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BI has become one of the most promising sectors in the global information technology market, and it is also an important part in the enterprise informationization evolution in China. Statistics showed that in 2007, the BI market in mainland China had reached 2 billion yuan (US$ 260 million), up 35% from 2006, consisting of BI product licensing of 900 million yuan and BI system integration of 1.1 billion yuan. There are currently more than 500 BI companies (product developers, integrators, distributors and service providers) employing about 80,000 employees in China.

BI is usually referred to as software solutions that can compile existing enterprise data into proper knowledge, in order to assist a company’s decision making process. BI usually involves the following technologies: data mart, data warehouse, user query & report, online analytical processing (OLAP), data mining, key performance indicators and analytic application.

Leading BI technology companies in China

Guangzhou Sunnet - Sunnet has been operating for nine years, starting from the basic multi-dimensional analytical product BlueQuery2.6 in 2001 to the latest BlueQueryEnterpriseV product for enterprise multi-dimensional analytical services.

Shanghai Tenly Software - Tenly’s Markway-branded products include analytical systems, network mining system, intelligent reporting and informationization testing software. Its Markway analytical system was the first Chinese language-based, large-scale statistics analysis and data mining software with proprietary intellectual property in China.

ADM Software - ADM has successfully completed more than 200 large and medium scale projects, with relatively sophisticated BI solutions for the financial, aerospace, retail and government sectors. ADM has become a leader in the enterprise decision-making supporting system field in China.

Beijing Ourway Power Co - This is a fast-growing company for enterprise informationization of small and medium enterprises. Its Power-BI enterprise decision analytical system is the first fast-installation BI software in China.

Competition landscape

Due to the surging global mergers and acquisitions activities in 2007, the BI software market from now on will be dominated by IBM, Oracle, SAP and Microsoft, and specialist BI companies such as SAS, Informatica and Microstrategy are expected to lead the product developments in the industry. Currently local Chinese BI companies have a market share of 36% in China, and Chinese BI licenses only make up of 6% of total BI licensing revenue in China.

Multinational BI advantages

Revenue sources of multinational BI companies in China mainly come from product sales, technical services and large-scale project integration. Multinationals currently have competitive advantages in data warehouses, data mining, ETL (Extract, Transform and Load), reporting and OLAP, with strong market shares in large projects of financial, telecommunication, insurance and energy sectors.

Domestic BI advantages

Local Chinese BI companies are making most money from system integration and product sales, and local system integration companies have captured half of the system integration market of financial and telecommunication sectors. Local BI product developers have achieved significant progress in 2007, especially BI reporting products from Sunnet and Runqian. Although product developers have successfully upgraded their core technologies, the key for their sales achievements last year still lies in the cooperative partnerships with downstream integrators and distributors.

Industry growth

The BI markets of financial, telecommunication and insurance industries had all experienced 20% or so growth rates in 2007, while 30%-plus growth rates were seen in energy, manufacturing and government sectors. The environment for implementing corporate-scale BI systems is becoming sophisticated in large companies, so it remains an important part of the whole BI market of China for the next three years. Medium size companies will be the major growth spot in the Chinese BI market, as this segment will be in a development phase in the next three years. BI systems for small companies are still at an early stage, and it is expected to be maturing in five years’ time. Overall, demand for BI products in China will enter a fast growing phase in the next five years, with an estimated 5 billion yuan value, and followed by another three years of post-maturity extension period.

BI softwares can be more independently implemented in large Chinese companies, while BI capabilities in small and medium enterprises may still have to rely on management softwares such as ERP and CRM. Therefore, it is expected that there will be an increasing number of BI products being embedded into ERP and CRM management softwares as complementary capabilities. But for the long term, BI developers in China should pay more attention to operative BI products.

The biggest constraints for popularizing BI products are their high prices and lack of supporting talents. While industries such as finance, telecommunication, insurance, energy and electricity may have higher reliance on BI capabilities, companies from other industries may require relatively smaller BI investments. The whole BI industry in China is expected to become more competitive, reducing the overall pricing level. Therefore, there would be a higher volume of BI license sales, but total sales value growth may remain relatively stable.

Segment market demand analysis

Demand for BI products of different segments may change over time, and the performance results in 2007 were as follows:

Reporting and OLAP products - Reporting is a basic aspect of BI capabilities, and OLAP multi-dimensional analysis is an outstanding feature of BI. Although reporting and OLAP products accounted for 45% of the BI market, this segment was highly competitive, with multinational players capturing more than 80% of shares.

