Overview
What is MicroStrategy Analytics?
MicroStrategy Analytics is an enterprise business analytics and mobility platform. Key features include automatic big data analysis and reporting, data discovery and visualization, digital security credentials, and support for mobile devices.
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Strong and Easy Reporting
MicroStrategy Analytics Product Review
MicroStrategy -Powerful enterprise BI tool, can you handle it?
Microstrategy is the BEST BI tool out there...
Perfect data visualization tool for ease of generating reports and valuable customer insights!
MSTR Makes Data Analysis a Breeze
Intensive and reliable tool
Microstrategy , very good but..
MicroStrategy Review
MicroStrategy - excellent tool in the right hands
Integrated and efficient analytics solution
MSTR good for a structured environment
Simplifying reporting needs
Enterprise BI Solution - Not an Analytics solution
Popular Features
- Formatting capabilities (24)10.0100%
- Customizable dashboards (23)10.0100%
- Report Formatting Templates (24)10.0100%
- Pixel Perfect reports (23)10.0100%
Reviewer Pros & Cons
Pricing
What is MicroStrategy Analytics?
MicroStrategy Analytics is an enterprise business analytics and mobility platform. Key features include automatic big data analysis and reporting, data discovery and visualization, digital security credentials, and support for mobile devices.
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
Offerings
- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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Alternatives Pricing
What is Microsoft Power BI?
Microsoft Power BI is a visualization and data discovery tool from Microsoft. It allows users to convert data into visuals and graphics, visually explore and analyze data, collaborate on interactive dashboards and reports, and scale across their organization with built-in governance and security.
Product Demos
MicroStrategy Analytics Product Demo v 10
Augmented Reality - MicroStrategy Analytics Demo
MicroStrategy Analytics Product Demo v10 (With Voice)
MicroStrategy - Analytics Desktop (Basic) - Online Training Video by MicroRooster
MicroStrategy - Analytics (Visual Insight) - Online Training Video by MicroRooster
Features
BI Standard Reporting
Standard reporting means pre-built or canned reports available to users without having to create them.
- 10Pixel Perfect reports(23) Ratings
Pixel Perfect reports are highly-formatted reports with graphics and ability to preview the report before printing.
- 10Customizable dashboards(23) Ratings
Customizable dashboards are dashboards providing the builder some degree of control over the look and feel and display options.
- 10Report Formatting Templates(24) Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Ad-Hoc Reports are reports built by the user to meet highly specific requirements.
- 10Drill-down analysis(22) Ratings
Drill down analysis is the ability to get to a further level of detail by going deeper into the hierarchy.
- 10Formatting capabilities(24) Ratings
Ability to format output e.g. conditional formatting, lines, headers, footers.
- 10Integration with R or other statistical packages(16) Ratings
Integration with the open-source R predictive modeling environment.
- 10Report sharing and collaboration(23) Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration is the ability to easily share reports with others.
Report Output and Scheduling
Ability to schedule and manager report output.
- 10Publish to Web(22) Ratings
- 10Publish to PDF(23) Ratings
- 10Report Versioning(20) Ratings
Report versioning is the assignment of version numbers to each version of a report to help in tracking.
- 10Report Delivery Scheduling(22) Ratings
Report Delivery Schedule is the ability to have reports delivered to a destination at a specific data and time.
- 10Delivery to Remote Servers(5) Ratings
Ability to deliver reports to remote servers
Data Discovery and Visualization
Data Discovery and Visualization is the analysis of multiple data sources in a search for patterns and outliers and the ability to represent the data visually.
- 10Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)(20) Ratings
Pre-built visualization formats are canned visualization types that can be selected to visualize different kinds of data.
- 10Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization(19) Ratings
Location analytics is the visualization of geographical or spatial data.
- 10Predictive Analytics(18) Ratings
Predictive Analytics is the ability to build forecasting models based on existing data sets.
- 10Pattern Recognition and Data Mining(1) Ratings
Pattern recognition and data mining mean the ability to recognize hidden patterns in large quantities of data.
Access Control and Security
Access control means being able to determine who has access to which data.
- 10Multi-User Support (named login)(19) Ratings
Named model access means that users have access based on name and password.
