decision, that could be huge. Use cases are always a challenge.

If I had no issues with the tool ever or if I did not have any problems when I upgraded, then I would probably give it a higher rating (a perfect 10). If the Enterprise Manager was a little bit less quirky when you build out-of-the-box customization reports for it, I probably would give it a 10, but just those small things bring it down a little bit for me. However, it is a good tool.

Let us say that you have someone who comes in who does not have a strong programming background and they want to use Enterprise Manager to do some things. It is sort of the way the warehouse is set up, they might need the statistics warehouse when they first get in and they could be very turned off by the UI. Just the way some of the reports tailor themselves out-of-the-box, it does not really lend itself to be helpful. 

Then you have to customize, and when you start customizing, you bring in these attributes that sometimes do not even fit together. You may want to see something and how it gets done, then you are kind of stuck. That can make you leave the tool alone completely. Luckily for us, we have found ways to work with our consultant, and just really try to tackle it as much as possible. We have found ways to get around it.

I actually enjoy MicroStrategy a lot. When it came to Arcadia Data, it was sort of dead in the water, a Lazarus project. It kind of came up from the dead. Mostly because people did not understand the tool. My grandfather always had a saying that you got to know the tool before you can use the tool. That is what we did. My colleague and I took MicroStrategy, and said, "What does it do, what is it?" 

We just started building simple reports from scratch and went from there. Now, that we understand it, people are like, "Oh, okay. I get it. It's not that bad, it's actually great."

I am a fan of MicroStrategy and other tools, but I think MicroStrategy is a great tool. It does really well for what it serves.

We like the tech support. They have done a number of things to help us out. They have sent us to rapid response before, when we really needed them. They have gotten back to us as early as a day, maybe half day, and even within an hour. 

We have had positive experiences with them. There are areas that I can specify that they can improve in, but I think that is with any help desk or technical support.

I was not involved in the initial setup. 

I came in three years after its inception, and it was in the Lazarus stage. They were not going to spend any more money, get rid of the tool, phase out of it, and since then we have brought the tool back:

• We have bought 100 new licenses.
• We have ramped up user adoption.
• We have run on trips to do symposiums.
• We have found that it is starting to fit together.

Do not walk away without taking the time to get to know the product or the people intimately. If you are trying to do analytics, it is a fantastic product, a top-tier product. We have dealt with a number of other products. I worked with folks who have dealt with Tableau and others. Especially with what they are doing with Dossier and all the things that are coming out, MicroStrategy has really started to lead the way with analytics in the future. I would court MicroStrategy and spend some time with them. Get to see what the tool does and what can it do for you. Do some proofs of concept.

Most important criteria when selecting a vendor: We try to court them as much as possible. We want them to come and see how we do things in Louisiana. We are very much a down to earth folk. I will say that. People mention the Cajuns. We are kind of rambunctious, too. We got to get to know the person that is selling the product before we even get to know the product, then we look at the product, and say, "What does it do? What can it do for us?"

We do a lot of proofs of concept. We are doing telemetry in our trucks, ambulances, and vans, possibly. What we found is the MicroStrategy reps travel a great distance to see us, and we appreciate that. We need to see them face-to-face. If there is a quote, it is amazing what you find face-to-face. That is huge for us. We have to have that.

MicroStrategy is just readily available for us.

We use it mostly for the operational reporting. We also use it for the insurance claims and how to track them. 

The product is working fine. We feel they understand the healthcare system. 

The features of the product have definitely been beneficial. We do plan to roll out MicroStrategy Self-Service to our business teams.

We prefer having the analytic capabilities in a single platform, like MicroStrategy provides, because it is easier. The customer gets to use one type of tool, then sticks with it. The customers are looking for Geospatial in 2018, so that is where we will be using it.

We have been using it mostly for grid reports and its exporting features. We are going to start using the Geospatial, which is a new feature. We are also looking forward to the 10.9 and 10.10 features coming out. 

We have not invested nor are we planning to invest in MicroStrategy's mobile platform.

It is a very stable solution, meaning the application is very good. MicroStrategy works very well.

It is highly scalable. We have quite a few customers who are the users themselves. They use it and have not had any issues yet. 

I sometimes use technical support. When I do, I have found them to be helpful. The right person answers me when I contact them.

I was not involved in the initial setup.

However, I have been involved in upgrades of the solution, which were mostly straightforward.

The vendor technical support assisted in the upgrades.

This is definitely a solution worth investing in. It will be useful for the long term. Anyone who is researching similar solutions should look for the longer term.

