Agile Meets Integration at TDWI Conference
TDWI | August 25, 2010
At last week's TDWI Summer World Conference in San Diego, bottom-up disruption -- of an agile kind -- was a salient theme. Data federation player Composite Software Inc. stepped up to seize the agile mantle. These days, says Bob Eve, executive vice president of marketing with Composite, the DM Holy Wars are over. Most of the hype has died down, and federation -- which once aspired to an acronym of its own (Enterprise Information Integration, or EII) -- is an accepted and largely non-controversial DM technology.“
A Maturity Model for Measuring Data Virtualization Platforms
SYS-COM Media | August 25, 2010
Increasing IT agility, improving efficiency and staff productivity, and reducing costs. A Model for Measuring Data Virtualization Platform Maturity To assess data virtualization offerings in a systematic way, we developed a Data Virtualization Platform Maturity Model. This model has two critical dimensions. The first uses a five-stage maturity timeline to provide a common framework for measuring the various phases typical in software innovation. The second dimension looks at key functionality categories that, when successfully combined, create viable data virtualization platforms.
Q&A: Pair Appliances and Virtualization to Beef Up Performance
TDWI | August 25, 2010
Data warehouse appliances and virtualization make logical partners for companies interested in cost-effective solutions to handling massive amounts of data across devices. In this interview, Robert Eve, executive vice president of marketing for Composite Software, Inc., an independent provider of data virtualization software, talks about the growth of data warehouse appliances and data virtualization. He also suggests critical considerations for companies that want to introduce appliances and data virtualization into the enterprise.
Get Real Data. Go Virtual.
Information Management | August 17, 2010
Data virtualization. It’s a cloud-based approach to data management. But it’s not an outsourced or external cloud. It’s an internal data network, managed as a service across the enterprise. The data is organized in a sort of “middleware” layer and the contents defined by metadata. Data about the data. Such a scenario offers the opportunity to massively reduce the time needed to move data from one application to another. Instead, the data integration is focused on the virtual data layer, where information about the data, its sources and locations makes it easier to access and deliver whatever data is needed anywhere in the organization.
Composite Directory services ties the Comcast's service layer to directory data layer
Information Management | July/Aug 2010
The directory services IT team must produce high-performing and robust services very quickly. Its mission is to engineer, develop and maintain Comcast’s Provisioning Data System for high-speed internet (HSI) and digital voice (CDV); develop Web service access to the data store; provide customer authentication, authorization, entitlements (more than 25 million) for enterprise customers; and do it all faster, cleaner and cheaper. The Composite-based Directory Services layer delivers the following capabilities: data virtualization to eliminate complex federation and reconciliation of source provisioning, entitlement, and credential systems; abstraction of data sources to simplify application access and integration; and query optimization to reduce transaction time for processing a request.
Cloud Computing Can’t Dim Composite Software’s Prospects
Business Times | July 30, 2010
It’s become trendy amid the rise of cloud computing to foretell the death of traditional enterprise software. Composite Software Inc. CEO Jim Green chuckles at that. Large corporations have not thrown out the software and hardware they spent billions on, and the layering on of new technologies amidst an explosion of data has only made things more complicated.
How Three Integration Competency Centers Accelerated Data Services Adoption
Information Management | July 29, 2010
This article looks at both common organizational barriers to adoption and examples of applicable strategies used by successful adopters.
Challenges and Rewards of Integrating Commercial Web Data Services
SearchSOA.com | July 19, 2010
Early in the development of Web services and SOA, application developers began to focus on how to integrate various applications and their elements – databases are perhaps the best example. For its part, Composite Software, Inc., provides data virtualization. The company recently announced a joint solution with Kapow to accelerate the integration of Web data in large-scale data virtualization environments. The joint solution is called Composite Application Data Services for Web Content, and is powered by the Kapow Web Data Server.
Using Composite Information Server to Develop a Data Delivery Platform
BeyeNetwork | July 1, 2010
The data delivery platform (DDP) is an architecture for developing business intelligence systems. Data consumers, such as reporting and analytical tools, are decoupled from data stores. This article looks at developing a DDP with a federation server.
Netezza and Composite Software Introduce Data Virtualization Option to Integrate Netezza Appliances
DBTA | June 29, 2010
Netezza Corporation, a provider of data warehouse, analytic and monitoring appliances, and Composite Software, Inc., a data virtualization middleware provider, have announced the Netezza Data Virtualizer to simplify, accelerate and optimize the integration of data stored across multiple Netezza appliances.