Data Warehouse Products - Data warehouse and data mart products were another foundation for BI projects, accounting for 40% of China’s BI market, with foreign providers occupying prominent market positions.

ETL and data integration tools - Although ETL and data integration accounted for 40% of a typical BI project, ETL tools only had a 9% market share in China. Many applications are still based on manual coding methods in China, which means it will take some time for ETL tools to get popularised.

Data mining - Data mining technologies, with 3% market shares in 2007, have now relatively matured, but the lack of technical support experts is hindering their acceptance.

Other products such as performance management, KPI and meta data collectively had 3% market shares in China last year.

Everyone needs to borrow money at some point in their life. It can be as simple as asking a relative for two-fifty for a burger, to be paid back later, to deals with lending institutions involving amounts ranging from tens to millions of dollars.

Money may be needed to purchase a car, refurbish a home, or deal with a medical emergency. As long as the borrower can repay the loan, there’s no problem, the borrower gets a need addressed and the lender gets some profit out of risking their funds. It’s when the borrower runs into problems repaying that things start to go sour.

Basic Loan Components and Types

There are so many loan packages available today that it can be difficult sometimes to distinguish the best one for a particular need.

All loans come with three basic components: the principal, which is the amount actually borrowed; the interest, which is charged by the lender and is the way by which they make a profit out of the deal; and the miscellaneous fees charged upon setup.

Loans come in two basic varieties: secured and unsecured. Secured loans involve the borrower pledging some sort of security to cover the deal; this is commonly in the form of cars or other belongings, or a home or property. If the borrower defaults on the loan, the lender can then seize the agreed-upon collateral and sell it to try and recover some of its money. These sorts of deals come with low interest rates because some of the risk to the lender is covered by the collateral.

Unsecured loans, on the other hand, don’t require collateral, thus making them easier to acquire but at the cost of higher interest rates, to make up for the increased risk.

Personal Loans and Debt Consolidation

Personal loans, which can come in both secured and unsecured forms, are among the most basic of loans. They are used for everything, from covering the purchase of new appliances or that shiny new sedan, to funding vacations and dealing with unforeseen events.

Some people also take out loans to use them in paying off other loans, but that isn’t advisable. For one thing, unless the borrower manages to snag a really good loan, the amount borrowed will never be enough to completely pay off a previous loan.

When faced with multiple loans with considerable interest charges, one of the best courses of action could be to use a debt consolidation loan from a reputable firm.

Taking this course of action could probably result in lower monthly payments and reduced charges, as well as address the inability of some debtors to manage their finances.

Not only that, financial education conducted by some of these firms could also lead the borrower not only to debt freedom, but also teach them to live within their means and stop the endless cycle of debt repayment.

Chennai property market is steadily catching up with the booming Indian real estate with the growth of IT/ITES companies in the city. Capital and rental property values in the commercial real estate are getting strengthened and quite a good volume of demand has been witnessed for quality office spaces.

Commercial rental values in Chennai’s Central Business District (CBD) that encompasses Nungambakkam, Salai, Anna Nagar and Adyar areas have increased in the past 12 months, mostly driven by strong demand from multinational companies, banking and financial sectors as told by one of the developer. He further added that these companies require A Grade quality office space in Chennai and are not satisfied with the current infrastructure.

Current commercial rental value in Chennai varies from Rs 30-55 per sq. ft, which is higher as compared to last year. Rental values of commercial properties viz. offices and shops located at CBD region is reported to have the highest rental values at around Rs 45-55 per sq. ft. These rental values decreases off CBD region of about Rs 35-40 per sq. ft.

It was found from the MagicBricks that a total of 20.47 million sq. ft of commercial office space is to be developed in the city in the coming years in order to meet the demand from commercial sector. This will further influence real estate property values and it is expected that the capital and rental values will go a bit downwards.

Another broker coded that old Mahabalipuram and Guindy are the preferred business district for IT/ITES occupiers. Most of the companies are coming to these regions and the real estate values are likely to take a ride over these trends.

Meanwhile, rental values in Chennai realty space vary with the infrastructure, company’s requirement and facilities offered as well as the location. The recent rental values trends of the city are progressive and the real estate market looks positive in the long term.