Most important criteria when selecting a vendor: 

• The technical capability.
• They are able to deliver it.
• They understand the product. 

It is one of the best BI reporting tools as per Gartner. It is a complete reporting bundle, which includes reports/dashboards/document creation along with Cube.

It also comes with self-service analysis that helps the user carry out short analysis within the corporate level. It has a good administrator tool to handle the administrative part. It has server distribution to publish the dashboards and reports from the end user in different formats as well.

It includes lots of other features that help to take the reporting to the next level; for example, R Integration that supports more than 70 databases.

It has strong metadata in the architecture, which makes a huge difference with the other tools in the market.

It's a DSS tool. Thus, for analysis in an analytics-oriented company, it has made a huge difference in their decisions.

This product needs to be ready to use at the enterprise level . As the market is growing and changing very fast, sometimes the development team does not have sufficient time to incorporate requirements within the given time frame. Thus, some solutions should be ready to use, i.e., the plug and play functionality for solutions at the enterprise level.

I have used this solution for more than 10 years.

Not many issues were encountered in terms of stability; there were only a few defects which were resolved in later releases.

There were no scalability issues.

I would give the technical support a 8 out of 10 rating.

Previously, I have used different solutions. However, I have found MicroStrategy better than any other tool.

A few configurations are needed as per requirement.

The pricing policy is good compared to other products in the market. It's a license-based software.

We did not evaluate other options. As we know, it's the best solution.

We value the ability to build dashboards and reports in a relatively simple way. We can teach end users how to do their own reports and dashboards making the process cheaper and faster.

Also, the ability to import data from a grand variety of sources and combine them into a single report/dashboard, skipping the expensive ETL process or validating it before a robust construction.

MicroStrategy makes it easier to control internal and external demands and also to monitor public programs financed by the institution.

Data discovery and self-service BI still needs to be simpler to end-users.

I have used MicroStrategy since 2012; four years.

We have not had stability issues.

We have not yet had scalability issues.

I rate technical support a 4.5/5.

We did not have a previous solution.

Initial setup was complex. MicroStrategy is a hard tool to configure in many ways, starting from its licensing schema.

Make a good study of your needs because its very expensive to change from nominal licensing to a server core licensing.

The buying decision was made by a previous team. But other solutions are always evaluated, like Tableau and ClickView.

Make sure there isn’t a cheaper solution that satisfies your demands. Prepare a good team to develop and use it or you’ll have a big mess and difficulties making data discovery and self-service BI.

The ability to create VI’s which are easy for front end users to manipulate in order to see the data they wish to see.

Visual Insight allows the developer to create reports and/or cubes as the foundation and the end user can easily pull any of the metrics and attributes into the report, graph or other visualization without requiring technical reporting knowledge. This really gives the end user the ability to manipulate the data as they see fit. They can see as little or as much detail as the report/cube allows.

The ability for end users to self-service on ad-hoc reports.

Instead of using a lot of table joins within MSTR, we have had to rely on ETL for those same reports and then expose that view/report in MSTR. A couple of reasons for this are slowness when running the report inside MSTR and difficulty in setting up left joins when using multiple tables.

We have been using the solution for about three years.

We have not encountered any stability issues. Only a few outages that have always been resolved quickly.

Scalability issues have been the most significant which we have faced.

This is not an area I have to deal with much but from what I have heard it seems to be good.

We previously used SSRS. We still use this sometimes but have been working to transition to MSTR. MSTR gives the end users more flexibility when looking at reports.

The setup was complex. Our warehouse was completely rewritten in order to fit the MSTR model.

We have no specific comments regarding this issue.

We evaluated others but I was not part of that decision making so am unaware of other options being looked at.

Find other companies who are willing to share their experience and the lessons learned when setting up their environments.

• Enterprise reporting
• Mobile
• Distribution
• Dashboards

Most of our customers for whom I implemented the solutions were interested to see the level of detail. However, due to a couple of weaknesses we get from this tool, this was a bit painful.

We do consulting and Implementation of solutions to many industries like retail, distribution, manufacturing, oil & gas, wholesale, etc. Most of the solutions require the end reporting to be apt and simplified in nature. MicroStrategy’s built-in solutions help a very reasonable amount of customers. As they require customization, developers are required to use the desktop client. That is not simple.

Simplify the development environment and improve the visualizations.

I have been using MicroStrategy for one year and three months.

We have not had stability problems.

We have not had scalability problems.

I rate technical support 2.5/5.

