Pre-built data warehouse to support BI-tools

Data warehousing goes hand in hand with using BI tools. In many cases, a data warehouse is a necessity for smooth BI-reporting. However, building the data warehouse is often perceived as a laborious and expensive project. BI Book reporting tool saves its users from this hassle by providing a pre-built data warehouse for more than 50 systems. Read more about what to consider when building a data warehouse, and test whether BI Book would be the right solution for you!

Building a data warehouse is something that anyone considering deploying BI tools has probably come across. A data warehouse is a place where data from different source systems is modeled, organized, and then transferred to a BI tool. Data warehouse allows smooth reporting, as the data is already processed in the data warehouse in a suitable format. This way, the reporting tools can focus on what they are best suited for, i.e., visualizing the data. Data warehousing speeds up, e.g., report's download times, and prevents browser windows from crashing.

Building the data warehouse from scratch is often a laborious process that takes a few days to a year. The duration and cost of building a data warehouse are significantly affected by how many and from which systems the data is retrieved, for what purpose, and how the data is to be modified.

One of the biggest benefits of BI tools is that the data can be retrieved from multiple systems and combined into unified reports. For example, BI tools allow you to view data from accounting systems along with HR data. Companies usually have several systems for different business areas.

Data warehousing is almost a necessity for the smooth use of BI tools if the amounts of data being processed are large and the data is retrieved from multiple systems. While the amount of data remains small, it is possible to integrate BI tools into systems without a data warehouse. Data is transferred from source systems to the data warehouse, often using integrations. Thus, in addition to building a data warehouse, the implementation of BI tools also involves building integrations with different systems. Integrations often utilize, for example, interface technology.

Is it worth building the data warehouse yourself, or would the pre-built data warehouse become more profitable?

BI Book reporting tool provides its users with a pre-built data warehouse, the Data Room, that adapts to the needs of more than 50 of the most commonly used systems. In addition to the data warehouse, BI Book offers its users pre-built integrations with different systems. The tool enables the implementation of BI reporting for its customers on some systems with even one click. BI Book has a standard data warehouse for several systems that can be copied to different BI Book customers. Netvisor and Procountor are good examples of standard systems for which building the data warehouse is possible with one click by using BI Book.

With Netvisor, for example, the data has to be modified a lot in a data warehouse. Therefore, building a data warehouse is laborious and time-consuming if done by a single company. BI Book’s replicable data warehouse is a result of hundreds of work hours and is achieved through the implementation of numerous data warehouse projects for various systems and companies. BI Book's own data warehouse, Data Room, enables users to supplement the data sources used in reporting by transferring to the Data Room e.g., Excel files for budgeting and forecasts.

Data warehouse management and maintenance

The work related to the data warehouses does not end with their construction, but the data warehouses must be regularly managed and developed. For example, with data models, you must ensure that they are always up-to-date and that the data living in them are validated. System vendors may also make changes to various interfaces that also affect the data warehouse. Managing and maintaining data warehouses requires the expertise of a Data Engineer. BI Book takes full care of the management and development of data warehouses on behalf of its users.

How does the data warehouse benefit the use of BI tools?

• The data warehouse reduces the load on BI tools and thus enables efficient data visualization. Using it also shortens report download times and prevents browser windows from crashing.
• As the name implies, the data warehouse effectively stores information. If a company decides to change its HR system to another, the data in the old system would still remain in the data warehouse. The data warehouse enables the old system's data to be used in reporting and combined with the new system's data. By the same logic, it would also be possible to change the BI tool so that the previous data would not be lost but could be used smoothly in the new tool.
• The data warehouse enables the restriction of user rights effectively, utilizing the different levels of the data warehouse.
• The data warehouse enables the conversion of data from different systems into a comparable and consistent one. For example, different systems may often collect slightly different information about the same customer, and the data warehouse allows this information to be combined. Calculation formulas can also be pre-stored in the data warehouse, easily copied, and utilized in all reports.

BI Book's pre-built data warehouse is right for you if:

1. You want a high-quality data warehouse for your use without high construction costs.
2. You want to connect multiple systems to the BI tool and keep reporting smooth.
3. You want to focus your employee's valuable work time on something else than regular maintenance and development of the data warehouse.
4. You want to restrict access to your reports and increase their information security.
5. Instead of gathering and searching for information, you want to focus on analyzing it and developing your business.
6. You want comparable and unified data.
7. You want in-depth analytics that also allows you to track budgets and future forecasts effectively.

In addition to the pre-built data warehouse, BI Book user has access to e.g. ready-made report templates for different systems built by experienced Data Analysts. Learn more about how BI Book enables the deployment of BI reporting without high initial investment. You can also book a free appointment with our Data Analyst and discuss more about our pre-built data warehouse solution and BI reporting. Book an appointment here.

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