http://smartdatacollective.com/jgptec/140486/3-big-trends-data-visualization

Data visualization is core to business intelligence (BI), as it’s the means by which data is communicated to the user. Results, alerts suggestions, or even more controlled guidance—all of these elements are passed through the data visualization function of a BI application. No matter how much importance software providers give the aesthetics of visualization, all agree that a BI or business analytics application requires a visualization framework that is clear and simple and able to communicate the intended message. Here are three major trends of the last year that are reshaping the BI and analytics space:

1. Mobility

The BI ecosystem is seeing major advances with respect to where data can be consumed. The application of mobile technologies to BI has enabled information workers and decision makers to consume data wherever they are.

2. Geolocation

According to the Pitney Bowes white paper Location Intelligence: The New Geography of Business, “More than 80% of all data maintained by an organization has a location component.”

3. Data Mashups

Having the freedom to use information coming from disparate sources, integrate it, and perform analysis has long been the dream of information workers or decision makers—and a nightmare for the BI team. But the ability to mix data from different sources in an easy way is becoming mainstream. Data mashup techniques have been developed to collect both structured and unstructured data, integrate it into a single place, and enable users to interact with it for analysis and discovery.