Next Wave of TwinFin
Web STORAGE | June 28, 2010
As enterprise-wide analytical needs grow, customers have an increasing need to integrate information from various analytical stores to come up with the 'Wow' answers. The Netezza Data Virtualizer delivers query results to reporting and analytic applications from within a grid of Netezza appliances, regardless of the data's physical location. The Netezza Data Virtualizer, developed by Composite Software, is licensed and supported by Netezza.
Netezza In Bid to Speed Up Analytics
TECHWORLD | June 24, 2010
Netezza has launched a new product aimed at providing an integrated view of data distributed across multiple Netezza devices. The Netezza Data Virtualizer has been powered by Composite Software to analyse results while Netezza continues to process the data.
The Emergence of Integration-as-a-Service
TDWI | June 23, 2010
Thanks both to aggressive service enablement and to the efforts of DI vendors, which have aggressively SOA-ified their integration platforms, another paradigm -- call it Integration-as-a-Service (IaaS) -- has emerged. In other words, write analysts Noel Yuhanna and Mike Gilpin in a recent Forrester Wave research bulletin, "IaaS offers a virtualized data services layer." Forrester names a "gang of four" including Composite Software, that it says leads the IaaS pack. Not surprisingly, they offer established and respected DI offerings.
New Data Virtualizer from Netezza and Composite
Information Management | June 21, 2010
“As enterprises expand their Netezza deployments, it is only natural that they want to gain an even higher return by integrating these important analytic environments,” said David Besemer, Composite Software CTO in the news release. The goal of the Data Virtualizer, says Besemer, is to satisfy this hope and meet these needs.
Yesterday's DM Radio Broadcast on Data Federation
The Data Doghouse | June 18, 2010
This DM Radio broadcast was on using data federation to enable an enterprise to leverage information for analyzing their business and decision-making. This technology is also called data virtualization and used to be called Enterprise Information Integration (EII).
Latest Version of Composite Information Server Data Virtualization Platform Now Available
Database Trends and Applications | June 8, 2010
Composite Software, Inc. has introduced the newest version of the Composite Information Server Data Virtualization Platform to address the increasing demand by global enterprises with complex and disparate information systems for more agile, cost-effective data integration solutions.
Data Virtualization Simplifies and Accelerates BI Projects
Database Trends and Applications | June 8, 2010
With business intelligence (BI) tools more powerful than ever, today’s biggest BI bottleneck is the source data itself. Data virtualization, sometimes called data federation or enterprise information integration (EII), addresses these source data problems by loosely coupling BI and supporting data sources.
Composite Software Launches Data Virtualization Platform
TMCnet.com | May 27, 2010
Composite Software, Inc., a supplier of high performance data virtualization, said that it has introduced the newest version of the Composite Information Server Data Virtualization Platform, to address the escalating demand by global enterprises with complex and disparate information systems for more data integration solutions.
Composite Makes Data Availability a Reality through Virtualization
Ventana Research | May 21, 2010
A major cause of challenges for organizations trying to improve processes and make more effective business decisions has long been not having enough data on a timely basis to apply analytics, generate metrics or review and act upon it. One solution to this issue is to provide federated access to data and what is called data virtualization, which can dynamically access and integrate data as queries are being performed – a solution that has also been known as enterprise information integration (EII).
Broad Updates To Virtualization Platform Include New Discovery Product, Data Monitor, Oracle Essbase Access And Increased Security
Information Management | May 18, 2010
Composite Software, Inc. announced the latest version of its Composite Information Server Data Virtualization Platform. By meeting the need for increasingly virtualized and agile approaches to data integration, the platform updates are will benefit global enterprises, according to Shawn Rogers, vice president of business intelligence research at EMA.
Composite Software Creates Industry’s Most Complete Data Virtualization Platform
Bloomberg BusinessWeek | May 18, 2010
“A pioneer in data virtualization, Composite Software has proven itself the gold standard for high performance and flexibility,” said Shawn Rogers, vice president of Business Intelligence Research, Enterprise Management Associates (EMA). “These newest additions to its data virtualization platform will surely benefit global enterprises by filling the need for a more virtualized and agile approach to data integration as they concurrently extend Composite’s technology leadership position.”
Can Data Virtualization Solve the BI Integration Problem?
