Gartner Accepting Nominations for the Business Intelligence Excellence Award

Finalists Will Present Case Studies at Gartner Business Intelligence Summit in Washington D.C., March 9-11, 2009

STAMFORD, Conn. — Gartner, Inc. is accepting nominations for its Business Intelligence (BI) Excellence Award. Nominations will be accepted through January 16 via an online entry form from any end-user organization that has implemented a business intelligence solution.

Enterprises are invited to enter and work within a case study framework to describe their BI initiatives and why it demonstrates business excellence. A team of Gartner analysts will evaluate and select 3 finalists based on the Gartner Business Intelligence and Performance Management Framework, astrategic framework developed by Gartner to help companies maximize the probability of success. The six layers of the BI and Performance Management Framework include:

* Business Strategy — Organizations should measure the success of BI and PM programs on how well they help the business achieve strategic and operational objectives. Defined business strategies and objectives are critical to the success or impact of a BI or PM initiative and build the case for return on investment.
* Performance Management — The goal of PM is to link operational activities with business strategy. Defining the “metrics” is key, because, if well chosen, these are the appropriate measures of the success of strategic objectives.
* People and Processes — This layer should characterize the users and processes and explain how information and analysis is employed to drive changes.
* Analytic Applications — Analytic applications are components of the BI and PM vision and plan and are defined at this level. The links between the PM layer and analytic applications are defined here and detail how the analytic applications contribute to achieving the performance objectives (that is, the metrics) defined in the PM layer.
* BI Platforms — This layer defines the combination and relative priority of BI platform capabilities that different users require from their analytic applications, and how these diverse capabilities are being addressed while minimizing redundancy.
* Information Management Infrastructure— This layer needs to address how the data architecture and data integration infrastructure — which are the foundations of enterprise BI initiatives — ensure efficiency and agility to react to changing business requirements.

“BI and PM initiatives must be integral to the business strategy and execution in order to drive maximum value from these initiatives. As such, the related technology and applications must be core to IT architecture and applications portfolio,” said Kurt Schlegel, Gartner research director and BI Summit co-chair. “The BI Excellence Award honors the company that has shown leadership in leveraging information assets coupled with business intelligence to drive business performance to new levels.”

Three finalists will be selected and asked to present their BI success story to conference attendees at the Gartner Business Intelligence Summit, taking place March 9-11, 2009 in the Washington D.C. area. Summit attendees will vote to select the Gartner BI Excellence Award winner from the finalists. The winner will be announced at the summit.

More information on Gartner’s BI Excellence Award and the online entry form are available at http://www.gartner.com/it/summits/748720/bi7_awards.jsp or on the Gartner Business Intelligence Summit Web site at www.gartner.com/us/bi.

About Gartner Business Intelligence Summit
The Gartner BI Summit, being held March 9-11, 2009 at the Gaylord National Resort in Washington D.C., is the only event designed to provide businesses with the knowledge required to create a visionary business intelligence strategy. This event focuses on the methodologies, strategies, technologies and architectures that will move organizations from the tactics of cost cutting and compliance to increasing their agility and responsiveness, and improving overall business performance. Additional information is available at www.gartner.com/us/bi. Members of the media can register by sending an e-mail to Christy Pettey at christy.pettey@gartner.com.

Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT) is the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company. Gartner delivers the technology-related insight necessary for its clients to make the right decisions, every day. From CIOs and senior IT leaders in corporations and government agencies, to business leaders in high-tech and telecom enterprises and professional services firms, to technology investors, Gartner is the indispensable partner to 60,000 clients in 10,000 distinct organizations. Through the resources of Gartner Research, Gartner Consulting and Gartner Events, Gartner works with every client to research, analyze and interpret the business of IT within the context of their individual role. Founded in 1979, Gartner is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, U.S.A., and has 4,000 associates, including 1,200 research analysts and consultants in 80 countries. For more information, visit www.gartner.com.