- 10Role-Based Security Model(20) Ratings
Role-based access means that access to data is determined by job or position in the corporation.
- 10Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)(20) Ratings
Multiple access permission levels means that different levels of users have different rights.
- 10Report-Level Access Control(1) Ratings
Report-level access control means that the type of report determines who has access to it.
- 10Single Sign-On (SSO)(9) Ratings
Allows users to use one set of login credentials to access multiple applications
Mobile Capabilities
Support for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.
- 10Responsive Design for Web Access(19) Ratings
Web design aimed at producing easy-to-read sites across a range of different devices.
- 10Mobile Application(15) Ratings
A dedicated app for iOS and/or Android.
- 10Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile(19) Ratings
In-app dashboard reports and data visualization.
Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
APIs are a set of routines, protocols, and tools for used for embedding one application in another
- 10REST API(6) Ratings
REST is an architecture style for designing networked applications
- 10Javascript API(7) Ratings
A Javascript API is a type of API
- 10iFrames(5) Ratings
An iFrame is an HTML document embedded inside another HTML document on a website
- 10Java API(4) Ratings
A Java application programming interface (API) is a list of all classes that are part of the Java development kit (JDK)
- 10Themeable User Interface (UI)(5) Ratings
A themeable user interface means that a specific visual them can be applied to it
- 10Customizable Platform (Open Source)(6) Ratings
A customizable, open source API Gateway is a fast and scalable type of API
Product Details
- About
- Competitors
- Tech Details
- FAQs
What is MicroStrategy Analytics?
The platform integrates with a wide range of third-party data warehouses however. MicroStrategy also built a free discovery/visualization tool called MicroStrategy Analytics Desktop, which is not completely integrated with the rest of the platform. MicroStrategy has strong mobile and cloud capabilities which are differentiators for the platform. MicroStrategy's cloud offerings are unique in that they host the software in their own data centers and allow customers to keep their data on-premise to alleviate security concerns. Analytics is a platform for Business Intelligence (BI) and self-service analytics. It enables organizations worldwide to analyze the vast amounts of data stored across their enterprises to make better business decisions.
- MicroStrategy Analytics Enterprise: Enterprise-grade business intelligence
- MicroStrategy Analytics Desktop: Free self-service visual analytics
- MicroStrategy Analytics Express: Free cloud-based self-service visual analytics
MicroStrategy Analytics Competitors
MicroStrategy Analytics Technical Details
Deployment Types | On-premise, Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based |
---|---|
Operating Systems | Windows, Mac |
Mobile Application | No |
Frequently Asked Questions
Comparisons
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Reviews and Ratings
(265)![](/_next/image?url=%2Fimages%2Fnext%2Favatar-group-2.png&w=256&q=75)
Community Insights
- Business Problems Solved
MicroStrategy Analytics is a versatile tool that is widely used across departments in various industries. Departments such as Accounting, Finance, and Audit have found the software to be invaluable in pulling policy level detail reports and generating month-end summary reports for the general ledger. This has greatly streamlined their reporting process and facilitated SOX audit testing. Additionally, multiple business units within organizations rely on MicroStrategy Analytics for financial decision-making and direct people impacting decisions.
Users have also found the software to be useful for prototyping, demoing to customers, analyzing functionality, implementing it, and advising customers on its implementation and usage. Its ability to provide a comprehensive view of company data and create live dashboards has made it an essential tool in achieving corporate strategic goals. It has also empowered department financial budget officers to easily view their budget values.
Furthermore, MicroStrategy Analytics is not limited to specific industries but is used across various sectors like finance, healthcare, and retail. It excels at creating web-based dashboards and mobile reporting, helping solve issues related to turnaround time, staffing, and tracking by utilizing data from scheduling programs and electronic medical record systems.
Overall, MicroStrategy Analytics serves as a full business intelligence enterprise solution by sourcing data from various database technologies, solving the problem of data silos organizations may face. Its versatility makes it a trusted tool for analyzing large datasets and providing valuable insights that drive informed decision-making.
