What does the Equivio acquisition mean for Microsoft training?
With the amount of digital information being produced on a daily basis, enterprises require tools that can not only “make sense of it all” but provide specific answers to vexing questions.
A number of Microsoft training courses are focusing heavily on the corporation’s analytics programs, which aren’t rudimentary solutions by any measure. Being able to register unstructured data (video, images, text, etc.) and identify trends that are easy for even a team of professionals to overlook is an incredible feat.
Scrutinizing written sentiment
A large bulk of the data produced in the world resides on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and other websites. They all contain a plethora of written information. The problem is, machines have an incredibly difficult time discerning such data – a reminder that the human brain is vastly different than the average PC or a supercomputer.
Microsoft is acknowledging this issue, investing in companies that specialize in machine learning, artificial intelligence and text mining. Computer Business Review noted that the Redmond, Washington-based company recently signed a letter of intent to purchase Equivio, a text analysis startup based in Israel. The deal is estimated to be about $200 million.
What does Equivio’s software do? It employs machine learning algorithms that allow it to peruse legal documents for pertinent information. Emails, social and collaboration networks can also be scrutinized in a way similar to the manner in which humans process written language. The source noted that Equivio’s tools “simplify samples of texts linked to an issue and apply the sorting logic to groups of texts.”
Affordable analysis
The type of data analytics platform mentioned above is often quite expensive because it’s so sophisticated. A part of Microsoft’s mission is to bring programs of the same caliber as stand-alone solutions to users at an affordable price. Business 2 Community contributor Jason Bowden noted that Microsoft intends to deliver powerful business intelligence tools to small businesses, an ambitious endeavor in and of itself considering that only large organizations procured such technology in the past.
Bowden cited a 2014 Forrester report, which named Microsoft as one of the leading BI tool providers of the year. Power BI, Microsoft’s signature data analytics platform, has been lauded by users for its ability to integrate with existing repositories (warehouses, databases) without hassle.
Will Equivo’s technology be combined with Power BI? If the acquisition is finalized, it’s a very likely scenario. The agreement would bring a new class of analytics to Microsoft’s existing solution, prompting professionals to learn as much about the software as possible.
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