A case study of the external development of a business intelligence system

Business intelligence (BI) systems are likely to be among the most strategically important information systems in an organization. The data stored in a data warehouse and presented by executive information systems and decision support systems is used by the most senior managers to make decisions that will determine the future performance of the organization. As with other classes of information systems, BI systems may be developed under a number of sourcing strategies ranging from comprehensive outsourcing to total in-house development. Most previous research has been highly critical of the use of external developers and service providers for business intelligence. This paper presents research that examines the external