ITBusinessEdge | May 18, 2010
Composite Software just released a new version of its data virtualization platform. The news is still new, but I'm sure at some point someone will test drive its new functions and report back. To be honest, what caught my eye wasn't so much the new release, but this little tidbit of information buried in the second half of the press release quoting from a May 10, 2010 Forrester Research report, "The State of Business Intelligence Software and Emerging Trends, 2010"
Battling Brittleness Within IT
ITBusinessEdge | May 11, 2010
Even if you're not exactly sure what a brittle IT ecosystem means, you know it's not a good thing. It turns out, one key to combating brittleness in IT is to understand modern data hubs and how they differ from the way data was stored in prehistoric times like the '80s and '90s.
Federated Data Models Can Accelerate Data Integration
Information Managment | May 6, 2010
Exponentially growing data sources and the information they contain promise to bolster our professional decision-making on both a day-to-day and a long-term strategic basis. Yet, data professionals in large enterprises and government agencies face increasingly difficult data integration challenges.Traditional approaches such as data consolidation and replication alone have not kept pace. As a result, federated data models have evolved to complement these investments and fill the gap.
Composite Software Expands its Federal Operations
Database Trends and Applications | May 4, 2010
Composite Software, Inc., a provider of data virtualization middleware, has expanded its federal operations in response to accelerating government agency demand. The company increased its federal team with key new hires in sales, sales engineering, and services, and solidified a new GSA partnership with Carahsoft Technology Corp., a government IT solutions provider, to build upon a second consecutive year of greater than 50% revenue growth.
Independent Analyst Firm Recommends that BI Professionals Consider Agile BI out of the Box
eBizQ | May 3, 2010
Composite Software’s data federation or enterprise information integration (EII) approach is one of five metadata-generated BI applications defined in the report. According to the Forrester Research report, “Since they [Composite Software] do not generate a physical data warehouse but rather create virtual views (virtual data marts) directly connecting to source data bases and applications, ETL, DW schema and data cache, and semantic layer are actually the same thing, eliminating the need to build three separate components.
More Tech Firms setting Up Offices In Washington Area to Get Federal Business
The Washington Post | May 3, 2010
Composite Software, a data services company in San Mateo, Calif., had plenty of experience under its belt when it made its move to launch government sales. The company had worked with major banks, pharmaceutical firms, and oil and gas companies, according to Jim Green, the chairman and chief executive. So, in its early pitches to the federal government, Composite provided examples of its prior work.
Extending the Scope and Reach of Business Intelligence, Part 3: The Role of Data Federation
BeyeNetwork | April 27, 2010
In this article, Claudia Imhoff and Colin White discuss the use of data federation as a means of accessing data quickly and easily, under what conditions we should use it, and when it should be avoided.
IT Infrastructure: eWEEK's Products to Watch April 2010
eWeek | April 22, 2010
Each month, eWEEK editors name new or newly updated enterprise-class products that we think should be on IT professionals' radars— products and services that promise to create efficiencies as well as competitive advantage. Among other products, this month eWEEK recommends checking out Composite Software's Composite Discovery.
Seven Keys to Data Virtualization Success
ITBusinessEdge | April 14, 2010
IT teams responsible for data integration may consider applying seven secrets practiced by their enterprise counterparts to make their own advanced data virtualization projects and architectures successful. The secrets, from Composite Software Executive Vice President of Marketing Robert Eve, aren’t vague recommendations; they’re proven tactics employed by companies like Pfizer Inc., Deutsche Bank and Dell.
Data Services Platforms--Bringing Order to Chaos
eBizQ | April 13, 2010
Today's advanced data services platforms (DSPs) recommended by industry authorities like Gartner and Forrester deliver flexible and enterprise-scalable data integration as both supplements to earlier-era enterprise data warehouses and as stand-alone solutions. They do so by loosely coupling business applications with their supporting data sources. This approach provides a number of benefits.
Netezza and Composite Software Announce Partnership
BeyeNetwork | April 13, 2010
Netezza Corporation, the global leader in data warehouse, analytic and monitoring appliances, and Composite Software, the leading data virtualization middleware provider, recently announced that they are working together on data federation offerings that simplify, accelerate and optimize integration of enterprise data stored on Netezza’s TwinFin appliances and other data sources.
