At the center of the data visualization market is Tableau Software, Inc., a company eager to simplify data consumption for the purpose of making it more accessible to everyday users. As Tableau gears up for its annual conference we look back at its notable developments in the past year, as well as expectations for the upcoming event. One big question for the Tableau conference is whether or not the company will unveil any groundbreaking products as the Big Data market continues to evolve with or without Tableau’s pretty visualizations.

Join the discussion! SiliconANGLE and Wikibon.org are hosting a CrowdChat this Wednesday, August 27th, to discuss Tableau’s market position ahead of their conference. See details here for the #data14 CrowdChat affair.

Tableau Year in Review

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This past year Tableau posted a strong second quarter with revenues up by 82 percent year over year at $90.7 million.  Its license revenue is also up 80 percent year over year at $60.4 million.

Aside from Tableau’s stellar revenue, the company also achieved significant milestones during the second quarter, such as the release of Tableau 8.2 which brought its services to Mac users, as well as the release of its Story Point feature.

Tableau was also named the fastest growing business intelligence software provider for 2013 by Gartner, Inc.; added 2,200 new customers; and held four regional Tableau Conferences in Sydney, The Hague, Munich and London with over 1,000 customer and partner attendees.

• Growing business

Tableau will soon open the doors to a new engineering center, or what they call as a “dev heaven,” in the former Sound Mind & Body gym in Seattle’s Fremont neighborhood. This new office will house its engineering and product teams, as the company now has more than 1,500 employees and need to give the teams room to breathe.

Tableau also recently closed a deal with Procima Experts, Inc., a business intelligence, data management and predictive analytics consulting firm, certifying the latter to support its clients in the implementation of Tableau’s ultra-performing data analysis solution.

• Staying relevant 

Tableau has a lot on its plate right now and that’s a good thing in the tech industry where there are always competitors who can snatch up market share  in the blink of an eye. The company’s true challenge will be to remain relevant in the Big Data market where data visualization is only one method for simplifying data to be more easily consumed by end users. According to Wikibon analyst Jeff Kelly, automation is becoming a powerful software enhancement for breaking down data into bite-sized pieces, and more companies are bypassing data visualization with the use of in-house analytics teams for intelligence-driven decisions.

However, Tableau remains in a solid position within the Big Data ecosystem. The data visualization company is riding the Big Data wave and can succeed regardless of the direction that wave takes. “No matter who wins the Hadoop wars, Tableau wins,” said Kelly.

Join the conversation

The Tableau Conference in Seattle, WA is coming up soon on September 8-12, 2014.

Join us on August 26, 2014 at 2:00 PM CDT for a live discussion on CrowdChat regarding Tableau, what to expect from the upcoming conference, innovations in data visualization and more.

John Furrier, the CEO and Founder of SiliconANGLE and the Co-founder of CrowdChat, and Jeff Kelly, Wikibon Analyst, will be hosting the live CrowdChat.

Image via Tableau Software, Inc.