Visualisation is a key component in data storytelling, which is a methodology that transforms the complexity of data into a story that is easy to understand for all audiences.
This methodology has 3 basic elements, firstly data, the basis of any study, secondly the visualisation of this data and finally the narrative. In this article, we will focus on the intermediate step, visualisation.
Visualisation allows you to look at all the information you have in an orderly, clear and coherent way. Thus, you will be able to extract conclusions and insights that you will incorporate into your data narrative.
Technologies for visualisation are evolving quickly. Yearly, IT consulting firm Gartner publishes its Magic Quadrants for ‘Analytics and BI-platforms’. After rating their ability to execute and completeness of vision, all analysed vendors are positioned in one of the four quadrants: Niche Players, Challengers, Visionaries and Leaders.
At Nucleoo, we’ve analysed Gartner’s Magic Quadrants in this particular space over the last decade. From the report we can draw the following conclusions:
- Currently, there are three undisputed Leaders; Qlik, Tableau and Microsoft, but their evolution in recent years has been different.
- The only company in the Leaders’ quadrant for more than 12 consecutive years is Microsoft with its visualisation tool Power BI. It has been at the top of this ranking for 6 years.
- Tableau entered the market later, appearing in the Challenger quadrant before moving to the Leaders in 2013, where it has remained until now. Currently ranking second with some distance over Microsoft.
- Qlik started in 2009 as a Visionary, the following year moved to Challengers, and in 2011 moved to leaders, since then it has been in that quadrant. At present, in third position behind Tableau and Microsoft.
