Pyramid Decision Intelligence Platform

Pyramid Analytics  is a great tool for digging into data from different angles. It is like a supercharged version of Power BI , offering a smart way to analyze information over time and other dimensions. With Pyramid, you can easily create detailed reports that provide timely and intelligent insights. It is a user-friendly platform that makes data exploration and decision-making easy.

At my previous job, we used Pyramid Analytics  for a healthcare client, and it made a big impact. They wanted to predict patient visits using machine learning. With Pyramid, we analyzed five years of clinical assessment data and forecasted how often patients would visit each site. After six months, our regular analysis showed that Pyramid accurately predicted visits around 80% of the time. This was a huge benefit in implementing the healthcare plan, providing valuable insights for better planning and resource allocation.

The most valuable feature of Pyramid Analytics, outshining even top-tier platforms like Power BI , is its robust support for DAX queries. This capability enhances data analysis significantly, making Pyramid a versatile and powerful tool for deriving insights from complex datasets.

Pyramid Analytics could improve by speeding up data refresh, especially for large datasets. While it is currently an in-memory tool, efforts are underway to enhance direct connections to source systems and potentially move to the cloud for faster reporting. There is also room for improvement in supporting additional reporting formats like D3.js  and web reports.

I have been working with Pyramid Analytics for five years.

I would rate the stability of Pyramid Analytics at around a six out of ten. While it is not exceptionally stable currently, there is ongoing improvement as the tool evolves at a faster pace.

I would rate the scalability as a nine out of ten. Currently, we have around 30 to 50 end users in our organization, with seven developers working on various business modules. Initially, we started with 15 users and have developed around 100 to 150 reports. While our current usage is at a maximum of 50 end users, we anticipate potential increases in the future, especially if there are any acquisitions.

I would rate their tech support as a ten out of ten.

Positive

I used Power BI, Tableau , and a bit of Click before switching to Pyramid Analytics. I made the switch because Pyramid has a more user-friendly interface with better features. It also supports multi-dimensional models, which was a key factor, something Tableau  doesn't offer.

Deploying Pyramid Analytics was quite straightforward. The deployment involved a small admin team of two to three people, while the overall team size was around 15 to 20, including seven business intelligence specialists. In terms of maintenance, it is minimal, typically requiring only a patch upgrade every six months. Overall, it is a low-maintenance solution once it is up and running.

We have seen a significant return on investment with Pyramid Analytics. For instance, in forecasting patient visits to urgent care facilities, we achieved an 80% accuracy, allowing providers to plan and allocate resources more effectively. 

I find the price of Pyramid Analytics to be quite reasonable, especially when compared to other tools in the industry. It is a cost-effective choice, particularly for mid-sized or larger companies with a three-tier or higher structure. It meets the needs well within budget.

My advice to anyone considering Pyramid Analytics would be that if you are a smaller organization with budget constraints but still need robust reporting metrics, Pyramid's mode could be the perfect fit. It offers all the necessary features and solid technical support at a more affordable cost. On the other hand, if you are a larger organization with a bigger budget, you might want to explore Power BI. While both platforms are similar, Power BI, being integrated with Microsoft, has the added advantage of seamless connectivity to Microsoft systems. They serve the same purpose, but Power BI is hosted by Microsoft. Overall, I would rate Pyramid Analytics as an eight out of ten.

I use it to create reports for my clients. These reports focus on traditional business topics like market share, share difference, and sales difference over different time periods. It helps us analyze and present data in a structured way.

The features I find most valuable are 'Discover,' 'Formulate,' and 'Model.' I use them regularly to build logic and create reports for my job.

There is room for improvement in terms of documentation and examples, especially for newcomers like me who are learning both business intelligence and Pyramid. I have occasionally struggled with understanding the syntax, so more extensive documentation with practical examples would be really helpful. Additionally, I have encountered challenges with loading large amounts of data into memory. While working in the cloud is fine, managing and processing data in memory has been a struggle. I have had to raise technical support tickets to address these issues.

I have been using Pyramid Analytics daily for about eight months.

On a scale of one to ten, I would rate the stability as a six. I have experienced an issue where I lost a lot of work, and it was frustrating. While it doesn't happen regularly, there have been instances of work being lost, including by a partner in Germany.

The scalability of Pyramid Analytics is quite high, I would rate it eight out of ten. At my company, six people use the solution, and we have about 100 clients who use it as well. We are considerably expanding the usage of the solution.

My experience with the support team has been positive. I have reached out for help with various issues, and I think they are attentive, supportive, and responsive. Overall, I find their support to be good.

We didn't use a different solution before Pyramid Analytics. We chose Pyramid primarily because it was the preferred choice of our major client.

The solution is not cheap, but its pricing is comparable to other BI tools on the market.

My advice for newcomers is to try to separate your work from understanding other data as much as possible. Start with public datasets or your own familiar data, like sports analytics, to learn the tool and its capabilities. This way, you can stretch yourself and explore various aspects of the tool without being limited by client expectations. Overall, I would rate the solution a seven out of ten. 

It is a versatile business intelligence and analytics platform that can be used for various purposes including creating medical services dashboards, supply chain dashboards, and leveraging AI capabilities. It allows connecting and analyzing data from multiple sources, creating models and visualizations, and collaborating with others. 

It offers a unique and powerful feature called ''swapping'' which allows users to easily switch between columns and rows, and the platform automatically recalculates all the relevant measures accordingly. It provides extensive self-service capabilities, enabling users to customize visuals such as changing bars to circles. It offers a wide range of analytics options including statistics and visualizations, as well as prediction capabilities, allowing users to make forecasts based on the latest data.

