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IBM Planning Analytics

Introducing IBM Planning Analytics Local

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IBM Planning Analytics Local, the convergence of TM1 on-premise with Planning Analytics on the cloud is now available! This new release brings many of the great enhancements and performance improvements that IBM has been making in the cloud environment available to on-premise TM1 customers.

I recently hosted a webinar with Dan Bernatchez, our FPM practice leader and Chief Solutions Architect for TM1, to review the new features of the solution and provided a live demo of Planning Analytics Local.

One highlight of the webinar included Dan showcasing Planning Analytics Workspace, which is a completely transformed user experience. This new “face” of TM1 provides a rich, interactive workspace that is visual, intuitive, insightful, social and mobile.

Dan also explained how Planning Analytics Local uses hierarchies for deeper analysis of TM1 data. Essentially it turns attributes into virtual dimensions, saving RAM, increasing query performance and adding flexibility. This enables users to have smaller, faster cubes, to introduce hierarchies to queries as needed, and to do dimension versioning.

Since Planning Analytics Workspace is the one new component that comes at an additional cost, IBM is offering a special 75% discount for existing TM1 customers who purchase it before year-end 2016. For information on this pricing deal, contact me and I can help you.

This webinar was the first in a three-part series showcasing IBM Planning Analytics. Stay tuned for the dates and topics of the next two webinars coming in early 2017.

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Creating IBM Planning Analytics Workspace Content (Part 2)

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This blog is intended to continue and build upon the previous blog How to Create IBM Planning Analytics Workspace Content. In this blog, I will provide an overview on building the remaining content (second and third row of visualizations) in the Dashboard below.


Dashboards


Create or Open a Book

  • Open up Planning Analytics Workspace, create a new Book or open up an existing book.


Steps to Create Units by Month

  • Drag and Drop a view from the Revenue Cube onto your canvas (we are using Revelwood’s Big Apple demo database for these examples).
  • Update the View so the Rows are the Products and the Columns are the Months that you want to report on.
  • Click on the amounts in your view, and select ‘Edit the Title’ from the blue Toolbar above your View and type in ‘Units by Month (000’s)’. The results will look like the following:


Steps to Create Units by Region

  • Click on the amounts in your view, and select ‘Duplicate’ from the Toolbar.
  • Drag and Drop that view to the right of the first view.
  • Swap the Product Dimension with the Region dimension, so the Regions are on the Columns.
  • Edit the Title to be ‘Units by Region (000’s)’. The results will look like the following:


Steps to Create Gross Margin by Period

  • Navigate to the Applications Folder of Revelwood’s Big Apple demo database.
  • Select the ‘Gross Margin by Period’ report.
  • Drag and Drop that report below the Units by Month (000’s) view.
  • Align and Size it as required.
  • The results will look like the following:
  • Click the amounts in your Units by Region view and select ‘Change Visualization’ from the blue toolbar above your View and select ‘Column’.


The result will be:


Summary

We’ve walked through the steps to create a simple Dashboard that includes Cube Views, Visualizations and Excel TM1 worksheets. Additional items that can be added to a Dashboard include; Media, Action Buttons, Web pages, Images and more. In short, IBM Planning Analytics Workspace is a powerful reporting tool providing you with new ways to analyze data, plan and access your content.

Want to learn more about IBM Planning Analytics? Email us and we’ll show you how powerful it can be for your company.

Read other Tech Tips blog posts:

Important Things to Consider When Changing your COA Structure

Securing Data from IBM Cognos TM1 On-Prem to IBM Planning Analytics

How to use IBM Planning Analytics Workspace

How to Create IBM Planning Analytics Workspace Content (Part 1)

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IBM’s Cloud Strategy and How Revelwood Can Help

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IBM is investing heavily in its analytics solutions, which means lots of things are changing for the better. At Revelwood, we see it as our job to help our clients interpret these changes to better understand how they might affect your organization in a practical way.

One critical component of IBM’s strategy has been the move to cloud. Not only has IBM acquired cloud-based companies like Softlayer to address the world’s infrastructure and platform needs, but it is migrating virtually all of its software solutions to the cloud, as well. TM1 moved to the cloud back in early 2014. Late last year, TM1 Cloud was reincarnated as IBM Planning Analytics (IPA), which includes TM1 and much more.

Here is a quick summary of the key components that are part of IPA:

  • TM1 – Multidimensional database engine (same as on-prem)
  • TM1 Web – Web environment, including Websheets, cube browsing, etc. (same as on-prem)
  • CAFÉ for TM1 – Excel add-in for TM1, including new functionality not available in Perspectives (Perspectives is also supported in IPA, but only for administrators as a means to publish Websheets)
  • Planning Analytics Workspace – a visual, self-service dashboard and lightweight reporting and data capture tool to interact with TM1 data (New!)
  • Watson Analytics – self-service cognitive discovery and prediction (New!)
  • Cognos BI – business intelligence and robust reporting against the TM1 data source (New!)

Moving to IPA on the cloud has its advantages, as well as some considerations to be aware of. For example, not all existing functionality in on-premise TM1 is ready for the cloud just yet. We’ll be covering more on IPA in upcoming blogs, so be sure to check back here often.

What we at Revelwood find most compelling about IBM’s direction is the dual “on-premise or in-the-cloud” strategy. Your organization can choose the right solution at the right time. We can help you understand the differences, develop a roadmap for migration, structure your renewal contract to include the cloud option and, of course, work with you on the migration itself. Just let us know and we’ll get the conversation started.

Who at Revelwood should I call, you ask? Great question. If you haven’t met him already, you should meet John Pra Sisto. John joined Revelwood last year as our first ever Client Success Manager. Yes, his entire purpose at Revelwood is to ensure that our clients are happy and successful. If you don’t know who to turn to, contact John. He can be reached at 201.984.3025 or jprasisto@revelwood.com.

Thanks for listening…we look forward to hearing from you.

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