Attribute Ratings
- 9.9Likelihood to Renew27 ratings
- 9Availability2 ratings
- 9Performance2 ratings
- 3.2Usability5 ratings
- 2.2Support Rating5 ratings
- 9Online Training5 ratings
- 9Implementation Rating4 ratings
- 9Configurability1 rating
- 9Product Scalability2 ratings
- 10Vendor pre-sale1 rating
- 10Vendor post-sale1 rating
- 10Data Visualization1 rating
- 8.8Data Sources18 ratings
- 8Data Sharing and Collaboration18 ratings
Reviews
(1-25 of 25)MicroStrategy Analytics Product Review
- They sell the product well, and make promises you will actually believe
- "checks the box" for most features a company would need. Doesn't actually deliver them though
- They answer the phone in a timely manner. Can't answer your questions or provide support, but the queue time isn't bad
- They have online documentation. It's not up to date, and likely doesn't reflect the version of software you are using, but hey... they can point to it.
- [I feel like] compared to it's peers, this product is not ready for primetime. Has almost no capabilities "out of the box" good luck finding ANY canned reporting capabilities
- Almost non-existent ecosystem for finding trained help. Relative to the 'big guys" there are not consultants or candidates you can find on the open market to actually help you implement
- [I feel like they should] stop answering feature limitations by saying "go to the cloud product". If we wanted a SaaS solution, [there] are MUCH better ones than MicroStrategy Analytics. Your primary value proposition is it can be installed locally. I didn't realize that meant we would be limited in functionality to the dark ages.
MicroStrategy -Powerful enterprise BI tool, can you handle it?
- Strong semantic layer to define all the business rules and tightly coupled
- MicroStrategy Analytics cubes are easy to create and deploy
- MicroStrategy Analytics cubes performance is best in the industry from performance point of view
- Slice and dice features are awesome
- You can define hierarchy, drill up and drill down within data set
- SDK for Customizing Analytical Applications means you can leverage metadata
- Embedding Analytics with MicroStrategy REST API
- Data Mining and Predictive Analytics
- MicroStrategy Analytics desktop support waterfall model
- Modern BI tools prefer agile methodologies
- Correlating unstructured data sets gets challenging
MSTR Makes Data Analysis a Breeze
- Visual representation of data
- Ease of use for setting up and modifying dashboards
- Intuitive UX for non-experienced users
- Sharing custom dashboards
MicroStrategy - excellent tool in the right hands
- Customized dashboards between the desktop and web applications.
- Shared objects which allows reusability in a number of different reports.
- Web tool still doesn't have all the customization possible in the developer application.
- Rigid star scheme requirements creates complications in unstructured data.
- I would love to see out of the box "what-if" scenario functionality.
Integrated and efficient analytics solution
- Integrated solution for delivering different types of reports through multiple mediums like web, mobile or distribution services.
- Unique Schema and public objects concept saves development costs by allowing reusable components and maintenance across.
- Having end to end MSTR implemented eliminates the need to look at different tools for in memory and visualization.
- Version control and parallel development limitation- I understand it somehow conflicts the architecture specialities but point to be thought over.
- Visual Insights capabilities to compete with Tableau like reports.
- MSTR services and technical support teams response time - not always a concern but can definitely be improved.
- Automated reporting
- Interactive dashboards
- Large amounts of data
- Formatting of reports
- Moving data around on a report at the user level
- Creating applications
MicroStrategy - Why, When & Where ??
- Visual Insight is a very good tool for data discovery and for create quick dashboard presentation. This is is basically a online web based portal where you have capability to quickly slice & dice the data . Also it provides you options to create derived metrics & derived attribute (MSTR 10) with various mathematical or statistical functions. One of the major mention would be the map based data visualization where you can plot data based on Latitude & Longitude.Also with MSTR 10 following limitations were removed i) using hyperlink ii) HTML 5 is implemented instead of Flash ,so easy to be rendered in mobile too iii) Adding images is possible for hardcoding company logo & symbols
- Drilling Capabilities. This requires some good backend data modeling. Once you bring in all the facts and dimensions you are supposed to establish relationship between them & create hierarchies. Then it would be easy to drill more & more. For example - Device hierarchy - (Device Used by User--> Browser-->Operating System)
- Data Source Connectivity.