Seven Secrets to Data Virtualization Success
ITBusinessEdge | April 9, 2010
Historically, seven has been a sacred number. Creation took seven days to complete. To the ancient astronomers, there were seven planets. Pythagoreans revered seven because it was the sum of three and four. Today’s IT teams responsible for data integration may consider applying the following seven secrets practiced by their enterprise counterparts to make their own advanced data virtualization projects and architectures successful.
Data Virtualization and Data Quality – An Overview
BeyeNetwork | April 8, 2010
Data virtualization delivers many benefits including real-time data access and pipelining to the enterprise information environment. As data virtualization is increasingly used in enterprise data integration architectures, particular attention must be paid to data quality, which historically has been the Achilles heel. Opinions vary on whether data quality processes can be fully integrated into the data virtualization layer, primarily due to the complexity of the data quality components themselves.
Data Virtualization Extends Enterprise Data Warehouse
Database Trends and Applications | March 24, 2010
Supporting critical, yet ever changing analytics and reporting requirements in an environment of ever increasing data volumes and complexity is a challenge well understood by large enterprises and government agencies today. Composite data virtualization lets you preserve and extend existing enterprise data warehouse investments.
Composite Customer Pfizer’s Mike Linhares Named Top 25 Information Manager
Information Management | March 18, 2010
To create our inaugural 25 Top Information Manager list, we asked our staff, our contributors and trusted experts in the field to tell us who they thought were among today's best information managers and people to watch in 2010. We found every one to be a savvy leader and a game changer in their organization - truly among the best information managers working today. Michael Linhares, Ph.D. and research fellow, business information systems, business operations, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Pfizer Inc. leads Pfizer's BIS team and was a force behind the drugmaker's federated integration strategy based on Composite’s data virtualization platform.
The Many Uses of Data Federation
TDWI | March 17, 2010
"It makes a lot of sense to use data federation tools when it takes too long or costs too much to create a persistent store of consolidated data, such as a data warehouse or data mart," writes Wayne Eckerson, director of research with The Data Warehousing Institute (TDWI), in his recent TDWI Checklist Report: Data Integration. Eckerson also praises data federation's ability to facilitate on-the-fly access to heterogeneous data sources.
Data federation, virtualization supports multiple use cases at Comcast
SearchDataManagement.com | March 16, 2010
When customers input their user name and password at Comcast.com, their accounts are usually authenticated in a matter of seconds. In the blink of an eye, customers can navigate their accounts, purchase new services and change contact information. What most customers probably don't know is that behind the scenes, data federation technology is what makes it all possible. While data federation, also called data virtualization and Information-as-a-Service (IaaS), is not new, it has mainly been thought of as technology to supplement existing data warehouses. But as the technology matures, vendors like Composite Software and IBM are extending its use to more complex scenarios. Comcast, for example, has developed a virtualized
Is the Data Delivery Platform a Federated Architecture?
BeyeNetwork | March 16, 2010
Is the data delivery platform a federated architecture and/or is it the same as a federation server? This article tries to clarify the relationship between, on one hand, the data delivery platform and, on the other hand, the federated architecture and the federation server. Note that federation servers are sometimes called enterprise information integration (EII) tools.
333 Rule to Keep Your BI Apps in Check
Information Management | March 4, 2010
As we popularize BI, and as technology becomes more scalable, more stable, more function rich and user-friendly - BI spreads like wildfire and often becomes uncontrollable. How do we address this unstoppable proliferation of BI applications and reports? One is to address an existing situation, another one is to implement a process to prevent it from happening in the first place.
Information Lifecycle Management: Tool for Taming the Growing Data Beast
Database Trends and Applications | March 4, 2010
For many organizations, application information lifecycle management, or ILM, now offers expedient - and badly needed - measures for properly defining, managing, and storing data. Are organizations coming to grips with all this data surging into their systems? A new survey of 227 managers and professionals affiliated with the Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG) finds that most are only just beginning to take the necessary steps to address these challenges and keep massive amounts of data from overwhelming their enterprise applications.
333 Rule To Keep Your BI Apps In Check
Forrester Research | March 3, 2010
As we popularize BI, and as technology becomes more scalable, more stable, more function rich and user-friendly - BI spreads like wildfire and often becomes uncontrollable. How do we address this unstoppable proliferation of BI applications and reports? One is to address an existing situation, another one is to implement a process to prevent it from happening in the first place.
