Data visualization and user experience will be the dominating themes of the 2014 Tableau Big Data Conference, predicted theCUBE’s John Furrier and Jeff Kelly. In their coverage kickoff, the hosts swapped predictions for Tableau’s success and shared their thoughts on trends that will emerge from the upcoming conference.

Tableau emerged from the growth in data analytics, Furrier said. It was one of the first companies to view data as the “new currency,” and is focused on making data easy to use and understand. This business method has garnered Tableau a very loyal customer base and spurred the company’s growth both nationally and overseas. It’s continuing to expand it’s scope, Furrier noted, looking towards mobile and the cloud as areas of massive potential growth.

Part of Tableau’s unique approach, Kelly explained, is their attitude that “data visualization isn’t about automating you’re routine path, it’s about allowing users to be artists.” While Tableau enables business users to manipulate data quickly and easily, words like “creativity” and “artists” are not commonly used in business RFTs, commented Kelly. It might be that the enterprise is taking some time to catch up. Though Tableau is taking a new approach to Business Intelligence (BI), it’s growing quickly, Kelly added: “2,200 [new] customers, revenue up by 80 percent.” They’re also spending a lot, though, investing in Research and Development. Kelly mentioned that he was eager to see whether Tableau can maintain its customer focus during this period of rapid growth.

Facing new rivals

While Tableau is an established company, both @theCUBE hosts noted that it faces increased competition from newer, younger companies that take alternative approaches to data visualization. Kelly called out Hadoop-specific and mobile-first data visualization as putting pressure on Tableau to remain “cutting edge when it comes to cloud, mobile, and software as a service.”

Project Elastic, which was a featured initiative during the conference keynote, caught Kelly’s attention. He described it as “re-writing Tableau for the tablet” by making it intuitive and easy for business users. Furrier commented that Project Elastic also represents Tableau’s product leadership capabilities and its ability to innovate rapidly during a period of intense volatility and competition in the market.

Seeking out more use cases

Both hosts expressed their anticipation of Tableau use cases. They were eager to see both how current users take advantage of Tableau products, and how the company will continue to innovate to meet additional challenges. There’s potential, Kelly said, for data visualization to be tailored to specific use cases, and even to different types of workers within businesses. Kelly mentioned that he had taken note of new Tableau partnerships with vertical application providers focused on healthcare and retail (among others). He explained that this is a good strategy for a horizontal BI platform because it enables the company to tailor-make its product to specific customer needs.

See the entire conversation below.