- Enterprise Manager is basically BI to BI environment which is used by administrators or executives to track reporting usage, report performance,developer efficiency or frequency of usage & thousands of other statistics which proves to be very helpful in monitoring the efficiency of the whole environment. Once you set up Enterprise miner( which is a bit tricky) you will be able to access all the in built documents or you can custom built dashboard based on your usage
- Visual Insight have multiple limitations. Few of them are listed here - i)Cannot change default graph colors ii) text/graph formatting are very very limited iii)Add metric to Color by / Thresholds is not possible iv)one of the worst limitation of the VI in older versions is that it is not possible to create filters that apply only to a specific visualization. For example if there are 4 graphs in one dashboard & if you have filters then those filters would be applicable for all of them
- Some formatting options are not there either on Web or Developer especially while dealing with a document. We have to use both Web & Developer to solve issues.
- While connecting with MDX cube reporting loses a lot of features.
Comprehensive enterprise BI Tool
The main advantage of MicroStrategy Analytics is that it can be accessed online through a web browser which eliminates the need to carry heavy Excel files. Also, the reports and dashboards are updated in real time which was not possible with Excel based dashboards.
- It helps create dashboards that are personalized to a particular type of user. The access to the specific sections of dashboards and reports can be controlled and only the intended audience can access that information. This helps with distributing the same dashboard to different departments and even competitors.
- The reports are completely responsive to different devices and can be accessed via any device of any resolution. Also, MicroStrategy offers a vast range of power visualizations like heat maps and can also connect with third party applications like Google Maps for additional functionality. Also, this functionality is present even on mobile devices.
- With its Online Analytical Processing capabilities, users can modify the reports by slicing and manipulating the data as per their needs without executing the SQL query in the backend. This helps in saving a lot of development time as individual users can modify the report online by using filters and slicers without requiring the coding know how.
- ESRI ArcGIS maps can only be integrated and accessed with internet connectivity which becomes a limitation when using only with LAN connectivity.
- The community/forum is not very active with a limited number of users and low quality content.
- Some functionalities are missing from the web version and are only present in the desktop version. Also, dashboards over the web still lack integration with HTML5.
From zero to hero.
- Build a complete Business Intelligence solution from the ground up. They provide desktop, web and mobile interfaces.
- Analyze and report on large volumes of data from an extensive number of source databases.
- Provides a full Software Development Kit (SDK) to personalize, customize and write your own BI applications and web sites.
- Support for HTML5 is still at the beginning. The latest features were developed with Adobe Flash, which sometimes is not the best and fastest solution. HTML5 with CSS and SVG would probably be more portable and a smoother experience to the user.
- I personally would like to see native OAuth 1.0 and 2.0 Support. And the ability to directly attach JSON data feeds like Google provided data.
- Web Services documentation could be improved and expanded with more examples.
MicroStrategy Reviewed from the Trenches
- Ad-hoc analysis
- Dashboarding and visualizations
- There's no clean tree/hierarchical display of attributes that allows me to see the entire tree on one screen. This also translates to a report with one column showing the indentation for nested categories.
- The interaction and user interface with dealing with a prompted report is less than desirable. Many users hate the interface and find it difficult to use.
- Not all features are available in web when designing dashboards. You often have to bounce back and forth from Desktop to Web in order to get to the option you're looking for.
Microstrategy... The Macro Problem Solver
- The Microstrategy web front end is easy to navigate which makes it even easier to train our users on.
- Microstrategy Visual Insight has added a new dimension to our content which allow for a story to be told about the data.
- Microstrategy Mobile allows our executive team to analyze key KPI's at the swipe of a finger.
- I think that although Visual Insight is a new tool that it probably has the most upside to it. Adding features that are available on the Report Services side would be great for VI.
Overall I have been using MicroStrategy for a little over 10 years and it has proven to fit most all of my reporting needs.
MicroStrategy 10 - the best in BI
- Without a doubt, it scales, it is robust and the performance is great.
- The latest enhancements for version 10 (like replacing Flash with HTML 5) address some previous issues and concerns.
- They've closed the gap they had with Tableau and similar products with the introduction of Desktop, while still providing governed, data discovery. Something Tableau lacks.
- It is hard for me to point out room for improvement. Version 10 just came out and I haven't had the chance to fully experiment with it, but it looks very good so far.
