Finally, the IBM/Cognos Analysis Begins Rolling In...

There's been a lot of talk this week about the relatively ho-hum reaction of people around the industry to the news that IBM is acquiring Cognos, thereby completing the consolidation that everyone had been predicting would occur as BI largely ceases to be a standalone category.

Part of the reason is that quite frankly this had been expected for well over a year--I've spoken with people who were working for all the major BI and ERP vendors who have said they were on SWAT teams or on marketing teams preparing for this news back in 2006. It's long been seen as a pretty natural combination, with little product overlap and the ability to seriously extend Cognos' reach through the IBM services group.

The other reason is more my opinion, but I think people used most of their energy around SAP and Business Objects, because of the size of the acquisition, as well as the implication on the industry regarding the independence of Business Objects now that it was a part of SAP. IBM and Cognos don't really have that element of overlap or intrigue--probably due to the fact that it just makes a lot of sense given the consolidation trend.

So while the emails among the competitive teams of all the big vendors have been on fire this week preparing their field teams for the talking points and competitive analysis, the press and analysts have been relatively quiet.

But now we're starting to see the analysis roll in from lots of different sources, most all of it positive:

Rob Ash was apparently golfing when he first took the call from IBM indicating their interest...

David Kirkpatrick from Fortune tells us what the combination means for the industry...

Lee Pender from the MSFT focused Redmond Channel Partner IT magazine tells us all to save ourselves, the end of the BI world is near...

Mary Hayes Weier from Information Week talks to the remaining independent vendors who predictably are still carrying the "Independent BI is still the best" party line...

And finally, Bert Hill of the Ottawa Citizen tells us that "Breaking up is hard to do" and talked dissolution fees should someone else want to enter the picture at this point as well as talking about Rob Ashe's compensation accelerators in the deal...