In the past 35 years, business intelligence (BI) has evolved in two alternating waves: a reporting wave geared to casual users, and an analysis wave geared to power users. Both waves are now converging in an embedded analytics market where organizations and software vendors embed reports, analysis and analytics functionality into applications that run the business. This convergence will help close the last mile of BI by turning insights into action. The purpose of BI is to turn data into insights and action. Embedded analytics makes that possible by putting insights into the context of operational applications in which actions occur. With embedded analytics, business users no longer have to exit a business application to view results, analyze performance, and view recommended actions; they can do this inside the application itself.

First, we need to clarify some terminology and related confusion. EPM is not solely a system or a process. It is instead the integration of multiple managerial methods – and most of them have been around for decades arguably even before there were computers. EPM is also not just a CFO initiative with a bunch of scorecard and dashboard dials. It is much broader. Its purpose is not about monitoring the dials but rather moving the dials.