Recently there was an announcement of a joint venture between business intelligence vendor Business Objects and one of the world's leading sources for financial data, Thomson Financial, goes well beyond a simple partnership deal, We are witnessing the convergence of SaaS (Software as a Service) solutions along with industry-specific applications," according to Liz Herbert, senior analyst with Forrester Research.

The deal will bundle Thomson Financial business data that is typically used by market analysts and securities specialists with Business Objects reporting, analytics, and dashboard capabilities in prepackaged solutions targeted at particular user profiles.

"This is closure," said Herbert.

Steve Lucas, vice president of On Demand Business unit at Business Objects - "This solution will make Thomson data universal to anyone who needs this," said Lucas. Up until now Thomson data was limited to a small number of specialists who knew how to access and interpret the data.The SaaS solution is built around profiles of different types knowledge workers based on job function who have a need to consume such reports.

General availability is due in the third quarter.

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Tags: BO - Thomson+Partners - saas - future - convergence

Prashanth Rai