Cloud-based Business Intelligence (BI) is the future. And one of the first BI vendors to capitalise on this trend is Birst - "the only enterprise BI platform in the cloud." This article will provide you with a case study of how Build.com drives their business forward with Birst’s cloud BI system.

Having a clearly defined cloud strategy is a “must-do” for enterprise software giants like Infor and SAP. Living in a customer-driven world, both organisations must change in order to retain their top positions. Their cloud strategies now are maturing and more refined with tonnes of added values that are greatly beneficial to businesses of every shape and size.

Over the past 10 years, thousands of developers have flocked to Mountain View, California, to learn about the latest innovations and announcements from the software giant at the Google I/O conference (short for input/output in terms of web development).

More than 7,000 people attended Google's three-day conference this year (from 8th to 10th May) and were provided with a comprehensive picture of Google's upcoming developments. This 2018 event has confirmed some technology trends which are expected to be widespread in the near future.

Read more: Why Google says no to job interviews

Internet of Things, or IoT, is a familiar term, which stands for the connection between “things” through the internet. IoT opens up the doors to the bright future where technology makes your life easier than ever. Day by day, our lives are connected more to the internet via devices, applications or services which is the result of non-stop developing in every industry.

Machine Learning – a branch of AI, is changing the way companies utilise their Big Data reserve, which allowed them to reshape customers’ behaviour. Machine Learning based on the idea that machine can learn from data and recognise the patterns, which result in decisions and predictions with a degree of certainty.

Internet of Things (IoT) is not a new concept. The term is believed to be invented way back when the internet was introduced. Nowadays, the IoT is an umbrella term representing any device that has the ability to connect, or disconnect, to the Internet. Examples of IoT applications can range from household appliances, wearable devices to aeroplanes, etc.

Artificial Intelligence (AI for short) is known with the machine learning ability. In part 1, we have discussed the first two advantages of AI: Performance and Safety and learned that AI can help businesses save a huge amount of time and ensure efficiency.

In part 2, we will continue to discover three more things of AI's advantages in business.

Read more: Business Intelligence and Analytics - From A to Z (Part 1)

As we have mentioned in our previous blog post, the emerging Data Lake - a new type of data repository, is changing the way we use and utilise our data sources. Data lake keep all kinds of data – usually unstructured, in its raw form, and keep them safe for later intent. Because the new data lake applies the ELT (extract, load, transform) approach, businesses are able to generate profound insights, analysis, and useful forecast to support their operations.

The word “disruptive” usually brings a negative connotation – troublesome or undisciplined. Disruptive technologies, on the other hand, has a completely different meaning attached to it which is innovative and groundbreaking. The term is becoming increasingly popular as it is transforming the way businesses go about their daily work.

Infor OS stands for “Infor Operating Service” and is also the platform Infor is using to run their Infor CloudSuites, a set of cloud-based, user-friendly enterprise solutions such as CloudSuite Industrial.