The platform has encountered several bugs during programming. Their support team collaborated with us to find solutions, even if the bugs were new to them as well. While they managed to eventually resolve issues, it is acknowledged that there may be some bugs that they did not anticipate, especially in regions where the platform is less commonly used. There is room for improvement in terms of the user interface, particularly when it comes to modifying connections between filters and visual components in a dashboard. The process currently requires making changes one by one, which can be tedious. The platform developers are aware of this limitation and they have been working to enhance the user experience and provide more efficient ways of modifying dashboards.

I have been using it for one year.

The stability is inconsistent, as sometimes it presents alerts upon opening a dashboard, but these alerts may disappear upon reopening. The stability depends on the complexity of the functions implemented in the dashboard. If sophisticated functions are used, there may be instances where the system encounters errors or struggles to determine the cause of the alert.

We obtained two hundred licenses, but we have only thirty to forty people who use Pyramid dashboard. It is a scalable solution.

Our experience with their customer support services is highly satisfactory. They have offices here, in Tel Aviv, and when I called them to report certain issues, they scheduled a meeting with me in their offices. During the meeting, I had the opportunity to discuss the issues encountered and provide necessary information. The bugs reported were promptly addressed and resolved within a week or two, with the support team conducting collaborative meetings to ensure efficient communication. 

The initial setup was done easily and promptly.

After we evaluated several options like Power BI and Tableau, we decided to choose Pyramid Analytics. While Power BI is strong in cloud-based solutions, it lacks frequent updates for on-premises versions. As a result, Pyramid Analytics becomes the preferred choice as it offers robust features and frequent updates for on-premises data analytics.

When working on-premises, Pyramid Analytics offers several advantages over Power BI and Tableau. Despite some limitations in terms of programming, it offers extensive self-service capabilities and functions that cater to end-users needs. I would rate it eight out of ten.

The solution is used for high level reporting. 

Pyramid has a wide level of uses, as it's a complete ETL process and has a good level of connecting to a lot of data sources. 

Even though the solution has a functionality for every step, it's not so well- defined. That needs to be improved. 

I have been using Pyramid Analytics over three years. 

It is a stable solution. Sometimes there are bugs but most of the time, it is stable.

It is a scalable solution. Presently, 200 to 300 users are using the solution. 

The technical team is very responsive. 

The installation is done by third party vendors. 

I have seen a return on investment.

There is a yearly cost which is between ten to twenty thousand per year. 

The company decided on Pyramid Analytics because the pricing is good and we were in need of a BI platform. Plus it has a customer code and AI. 

I rate the overall solution an eight out of ten. 

It is mainly used by finance users in the Financial Planning and Analysis department. It works as a front-end application that enables access and analysis of finance data from various sources such as VIP and SAP. The interface has access to a specific multidimensional cube developed internally. The cube is built using MSAS. It allows users to explore financial data at a granular level and enables them to drill down or drill through to queue-based reports, providing better insights and analysis.

It proved to be a very powerful and useful tool due to its breakdown capabilities, easy reporting features, flexibility in building custom calculations, and the ability to integrate them into reports. Its web-based nature ensures no client installation is required, making it easily accessible for users. The application also complies with fax regulations, requiring necessary approvals before adding users. The user-friendly interface, look, and feel of the application further contributes to its success in the organization.

Its ability to access different applications and offer development functionalities, along with the valuable feature of drill-down reports, enhances its usefulness in financial analysis and reporting.

When developing multidimensional IMDS models in Pyramid Analytics, there is a need for better features to maintain and analyze data. The application currently lacks the ability to easily track the original physical table and field names, making it challenging to relate them to business names. It would be desirable to have the possibility to generate a data dictionary, detailing the original physical tables, renamed fields, and derived fields. Such features would simplify documentation, facilitate understanding of how calculations depend on physical fields and aid in explaining the development process to others. Having this lineage and easy-to-generate data dictionary would greatly enhance the usability of Pyramid Analytics for developers.

I have been working with it for five years.

It offers good stability. We didn't face any issues regarding it due to our multi-server environment with redundant task engines and downtime engines to ensure continuous operation. We have also upgraded our hardware configuration with more RAM and higher CPUs to enhance performance.

It is scalable, although we have not utilized all of its features. We faced some initial issues when integrating with Snowflake, but those were resolved in subsequent versions, leading to better performance. We developed direct query models instead of storing data internally within the application, which aids in dealing with larger volumes of data in the back end.

They provide a high level of customer service and support. I would rate it eight out of ten.

Positive

I was previously working with ProClarity, but they announced its retirement and lack of support for future versions. They had various issues and bugs, prompting the need for a more robust and supported solution.

We followed a set process of developing in dev, testing in QA, and conducting UAT before exporting and importing the model into production. Initially, we had to learn about the application from scratch and it took a couple of months to set up users, access, and familiarize with Pyramid Analytics. The finance teams were previously working with ProClarity and it took time to correlate their previous processes with the new tool. The main goal was to make users comfortable and provide support throughout the transition.

Finance teams appreciate Pyramid Analytics and have a positive opinion of the application in general.

The licensing cost is not excessively expensive, but it does increase with the addition of new features and modules. We only renewed our existing standard licenses and did not purchase any additional modules. The cost could be seen as reasonable, but it restricts access to only finance users. If expertise is required for developing and delivering solutions within Pyramid Analytics, consulting services may need to be hired, resulting in additional costs for the company. I would rate it seven out of ten.

It is a versatile and easy-to-maintain tool with connectivity to various databases. If the environment is highly secure and restrictive, configuring connections to systems like SAP or SharePoint may require overcoming network security restrictions and opening ports. There is no clear guidance on how to resolve these issues yet, so admin support is necessary for troubleshooting and analyzing logs or errors. I would rate it eight out of ten.