Microstrategy is 'great enough' for business.
- Aggregate awareness.
- The ability for the SQL generator to select the correct aggregate table, whether a hierarchy or dates, is invaluable to organizations with less mature database developer resources.
- Delivery of reports, particularly web-based delivery.
- Microstrategy provides the most options for report delivery, scheduling, and formats; a requirement of self-service BI.
- Managing metadata
- Microstrategy's architecture prefers a star schema; this can serve as a virtual ER builder and help locate possible bottlenecks in the database design.
- Scheduling delivery; the use of schedules is very inflexible.
- Instead of building specific delivery objects, a schedule builder (similar to MS Outlook) will push Microstrategy ahead of the competition. The schedule objects add to the maintenance.
- FTP/sFTP delivery options.
- Internal delivery to file systems and availing the file location to FTP is good, but often times external FTP/sFTP is required. Currently, BI engineers have to build external processes to deliver to external FTP.
- Desktop dashboard development; it is a bit disjointed.
- Dashboard development options are different between desktop (now called developer) and web are different. We often have developer and web open at the same time to build dashboards.
- Architect product; still hasn't gained global acceptance for schema management.
- More flexible cross-tab development.
- There's an idea I have about joining data sets where there's aggregate data combined with crosstab data. The example i use is a annual budget (metric) along side monthly spend (metric). Today, the annual budget must be an attribute which means it cannot be used in calculations.
Ground level perspective of MicroStrategy
- Extremely fast and reliable sql generation, report and document development.
- Flexibility and integration with nearly all data sources.
- Self reliant product, many out of the box products that allow easy maintenance, development, and monitoring.
- Cost of product is more reasonable than many other in its class.
- Reports and documents produced can be pixel perfect and allow for extremely custom dashboards and scorecards.
- There are many tools and products in the whole Analytics suite, I find this cumbersome and would like to see all these tools brought together
- There is no version control built into the product. Versioning seems outdated and the principle way of handling versions is outdated and I think should be remodeled.
- To a new user, learning the entirety of all MicroStrategy products is difficult and can take a long time to adapt to.
Go Self Service Business Intelligence
- Metadata layer
- Self service BI
- Easy and fast deployment
- Users community is missing
- Possibility to customize (sdk) is hard to learn
May not be suitable for all audience!
- Designing of the Architecture
- Ability to create highly interactive dashboards
- Handle large amounts of data
- Compatible with most of the data sources
- The development environment (Desktop) can be a little bit more intuitive. The UI is still more like 90s
- Ease of use for the end user to analyze data (ability to add comments/annotate) and share
- Include more informative and visually appealing visuals as well as widgets.
Microstrategy is not a walk in the park
- Fantastic features for mobile applications. Out of all of the BI tools out there, it is by far the best on an iPad
- Lots of features for the end-user to custom the output of reports
- In-memory processing allows for very quick responses
- It has a very steep learning curve for report developers. I found it the most difficult to learn from a developer perspective
- A lot of system administration overhead is required. Probably not suitable for a small organization. The cloud version would probably be better.
- The remote training that they offer (such as through the PEP program) is terrible. I had training classes online that would've been better served getting a root canal. Training is one of their most deficient areas in my opinion.
Empower your Sales Teams and boost ROI!
- Ease of creating Advertiser Based Playbooks that empowered sellers during their sales call.
- Flexible to update, modify, and uniformly deploy.
- At times more set templates were restrictive and not adjusting to accommodate more data points.
- Refreshes of certain data points prevented daily frequency.
- Formatting at times would reset to defaults.
Update Dec-14, this continues to be a game changer for our decision making and ability to flex with the changing media landscape.
MicroStrategy - Great for some, overkill for most.
- MicroStrategy is a very powerful BI tool that, with the right training, can open the world of analysis to consumers, allowing your data to assist the masses with important business decisions, by offering a layer of abstraction between your data and users.
- MicroStrategy does a good job with any type of security model you need to implement. Security can be regulated on a large scale down to the object level. Sending reports to multiple people and being able to limit the data to each of those people based on group security is a phenomenal aspect.
- The flexibility of dashboards, reports and grids within MicroStrategy desktop was remarkable and allowed for a highly customized BI interface.
