8/08/00 - Oracle and Microsoft Lead Field in European Business Intelligence/Data Warehousing Market
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SAN JOSE, Calif., Aug 8, 2000 -- 


European Market Set for High Growth Over Next Several Years; 
Microsoft, Oracle, and IBM Among the Leading Vendors Poised 
to Take Advantage of Growing Opportunities 

Survey results recently published by Survey.com, the leading eResearch services company, 
reveal that the European business intelligence and data warehousing (BI/DW) market will 
grow exceptionally well over the next several years. With BI/DW applications expected to 
grow 4 to 5 times in average size by 2002, expenditures on BI/DW solutions in Europe are 
projected to grow by 85% over the next 3 years. Leading the way in mind share for BI/DW 
software in the expanding European market are Oracle and Microsoft, according to the 
survey's respondents. IBM holds the third spot, followed closely by Cognos and Business 
Objects. 

"The market for BI/DW solutions in Europe is looking quite robust for the next several 
years," said Nancy Stewart, senior analyst at Survey.com, "respondents indicated they would 
be spending significant amounts on building and expanding BI/DW solutions. There will also 
be an upswing in the acquisition of storage and in the purchase of outside services, to 
support growth." 

Key business problems being addressed by BI/DW solutions in Europe -- the more traditional 
financial and sales analysis applications, as well as CRM, supply-side analysis, and 
employee-related analysis -- are much the same as those in North America, though on a 
slightly smaller scale. "The European BI/DW market is not expanding at quite the hyper-rate 
that the North American market is, but the growth rates we are seeing make it a highly 
attractive market for many vendors." 

"Mainstay players like Oracle, IBM, and Cognos are doing well, but it's the up and coming 
players like Business Objects and, particularly, Microsoft that will be the ones to watch," 
Stewart said. Survey respondents indicated that Microsoft provided the lion's share of their 
DBMS software and operating systems environment upon which BI/DW applications are running. 
"It is not surprising to find Microsoft in a favorable position in the BI/DW space in Europe, 
given 40% of the respondents indicated that Microsoft supplied their underlying DBMS system and 
on the whole, respondents were rather satisfied with their choice." 

Detailed results from the new survey are available to the press upon request. 


Survey.com 

Survey.com is the leading provider of eResearch and is the first company to successfully 
harness the power of the Internet for conducting primary and secondary market research. Last 
year the company completed more than 350,000 Internet-based surveys for both proprietary and 
syndicated market research studies on a broad range of topics, including information 
technology, consumer electronics, and entertainment. The firm's clients include Canon Computer 
Systems, CareerPath, Cisco Systems, CMP Media, EarthLink Network, IBM, InformationWeek, 
Microsoft, Motorola, PC World, Ticketmaster Online-CitySearch, and 3Com. 


CONTACT: Survey.com 
Brad Peppard 408/907-0001 ext. 500 
brad@peppard.com