Making smart business decisions, identifying problems, and being profitable demands methods and tools that turn data into actionable insights. Business Intelligence (BI) and Business Analytics(BA) present data management solutions. While BI is often used as a foundation to answer complex questions, BA is more advanced. The two terms sound similar but serve different purposes. Understanding Business Intelligence vs Business Analytics is crucial to get the best from your data.
Business Intelligence vs Business Analytics
Characteristics | Business Intelligence | Business Analytics |
Terms | Analyses history and present to drive current business requirements | Analyses historical data to drive current business |
Application | Suitable for all large-scale companies | Suitable for all companies where productivity and future growth are the goals |
Usage | For present business operations | For future business operations |
Tools Used | TIBCO PowerBI SAP Business Objects QlikSense | Word processing MS Visio MS Office Tools Google docs |
Learn more about business intelligence and business analytics with our Business Analytics Program with IIT Roorkee.
What Is Business Intelligence?
Business Intelligence is an infrastructure comprising strategies and technologies used in enterprise industries for collecting and analyzing the existing business data that gives insights into the historical, present, and predictive events of business operations. BI gives comprehensive business metrics to support better decision-making.
BI frameworks present current, authentic, and visionary views of commercial operations. They mostly utilize the information gathered in an information stockroom/shop and sometimes operational information.
What Is Business Analytics?
Business Analytics is the use of strategies and technologies to explore and extract insights and performance from historical business information for successfully driving future business plans, meeting customer needs, and increasing productivity.
It works on unused bits of knowledge and provides an understanding of business performance on the basis of information and measurable strategies.
Key Differences Between Business Intelligence and Business Analytics
Now that you know the definitions of the two terms let's explore a complete comparison of business intelligence vs business analytics.
Current Circ*mstances vs Future Events
The focus on the occurrence of events is the primary distinction between business intelligence vs business analytics. While BI concentrates on current and past events recorded in the data, BA focuses mostly on what is more likely to happen in the future. The two practices have different timelines for applying the results while using the same data.
When your analysis concerns what is happening now and why Business Intelligence is your choice for data management, contrastingly, Business Analytics answers the question: What is likely to happen next?
Use BI to form strategies for current situations and BA for strategies that would impact future operations.
Structured Data vs Semi-structured Data
BI applications are more suitable for structured data from enterprise applications like ERP and Financial Software Systems. It helps get insights from past financial transactions.
Business Analytics application suits both unstructured and semi-structured data, transforms them into meaningful data before analysis, and then gets insights from that data with thorough predictive analytics.
Descriptive vs Predictive Approach
Business Intelligence answers the two main questions:
- What has happened in the past?
- What is happening now and why?
It is descriptive and gives you detailed information.
On the other hand, Business Analytics is mostly about predictive analytics. It identifies patterns in business data, suggests why things are happening, and forecasts the likelihood of future events. Its goal is to predict future events based on what's already occurred. It helps formulate better decisions and be prepared accordingly.
Become a Business and Leadership Professional
- Top 10 skills in demandBusiness Analysis as a skill in 2020
- 14% Growth in Jobsof Business Analysis profile by 2028
- $85KAverage Salary
Post Graduate Program in Business Analysis
- Certificate from Simplilearn in collaboration with Purdue University
- Become eligible to be part of the Purdue University Alumni Association
6 months
View Program
Business Analyst
- Industry-recognized certifications from IBM and Simplilearn
- Masterclasses from IBM experts
11 months
View Program
prevNext
Here's what learners are saying regarding our programs:
Vy Tran
I was keenly looking for a change in my domain from business consultancy to IT(Business Analytics). This Post Graduate Program in Business Analysis course helped me achieve the same. I am proficient in business analysis now and am looking for job profiles that suit my skill set.
Sauvik Pal
Assistant Consultant at Tata Consultancy Services, Tata Consultancy Services
My experience with Simplilearn has been great till now. They have good materials to start with, and a wide range of courses. I have signed up for two courses with Simplilearn over the past 6 months, Data Scientist and Agile and Scrum. My experience with both is good. One unique feature I liked about Simplilearn is that they give pre-requisites that you should complete, before a live class, so that you go there fully prepared. Secondly, there support staff is superb. I believe there are two teams, to cater to the Indian and US time zones. Simplilearn gives you the most methodical and easy way to up-skill yourself. Also, when you compare the data analytics courses across the market that offer web-based tutorials, Simplilearn, scores over the rest in my opinion. Great job, Simplilearn!
prevNext
Not sure what you’re looking for?View all Related Programs
Reporting vs Applying
Date viewing and reporting is another point of difference between Business Intelligence vs Business Analytics. BI is simplified and has data arranged into easily comprehensible reports that brief the viewer on what is happening. Interactive dashboards, charts, and easy-to-read reports are commonly used with BI results.
Business Analytics takes a step further and goes on to reveal why things are happening by employing data applications and statistical analysis.
Analysts vs Managers
When studying Business Intelligence vs Business Analysts, it is crucial to consider the end users. While BI tools present understandable data to accountants, managers, and marketers, i.e., people without technical expertise. This information helps them make informed business decisions without needing the assistance of a data professional. Business Intelligence requires basic math for calculating results, and the rest is done using BI software. It relies on the formulation of mathematical models, Machine Learning, querying, and artificial intelligence for proceedings.
Business analytics is a little more demanding. It requires more information to parse and interpret useful information. Thus, it can efficiently be handled by data analysts with an analytics skill set who know how to build machine learning capabilities and have sound software application knowledge.
New vs Existing Analytics Strategy
Business Intelligence and Business Analytics go hand in hand. Initially, companies ease their way into analytics by enforcing a BI strategy. It sets the pace with efficient collection, storing and structuring of data. It is only after the business intelligence strategy is adopted that the businesses dive deeper into data with Business Analytics. Thus, the same data gathered and stored during the Business Intelligence can be used as inputs for predictive Business Analytics by analysts.
Conclusion
Business Intelligence vs Business Analytics is all about one being more advanced than the other. So, a firm command of the simpler– Business Intelligence is a prerequisite for diving into the more advanced– business analytics. In other words, BI tends to serve as a basis for BA.
Want to learn more about the role of analytics in today's fast-paced technical world? Sign-up for our Professional Certificate Program in Business Analysis and learn how to tackle complex business problems using in-demand tools. Make the most of this business analysis course with Masterclasses from IBM, EY, and Purdue University. Start your learning journey today!
