The Future of Data is Democratized. The Future of Data is Open.

[QlikSenseUpdates]

We are in the middle of a seismic change in the way that we access and process information.  Just think about the last few questions that came to mind and how easy it was to answer them. 

“OK Google – what is the #1 hit on the Country charts?” 
“Alexa, what’s the forecast for tomorrow?” 
“Shazam, what is this song?”
“Waze, what is the fastest way home?”

The wonders of search, predictive modeling, and artificial intelligence have been made real by Silicon Valley Titans who help us to navigate the boundless amounts of available data to find just what we want in our personal lives. But what about in our businesses?

[QlikSenseUpdates]

For almost 30 years, Qlik has been at the center of helping businesses achieve these same outcomes through innovative, highly performance associative technology, vibrant visualizations, and, most recently, AI and conversational analytics. We are proudly bringing modern analytics to the warehouse floor, the emergency response team, and the boardroom, and we will continue to drive our vision of augmented intelligence, where machines make humans more productive, insightful and, well…human.

But analytics technology is moving at breathtaking pace and we are not naïve enough to believe that Qlik can do everything. This is the rationale for our open platform approach, and it has served our customers well.  Most companies today have specialized analytics solutions for risk calculation, cybersecurity, marketing, and more. Enterprises also leverage reporting packages to create cubes and marts for regulatory and financial reports, often tightly coupled with their financial suite. Companies are getting more comfortable with open source analytics tools like R and Python and emerging technologies in Machine Learning are also changing the game for industry leaders. And yes, we even acknowledge that most departments that own Qlik have a neighbor across the building using Tableau, Power BI, or some other visualization tool. (You should introduce us when you get a chance…)

To maximize return on all your analytics investments, you need data. Lots of data…delivered securely according to business rules without cumbersome IT projects. You have been hearing a lot from Qlik about the importance of data literacy and data democratization. We’ve been advocating the importance of being able to understand and argue with data, and have introduced Qlik Data Catalyst as a cornerstone product of this vision – allowing our customers to profile, manage, and securely deliver data from any source to any analytics platform. But what about all the data you’ve already worked on getting into Qlik?

Today we are upping the ante as we announce the General Availability of Qlik Data Catalyst QVD Catalog. This is a game changer for our customers, allowing them to not only profile and catalog their QVDs for Qlik use, but also blend them with non-Qlik assets and share them downstream to any analytics platform. That’s right, we are now enabling the sharing of data previously locked in Qlik with any application.  Why would we do this?

Well, it sends a very clear message on just how committed we are to data democratization and open platforms.  We of course feel that Qlik is the best choice for analytics, and using QVDs in Qlik products drives an unparalleled user experience.  But data goes way beyond even the use cases Qlik supports.  So, if you are looking for a way to unlock your data, including QVDs, to share across the enterprise, the search is over. Qlik wants to be your partner for driving true transformation across the enterprise through data democratization and enhanced data literacy. At Qonnections this year, Mike Capone said on the main stage, “we are deadly serious about data.”  We intend to keep proving it.