MicroStrategy: Transforming Global Businesses into Intelligent Enterprises

MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in enterprise analytics and mobility software. A pioneer in the business intelligence and analytics space, MicroStrategy delivers innovative software that empowers business users to make better decisions and transform the way they work. MicroStrategy provides organizations with world-class software and expert services to deploy customized applications that accelerate organizations on their path to becoming an Intelligent Enterprise.

MicroStrategy's mission is to provide businesses with the technology and technique needed to become an Intelligent Enterprise—the ultimate data-driven organization. The company's vision is that the Intelligent Enterprise anticipates challenges and opportunities and turns them into profit and growth. MicroStrategy delivers a single version of the truth and agility, scalability and speed, AI and data discovery, enterprise analytics and mobility solutions. It connects to any data and distributes reports to thousands of users. An Intelligent Enterprise goes beyond business intelligence, delivering transformative insight to every user, constituent, and partner. The more organizations can become Intelligent Enterprises, the more productive and effective the business intelligence community will be.

The Dynamic Leader and Innovator

Michael J. Saylor is the President, Chairman & CEO of MicroStrategy. He has served as Chairman of the Board of Directors and CEO since founding MicroStrategy in November 1989 and has served as President since January 2016, a position he previously held from November 1989 to November 2000 and from January 2005 to October 2012.

In 1989 at the age of 24, Saylor combined his passions for technology, business, and the use of computer simulations to launch MicroStrategy. The company was founded on his vision of helping enterprises deliver intelligence everywhere. By harnessing the power of graphical operating systems and client-server computing and pioneering a new approach to business intelligence called relational online analytical processing (ROLAP), the company grew steadily, going public in 1998 (NASDAQ: MSTR). Under his leadership, MicroStrategy has emerged as a global leader in enterprise analytics and mobility software, serving thousands of institutions and organizations around the world.

Saylor is a named inventor on more than 40 patents. In addition to being credited as the inventor of relational analytics, he led MicroStrategy into the fields of web analytics, distributed analytics, mobile analytics, cloud computing, mobile identity, and IoT. He was also the creator and founder of Alarm.com (NASDAQ: ALRM), one of the first home automation and security companies, and Angel.com (sold to Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories for US$110 million in 2013), one of the first cloud-based interactive voice response service providers.

Saylor is the author of the book "The Mobile Wave: How Mobile Intelligence Will Change Everything", published by Perseus Books in 2012. The book anticipated the impact of mobile, cloud, and social networks on worldwide political and economic development, along with the rise of Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google as transnational technology leaders that would destabilize the status quo across most industrial and political domains. The Mobile Wave appeared on both The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal Best Seller lists.

In 1999, Saylor established The Saylor Foundation, which has donated millions to philanthropic causes including children's health, refugee relief, education, environmental conservation, and support for the arts. The foundation runs the Saylor Academy (Saylor.org), which offers free college education and continuing professional development courses to students worldwide. To date, it has provided free educational services to more than 225,000 students. In 2015, 2016 and 2017, Saylor participated in the Forbes 400 Summit on Philanthropy.

Enabling Data-Driven Business Transformation

MicroStrategy is constantly monitoring and analyzing the latest trends in data collection and management across a wide range of industries and companies. The company's goal is to understand how organizations are currently using their data and anticipate how they'll look at data in the future. With new data sources and connectors introduced every month, the business intelligence and data analytics space is evolving at a rapid rate. MicroStrategy keeps a close eye on this movement to ensure that the company is providing its customers with the most advanced solutions for their needs.

MicroStrategy works with a network of certified partners who offer some of the most innovative technologies to build analytics platforms. The partners help drive the company's mission to empower more data-driven organizations forward. The MicroStrategy platform is extensible and fully customizable—providing access to databases, ETL tools, and big data solutions that seamlessly connect to other enterprise data architectures. The company's partners are experts in implementing analytics and mobility applications that help modern businesses solve critical business challenges.

Earning Remarkable Recognition

MicroStrategy has been recognized by esteemed organizations globally for innovation and business excellence. Below are a few of the significant achievements.

•  Named as the Sole Challenger in Gartner's 2018 Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms

•  MicroStrategy's Customer Sumitomo Rubber North America won Ventana Research's 2017 Leadership Award for Digital Technology by using MicroStrategy Mobile

•  MicroStrategy's Customer Houghton Mifflin Harcourt won 2015 Ventana Research Technology Innovation Leadership Award for embracing MicroStrategy Mobile

Business Intelligence: The Future is Intelligent Enterprises

The company's perspective on the business intelligence space is centered around two main pillars: 1. the need for a single form of truth and, 2. the idea of "intelligence everywhere"—where business intelligence and analytics can impact every member of an organization.

MicroStrategy finds that many companies face the challenge of establishing a single record of data. When working with various sets of data or KPIs throughout the company, it's difficult to know which numbers are accurate and reliable. MicroStrategy believes business intelligence should enable organizations to consolidate their data into a centralized platform, establishing a "single version of truth."

The company also operates on the notion that business intelligence should empower every member of the enterprise, regardless of technical skill or area of focus, to access and utilize data analytics. With its user-friendly, self-service-focused platform, MicroStrategy allows data to informed decision-making at every level of the organization, transforming it into an Intelligent Enterprise.

MicroStrategy sees the transition into the Intelligent Enterprise as the next level of advancement. The company believes that in order to navigate, survive, and thrive in this increasingly complex landscape, forward-thinking companies need to transform into Intelligent Enterprises—capable of using data, people, and enterprise assets in aggregated and unique ways that were previously impossible. By moving towards this model, companies will be able to implement disruptive technologies rapidly and at scale.