Qlik Focuses on Enhancing Response Time and Addressing Governance Challenges

Over the past few years, businesses in various industries have increasingly utilized AI-driven data and predictive analytics tools to drive intelligent decision-making, improve cybersecurity measures, enhance operational efficiency, and gain deeper insights into their customers. These businesses increasingly seek real-time data streaming for analytics to achieve faster response times and enhance competitiveness. Understandably, the US-based software company Qlik sees significant demand for real-time data streaming as businesses recognize its importance in gaining a competitive edge.
In a recent interaction with CIO&Leader, Byron Yeung, VP of APAC, Data Integration at Qlik, highlighted their focus on addressing key challenges faced by Indian enterprises.
The data management and analytics vendor combines generative AI with their suites of capabilities and emphasizes two common challenges faced by Indian enterprises: the exponential growth of data overwhelming existing data pipeline processes and the complexity of integrating multiple data sources to accommodate evolving business requirements. Yeung recommended exploring efficient and cost-effective solutions such as real-time CDC data extraction and cloud-based data warehouse or data lake automation to overcome these obstacles. He noted that these cloud-based options offer flexible pricing models and simplified maintenance, resulting in a rapid return on investment.
Yeung also acknowledged data governance as a significant challenge, particularly for CIOs, given the evolving and complex ecosystem. Ensuring data security and compliance with regulations across different countries can be demanding. To address this, Qlik has acquired talent in data governance, security, and quality, integrating it into its solution and product portfolio. This approach addresses challenges like data currency that many customers face.

Byron Yeung, VP of APAC, Data Integration, Qlik
 
"We closely monitor regulatory compliance requirements and continuously assess the sufficiency of our solution. If necessary, we develop or acquire additional solutions to address these issues. For instance, in Europe, we have GDPR and modified our solution to ensure compliance with these regulations. It is indeed our top priority to meet the compliance needs of our customers and local governments," explained Yeung.
Experts in the industry recognize the collective need for streamlined data integration processes and efficient management of large data volumes. By prioritizing faster response times and strengthening governance, enterprises strive to optimize their operations and gain a competitive advantage in the dynamic Indian market.
Enabling enterprises build a robust data strategy
Regarding building a solid data strategy, the volume and velocity of data pose significant challenges for enterprises. Managing multiple data sources adds to data preparation and pipeline creation complexity. Yeung highlights Qlik's value through its automation capabilities, emphasizing the importance of automating data transformation, governance, and profiling processes to achieve quick results. He advises enterprises to engage with vendors who offer cutting-edge technology, particularly in the cloud, as it provides scalability, cost-effectiveness, and built-in utilities for process automation.
Yeung recommends enterprises to leverage the expertise of technology vendors rather than attempting to tackle these challenges themselves, especially on-premises. By doing so, businesses can efficiently handle data transformation, governance, and profiling, leading to improved decision-making and operational efficiency. Qlik has introduced the Connector Factory as part of its Qlik Cloud Data Integration solution. This solution, it says, enables data integration from databases and SaaS applications, consolidating the data streams and storing them in a cloud data warehouse. It offers automated transformation capabilities, ensuring a seamless experience for customers.
According to Qlik, the Connector Factory is crucial in facilitating this integration process. The company currently supports multiple connectors and has plans to expand its selection in the future. The objective is to empower customers to make well-informed business decisions by facilitating smooth data integration. Qlik intends to broaden its range of connectors, providing customers with more choices and flexibility. According to the company, this initiative targets two specific market segments: data integration and application integration, also known as iPaaS (Integration Platform as a Service). Qlik says its strategy aligns to assist customers in meeting their integration requirements.
"We are committed to delivering a comprehensive solution that addresses data integration and application integration needs. Our goal is to empower customers to leverage the potential of their data effectively," states Yeung. Additionally, the company is actively supporting and leveraging third-party data. Customers who have acquired data from other tools can reuse it without extracting it using Qlik's solution. Instead, the Qlik Cloud Data Integration solution can transform the third-party data within the warehouse.
"When discussing this innovation with our customers, they appreciate the ability to transform their legacy data within the same environment easily. This offering provides a valuable solution for customers with existing data obtained through alternative methods," explains Yeung.
Adding new capabilities through acquisitions
Yeung confirmed that Qlik continues to invest in acquiring companies to expand their capabilities and solutions, particularly in AI, machine learning, and cataloging. These technologies, the company says, are embedded into Qlik's product portfolio, enabling natural language processing and providing predictive and prescriptive insights to customers.
Regarding data integration, Yeung observes a shift from ETL (Extraction, Transformation, Loading) to ELT (Extraction, Loading, Transformation) approaches. Cloud data warehouse vendors promote the ELT approach, leveraging the scalability of cloud processing power for transmission. Yeung notes the benefits of reducing time and cost, along with improved cataloging, governance, security, and API connectivity.
Qlik focuses on industries such as insurance, banking, and manufacturing, where they have experienced success. These industries often have a mix of legacy and modern systems, and Qlik says that it helps them extract and transform data in real time. In India, its current customers include the likes of HDFC Life and TCS, among several others. The company will keep investing, acquiring companies to expand its capabilities and solutions.
Integrating with Open AI
Qlik also initiated its collaboration with OpenAI earlier this year to integrate its connectors and to work on a plan to combine OpenAI's technology with its existing tools. Overall, the company aims to provide comprehensive solutions, address the challenges enterprises face in data integration and application integration, and empower customers to effectively leverage their data, enabling them to improve decision-making and operational efficiency.
Qlik faces competition from several companies in the analytics and business intelligence market, including Tableau, Power BI, MicroStrategy, IBM, and SAP.