As Don noted in his post “Why the “E” in EDW (Enterprise Data Warehousing)?” many companies have successfully implemented Enterprise Data Warehousing, producing great business ROI. Don talked about how the industry has evolved to better appreciate EDW.

While consulting to companies on data warehousing solutions I’ve noticed that companies not effectively deploying EDW fall into two camps:

• No real data warehousing effort. Instead they rely on their business applications to provide reporting and analysis capabilities.
• A central data warehouse has been created. But they conduct most analysis using databases (maybe called data marts) or data shadow systems created separately from the central DW.

If you are in either camp it may finally be time for you to pursue enterprise data warehousing.
A true EDW approach means that you integrate and transform data from your enterprise applications (data creation) all the way to your business people getting their reports and performing business analysis (information consumption).

It is only when you are managing your data from creation to consumption, i.e. Enterprise Data Management (EDM), that you can effectively tap the business value in your enterprise’s underlying data. In addition, the most effective way to implement your industry’s initiatives such as HIPPA, or comply with governmental regulations, is through EDW.

Don mentioned that the initial approach that Bill Inmon advocated was a centralized DW (only) and his views have evolved to a more comprehensive EDW approach (from creation to consumption) that now includes data marts and other data locations to enable reporting and analysis.

Likewise, Ralph Kimball started from a different perspective, that all you need is data marts without that central DW, but his views have also evolved to an EDW approach. In the “old days” the debate was central DW (Inmon) versus data marts only (Kimball), but both revised their views based on the pragmatic needs of an enterprise.

I was involved in EDW using a hub-and-spoke architecture at Digital Equipment Corporation (acquired by Compaq, which was itself acquired by Hewlett-Packard (HPQ)) in 1987. That was before either Bill or Ralph were publishing books or evolving their positions to the EDW architecture that they would eventually advocate.

It took a while for the industry to recognize EDW as a best practice and even longer for companies to implement it. Many companies have tapped the business potential of EDW. Has yours?