We did not have any previous solution.

Setup was pretty much straightforward.

Licensing is completely dependent on the number of architects and developers the organization requires. The pricing is reasonable when compared with other industry leading tools.

We evaluated Oracle BI, Microsoft BI, Tableau and Cognos.

I recommend that they evaluate the in-built dashboards, test them with sample data and see how dashboards best fit your needs. As the development or customization of this tool is a crutch, people do not prefer to get into this technology.

Architecture

=========

In a nutshell, Microstrategy (or MSTR for short) architecture is composed of three layers

1 - Web/Mobile interface that connects to any given Intelligent Server (middleware)

2- Middleware (Intelligent Server) that

a. connects to data layer (many connectors included in the default license)

b. executes created SQL/MDX queries, OLAP functions

c. Generates pre-loaded MOLAP cubes (aka Intelligent Cubes) to speed up results (if defined)

3 - Data Access: Access to your DataWarehouse (no need to be dimensional model, but recommended) using any of the several included connectors

Attributes and Facts definition

======================

Using Microstrategy Architect you basically define:

a. Attributes and attribute forms (which corresponds to the Dimensions in the Dimensional Model)

b. Facts (which corresponds to Facts)

c. System Hierarchy or relationship of Attributes to Facts. Here it is where you also define your Star or Snowflake model for your attributes. Also (and this is a really cool feature) same Fact can be located at different aggregation levels either because you have it in the datasource (e.g an agg view) or because you ask a given FACT in MSTR to extend the value to another level. This is interesting to enhance performance using tables with pre-processed aggregated data, instead of letting MSTR calculate aggregations "on the fly"

d. User Hierarchy: or drill-in paths to see the information in your reports / Documents

Report and Dashboard Generation

=========================

Then you can start creating :

- Measures: Formulas (e.g KPIs) that uses Facts or other measures

- Reports which are data sets of attributes and Measures (here you can also use other type of objects like filters, consolidations, custom groups,etc...). You can see and export these datasets in a variety of formats (Excel, PDF, etc...) However the top use case for this report is as datasource for Documents/Dashboards

- Dynamic Documents and documents: You include "n" number of reports as your datasource and then represent using the widgets (Tabs, Tables, Heat Maps, ESRI Maps, ...) These are ultimately the Dashboards or final reports that end user will see and - here it comes the most valuable feature of MSTR from my point of view- either from Web or from mobile device - So you can quickly compose a mobile dashboard in few clicks if (and only if) you have created the right data model (e.g a solid DWH schema). At this point it is worth to mention that MSTR allows you to iteratively enhance the model and reports/dashboards (so no big-bang deployment needed)

- You can also create predictive analysis (datamining) using some of the techniques and gadgets provided as well as interactively play with data and come to conclusions using MSTR Visual Insight (kind of an 'slice and dice data' tool). Outputs from those analysis may be dashboards/documents.

Scheduler

========

Reports and Documents can be run on demand or can be scheduled to be generated and sent to target audience. Scheduler is also responsible of the Intelligent cubes refreshing (MOLAP recreation at a regular basis)

Microstrategy licensing model allows:

===========================

a. Access to all tools available (recent change, one year ago more or less) - before you had to license certain tools, now you have access to all tools in either on-premise installation or Cloud. Interesting Tools

b. In the on-premise installation model, licenses per user and therefore have high scalable BI solutions: In this licensing model you can deploy your architecture (Web Front-end and Middleware or Intelligent Sever) in as many servers you want.

Before we used Microstrategy at Xerox Services (HR services) we used to analyze data using Spreadsheets, to calculate and report on service SLAs and KPIs.

No need to mention how using MSTR has enhanced the process since then but a couple of the key benefits are:

- Data access not affecting transactional systems (data sources)

- Complex calculations (SLAs, KPI rules) right there on time when needed and always right or always wrong but centralized in a single place where formulas can be corrected if needed

Probably this is not MSTR's fault but BI tool in general: sometimes trying to follow MSTR rules to get some formulas and data using MSTR techniques is harder (and less performant) than just prepare yet another DWH view collecting needed data (with needed inner or left outer joins and aggregations) and just model that new view in MSTR.

Also MSTR, as all these BI tools, generate automatic SQL code from the model defined in the architecture tool so sometimes you are getting weird results but are easily trackable (MSTR reports in all SQL generated code) to be fixed.

No ETL comes with the tool, either you have your own solution (MSTR SSIS, Informatica) to model your DWH or you connect MSTR to the datasource / transactional (which is not good)