Acxiom and Arbor Software Team to Integrate Leading OLAP Server with Customer-Based Data Warehousing Solutions

Business Wire, Oct 21, 1996

CONWAY, Ark.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 21, 1996--Acxiom(R) Corp. (NASDAQ:ACXM) and Arbor(R) Software Corp. (NASDAQ:ARSW) today announced a partnership to integrate Essbase(R), Arbor's multidimensional database server, with information held in Acxiom's data warehouses, making data readily accessible to clients that require rapid, multi-user access to consolidated, enterprise data.

Acxiom builds and manages all aspects of customer-based data warehouses and DSS applications for large, primarily Fortune 1000 companies. Utilizing a simplified 3-tiered approach, Acxiom builds systems that enable clients to analyze their internal databases. First, an Acxiom client's disparate databases are cleansed and integrated.

Next, they are overlaid with external InfoBase information to create a unified customer knowledge base. Finally, data warehouses combined with desktop decision support tools make the information usable by corporate decision makers.

Arbor develops high performance, multidimensional database software for business planning, analysis and management reporting applications. Their flagship product, Essbase, is a leader in the OLAP (On-Line Analytical Processing) market. Essbase supports simultaneous, multi-user read/write operations at the server, enabling analysts to update projections and run interactive "what if" scenarios in a shared data environment.

Products Combined Strengths Provide Clients with Competitive Edge

Today's competitive landscape has dramatically changed the planning and analysis activities of corporations worldwide. In the past, simple extrapolation of past performance and "educated guesses" were acceptable for making business decisions. In the current environment, increasingly dense volumes of information must be intelligently analyzed. To provide these capabilities, companies are turning to data warehousing technology.

However, multiple studies and development failures have shown that a warehouse is only as useful as the data value contained within. While financial data is generally pristine, data cleanliness is clearly among the most costly problems associated with customer information. It is subject to multiple errors that start at order entry and propagate.

"Information content is essential to exploitation of a data warehouse," said Dave Wilson, Acxiom Business Unit executive. "A company that is able to enhance the intrinsic value of customer and market information will attain a distinct competitive advantage."

While Acxiom focuses on constructing warehouses, crunching customer data, and enhancing the data utilizing its massive consumer and business database, Arbor provides optimized multidimensional support for analysis. "The combined solution from Acxiom and Arbor Software takes sales and marketing activities away from an art form and closer to a science," said Jim Dorrian, president and chief executive officer of Arbor Software.

"This integration enables our customers to analyze large volumes of customer data to assess market trends and seize new market opportunities."

"Acxiom has taken a major step becoming an Arbor Alliance Partner," said Charles D. Morgan, Jr., Acxiom chairman and president. "We believe this relationship will provide significant business opportunities to both companies. By utilizing Essbase with Acxiom's IBConsumer sm and IBBusiness sm databases, companies will have the ability to easily deploy highly adaptable queries of tens of millions of customer records."

About Arbor's Essbase

Essbase is a multidimensional database optimized for business planning, analysis and management reporting applications such as profitability analysis, budgeting, forecasting, planning, financial consolidations, sales analysis and EIS. Based upon a true, client/server architecture, Essbase supports multi-user read and write access, large-scale data capacity, robust analytical calculations, flexible data navigation and consistent, rapid response times.

The Essbase server's open architecture supports direct data access using standard spreadsheets, leading third-party query, reporting and EIS tools and Web browsers.

Essbase scales from a single-user version to an enterprise OLAP solution serving thousands of users with databases that are hundreds of gigabytes in size. Essbase enables corporations to deliver OLAP applications directly from operational systems, or as a data mart within an overall data warehousing architecture. Essbase operates on Windows NT, OS/2, UNIX and AS/400 servers across all major networks connected to Windows, Macintosh and UNIX clients.

About Arbor Software

Arbor Software Corp. (NASDAQ:ARSW) develops and markets client/server software for business planning, analysis and management reporting. Arbor's products are used by more than 800 corporations spanning a broad range of industries and business applications including BankBoston, Fidelity, Los Angeles Times, Neutrogena, Pennzoil, PEPSICO, Prudential and Sears.

Arbor has over 100 applications, services, tools and platform partners, including Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Microsoft. Arbor's products are sold direct, as well as through system integrators and VARs worldwide.