IBM aims Cognos Express at middle markets

IBM Cognos Express is available on a modular basis

IBM is aiming its corporate business intelligence (BI) software at mid-sized companies for the first time.

The IBM Cognos Express package uses technology from the firm's acquisition of Cognos in 2007 to bring BI to companies with under 1,000 employees.

IBM said that it has rewritten the code so that it can scale down to the smaller business looking to merge databases.

"This is not just a repackaging exercise," said Caroline Seymour, a business unit executive at IBM Cognos. "We've spent many thousands of man-hours on this. It's purpose built for mid-sized companies."

The suite comes with three modules: Express Reporter, Express Advisor, and Express Xcelerator. The software uses Excel formatting to link to existing spreadsheets, and build business information charts via a web format.

Express Reporter is the base level package for linking data for the basic user, while Express Advisor offers more predictive capability and visualisation. IBM claims that Express Xcelerator, meanwhile, pushes these capabilities deeper for more advanced business modelling.

IBM is charging $12,000 (£7,240) for a single module, or up to $25 per user per month. Companies can buy on a modular basis or get the whole package, depending on their IT resources.

"When you are ready to buy the next one it just plugs in," said Seymour. " It's about minimising the impact on IT, which might not be happy about implementing on its own. It's about a partnership with management."