- Administration and implementation of MicroStrategy exposed fatal flaws in their software as a whole. I expected much, much higher quality software for the licensing/pricing demanded from MicroStrategy.
- Although their tech support staff were always friendly, it took multiple (and I mean multiple) attempts to solve issues, some of which were never resolved. Many of which were drawn out for weeks with support staff asking me to perform troubleshooting steps that I'd outlined I'd already performed in the ticket comments when posted. Just very ineffective support as a whole.
- Their error code base is not well documented. I can't count how many times I found an error being thrown and could not find reference of what that error meant, or was caused by. I found many people complaining about the same error in their community discussion boards, with no responses from anyone at MicroStrategy offering assistance.
Business Analytics Can Improve Quality of Service
- CAMERA is our major dashboard: Corporate Account Management Electronic Reporting Application
- It pulls data from multiple sources in the organization and helps monitor our SLA management.
- Reporting for masses the without going through a dedicated account!!
- Web reporting needs to be aligned with mobile reporting. One stop shop.
Analyzing the Analytics- MicroStrategy Analytics
- Scalability- build once and apply security features to allow the report to be used by multiple roles and levels
- Mobile functionality
- More visualizations- when your user base is comfortable with the charts in Excel not being able to replicate them causes reduced user adoption
MicroStrategy Review (Version 9)
- MicroStrategy was a helpful tool for providing daily, monthly, and quarterly reporting due to the ability to build automated reports that can be sent to large groups of people using distribution lists.
- I found MicroStrategy very helpful when putting together monthly performance reviews using the visual reporting tools. The ease with which I was able to switch from data tables to charts as a better way to tell stories about complicated data sets was particularly useful.
- When we needed to pull user information for targeted marketing campaigns, MicroStrategy dramatically reduced the amount of time we spent tying User IDs to user activity within our DMP. In turn, we were able to leverage the data to create user segments which helped us focus our marketing spend more effectively for marketing campaigns.
- Perhaps it was the nature of the size of the company I previously worked for, but the amount of time it took for changes and upgrades to be implemented was a bit frustrating at times.
- It would be incredibly helpful if users had the ability to make changes to metrics and attributes without having to rely to heavily on MicroStrategy developers, it would make the product a great deal more useful.
- Being able to distribute rich MicroStrategy reports without sending enormous emails was problematic at times. If there was a way to let data rich reports being distributed via email live in a web environment would be a big plus for the platform.
- Being unable to view reports on smartphones was a bit of a pain at times as well, particularly when you need to send reports to colleagues working off-site without a laptop or desktop computer available.
Micromanage your Business with Microstrategy
- Proficient data management for a multitude of attributes- this allows for a bank of knowledge for report building and analysis.
- User friendly making it a relevant partner in my day to day job.
- Web based function allowing for flexibility and ease of access from varying locations.
- Restraints on data exports by column and row can be constraining.
- Some user frustration due to time constraints at different levels of data.
- At beginning, hard to determine difference in metrics and attributes to aid in report creation.
Srini's MSTR review
- Data segmentation is a real strength. I used it extensively to pull data based on geographic and customer demographic lenses
- Speed. Especially with the basic builders which housed most of the reports I needed, the performance was outstanding. The datamart is huge.
- Visualization is a strength as well. I felt this was an underrated feature but MSTR produced great graphs.
- While performance was a strength of basic builders, advanced buiders were lacking in performance.
- Same with visualization. Graphs weren't easy for everyone and you needed bit more technical expertise. Tableau is a great example of how easy it should be for everyone to visualize graphs.
Reporting and Analysis for the Non-Techie
- Drag and drop analysis for users that don't need any database knowledge or programming experience.
- Beautiful dashboards that load quickly and provide instant snapshots and/or trends over time.
- Ability to extend from desktop to mobile with relative ease.
- Microstrategy Web and Microstrategy Desktop work slightly differently. There are still some functions that need to be completed in the Desktop software that are not available through a browser.
- Web-based dashboards still utilize Flash. I expect to hear about a transition to HTML5 or something similar, but have not yet heard about this. Microstrategy Mobile solutions do not require Flash.
- Product licensing is difficult to understand.