Board Empowers Customers’ BI Efforts with On-Prem and Cloud-Based Data via Progress DataDirect Hybrid Data Pipeline

Data is the essence of every business. But turning that data into actionable insight can be difficult without the right tools. Board International’s unified platform for Business Intelligence, Planning, and Predictive Analytics empowers enterprises to take that next step, converting data into fuel for better business decision-making.

What sets Board's data toolkit apart from the competition is its broad range of capabilities. Board is applicable across all industries, and it enables customers to combine functionality typically met with multiple tools,” said Pietro Ferrari, Chief Technology Officer, Board International. For example, customers using other analytics companies would need three tools to accomplish what they can with Board.

This makes flexibility critical to the success of the Board data platform. To deliver on this deployment flexibility, Board needed to modernize its on-prem data platform to support cloud-based environments. On top of that, the platform had to integrate data from a broad array of on-premises and cloud-based data sources.

“Data connectivity is our first concern how do we move data from on-premises to the cloud?” said Ferrari. Not resolving the connectivity issue would have been a showstopper.”  

Designed specifically for consuming and sharing data across today’s hybrid data landscape, Progress DataDirect® Hybrid Data Pipeline was the perfect fit. It provided Boardwith easy access to on-prem and cloud-based data sources and applications, without sacrificing security or scalability. 

“We didn’t find any other solution that took the same approach as Progress DataDirect,” said Ferrari. “DataDirect does all the maintenance and updates transparently, so we don’t have to.” 

Implementing Hybrid Data Pipeline (HDP) took roughly three months, enabling Boardto launch its cloud product within the year. Testing went smoothly, with Board working closely with DataDirect to resolve issues and get HDP running within Azure environment.  

Rolling it out to customers was also easy. “It was just a matter of provisioning; the customer can just pick up the address and download the on-premises connector. We don't need to do anything, just provision the user and enable it on our SaaS,” added Andrea Rocchietti, Global Head of Cloud Operations, Board International. 

Additionally, Hybrid Data Pipeline opened up a new revenue opportunity for Board. When customers start using Board and realize they need real-time access to their data as they go from on-premise installations to the cloud, Board can step in. 

“Hybrid Data Pipeline enables you to get through the firewall without connecting to a VPN,” Ferrari explained. “This meant we could OEM the DataDirect drivers to our customers, for an additional revenue opportunity.” 

To date, more than 200 Board customers are leveraging DataDirect Hybrid Data Pipeline to access on-premises data from Board’s cloud-based data platform. And with more businesses looking to migrate to the cloud, Ferrari expects that number to continue to grow over the next couple of years. 

Ferrari says choosing HDP was the right choice for today and for the future. “We needed a solution that would work immediately, and it did,” he said. “We didn’t even know if it was possible in the first place, and it saved us from having to dedicate our own developers to building an in-house solution, which could have taken months. Instead, we just deployed DataDirect, and it was done.”  

Most importantly, HDP has had a big impact in meeting Board’s own objectives and goals around cloud availability. When we presented our cloud strategy to partners, most of the questions were around data connectivity. Our data platform can’t exist without data, and our customers need a means of loading their data without extra friction, Rocchietti explained. Without DataDirect, we’d have to take an entirely new approach to empowering our customers to load their data.”