Composite Software Named an IAAS Leader by Forrester Research
BeyeNetwork | February 16, 2010
Composite Software Named an IAAS “Leader” for its Product Innovations and Proven Track Record of Supporting Complex Data Services Deployments. “The Forrester Wave: Information-As-A-Service (IaaS), Q1 2010,” from Forrester Research, an independent research firm, concludes that enterprises seeking greater business agility and flexible data architectures are increasingly adopting IaaS or data services.
Composite Software Expands U.K. Operations as Demand for Data Virtualization Grows
BeyeNetwork | February 11, 2010
Composite Software has expanded its U.K. operations to better meet growing European demand for its award-winning data virtualization solutions. Composite Software recently hired a new European Financial Services Sales Leader, Mike Singleton, who will be based in the U.K. In the newly created position, Mr. Singleton will work with Composite Software’s financial services customers, currently representing 10 of the top 20 global money center banks, as well as penetrate additional European-based financial institutions. Singleton’s successful sales career includes executive positions at Oracle U.K., Computer Associates and Informix, as well as Workshare Limited and Ithena Limited.
The Requirements of the Data Delivery Platform
BeyeNetwork | February 4, 2010
In this article, a list of requirements for the data delivery platform (DDP) is described. The DDP is an architecture for developing business intelligence (BI) systems where data consumers (such as reports and spreadsheets) are decoupled from data stores (such as data warehouses, data marts, and staging areas). The primary goal of this decoupling is to get a higher level of flexibility.
Q&A: Ten Tips for Maximizing Data Virtualization
TDWI | February 3, 2010
Global enterprises and government agencies that are implementing data virtualization in IT face a formidable set of challenges -- along with plenty of opportunities. By refining and maximizing the benefits from data virtualization, companies can squeeze more ROI out of their efforts -- for example, by using data virtualization to address challenges such as rogue data marts. IT leaders can also work to ensure that data virtualization efforts pay off by contributing to the corporate bottom line.
Effectively Integrating Data Can Help Federal Intelligence Agencies in War on Terror
NewsRX | February 1, 2010
In a keynote address, Karen Evans, partner of KE+T Partners LLC, connected the dots between recent failures to prevent attempted terrorist attacks to outdated information technology systems for integrating data across multiple Federal Intelligence Agencies, not for lack of collected intelligence data itself. Citing this as an opportunity to continue phased implementation of innovative data integration technologies, Ms. Evans praised the Federal Government's public efforts to update its data systems. Evans spoke at an invitation-only breakfast forum sponsored by Composite Software, Inc., the data virtualization leader.
I dig Data Virtualization Now
This is Owen Taylor's weblog | January 28, 2010
I have been working with Composite Software for 10 months now and am really getting into it of late. A recent blog entry by a Boulder-based analyst helps to maintain morale and Composite's incredible support staff and highly technical population keeps me well enabled and on my toes as I work to keep up.
Application Data Hub Improves Efficiency at Comag Marketing
Information Management | Jan/Feb 2010
The Composite Information Server allows the Comag Marketing Group to take information from Oracle Financials, CMG data warehouse, CRM and other legacy systems and expose them through common data services without replicating data to another database. As the most flexible and scalable option for responding to data synchronization and multiple uses within a batch-oriented environment, the Composite Information Server’s development and administration places minimal demands on our 22-member IT staff. While the larger CRM project is still underway, the Composite deployment has already yielded benefits including producing reports about the condition and stocking of magazines within 24 hours of collecting the information from the field.
Boulder BI Brain Trust Blog
The Boulder BI Brain Trust Blog | January 22, 2010
Often times software companies have a solution in search of a problem or an elegant solution that "only" really works on the fringes of business problems. The recent presentation from Composite Software to the BBBT showed me that Composite is not only elegant technology but relevant to direct business issues.
A Definition of the Data Delivery Platform
BeyeNetwork | January 21, 2010
Rick van der Lans proposes an initial definition for the business intelligence architecture called the data delivery platform, explains its functionality and compares it to the corporate information factory and the data warehouse bus architecture.
HP, Composite Team To Improve Data Virtualization Middleware
Integration Developer News | January 7, 2010
HP is working with Composite Software Inc. to deliver more agile enterprise data virtualization technologies for BI (business intelligence) and other high-value data projects. The partnership will focus on data virtualization middleware, real-time access and optimizing private/public cloud, company officials said. Under the partnership, Composite and HP will design a physical data warehouse, a virtual data view -- or a combination of the two. The ability to combine virtual data integration with physical data consolidation will help save money and provide cost-effective and custom global access, company officials said.