Acquiring or buying a property for commercial purposes involves huge funds and hence borrowings play a key role in real estate business. Even if there is sufficient finance at hand to own a property usually one prefers to borrow as the surplus money can be used for other business purposes. Cost of a loan is what a borrower thinks all the time as it is crucial in deciding the fate of the loan seeker. And it is all the more important in commercial real estate matters. Commercial real estate rates therefore should be carefully studied before taking the loan.

Commercial real estate loan rates depend on some basic factors. First of all it should be made clear that commercial real estate loan rates are usually lower interest rate loans. The rate of interest depends on whether the loan is secured or unsecured. Any secured loan comes at lower rate of interest rate and unsecured one with bad credit history on the top of it comes at higher rates. In case of commercial real estate loan lenders keep the very commercial property the borrower intends to buy as collateral. With the loan fully secured lenders provide commercial real estate loan at lower interest rate.

Usually commercial real estate loan rates are lower in the range of 6-7 percent. This means buying any real estate is cheaper through commercial real estate loan. But lower interest rate also depends on lender to lender and credit history. In the competitive loan market each lender has own rate of interest. Compare them and further lowered interest rate can be achieved. Your credit history also determines the rate. A good credit history certainly gives more confidence to the lender and he can lower the rate of interest. Another way is to see how much you are borrowing in relation to the value of commercial property. If the borrowed amount is way lower than value of the property you can take a reduced interest rate. See if you can make a larger down payment so that borrowings remain smaller. Surely for taking commercial real estate loan at lower interest rate one needs to fulfill some high condition like good credit history.

In case you are not that highly qualified borrower, you have the option of ‘hard money’. There are lenders who are willing to accept risks in lending money to say bad credit people at high interest rate. Hard money loans for commercial real estate buying may range 12-16 percent based on risk factors.

A lot on interest rate front depends on how many commercial real estate loan providers have you studied and compared. These lenders can easily be approached on their websites. Compare individual interest rates and settle for the suitable lender. Apply online to him for fast processing and approval of the loan.

Commercial real estate loan rates are usually lower rates but a lot depends on how much eligible a borrower is. Good credit history and lesser borrowing as compared to the value of collateral certainly enable in taking a reduced interest rate.

Commercial loans come in many shapes, sizes and appropriate interest rates, which is normally the ultimate thing for any business venture. Business loans have been the conventional method of funding businesses for quite some time now. Commercial loans, though useful for all businesses, small entrepreneurs are particularly benefited by small business loans.

Business loans can be used for starting a business, refinancing, expanding your business, purchase of equipments or any other commercial investment. Commercial finance can be ideal for residential or commercial property development projects. Commercial mortgage products are available with repayment terms from 5 to 30 years, and you can generally borrow up to 85% of the property purchase price / value, meaning you may only need a 15% deposit.

A business mortgage can allow you to owning your premises, provides your business with flexibility and creates opportunities to maximize your revenue potential. Business loans are available for almost any purpose such as business start ups, refinancing bank borrowing, equipment purchase or to add to cash flow. Unsecured business loans might include equipment leasing, factoring, cash advances, and credit lines for small businesses. This may in the form of Venture Capital Small Business Investment Companies (SBICs) who put venture capital, in the form of small business loans and equity financing, into small businesses for growth, modernization and expansion.

There are numerous significant distinctions between commercial real estate investing and residential real estate investing. Of over 20 major commercial loan differences, several important issues will be covered in this business financing article and other commercial financing elements such as SBA loan refinancing will be described in additional reports.

With the increasingly chaotic investment climate for residential financing in the United States, more residential real estate investors are exploring commercial real estate and business finance opportunities. It is important for prospective commercial property owners, business owners and business investors to educate themselves about options for the business loan and commercial mortgage environment they will be facing.

Stated Income Commercial Mortgage and Commercial Loan Opportunities

Stated income commercial loan programs will preclude the need for personal tax returns to qualify for a business loan. However the stated income commercial mortgage will not change documentation requirements involving income for the business being purchased. In contrast to residential mortgages, no doc (no documentation) loans are not possible for commercial financing.

Business Finance Minimum and Maximum Amounts

Commercial property loans and business opportunity financing less than $100,000 are not routinely available. A typical maximum for a stated income commercial mortgage is $2 million. Several common business financing possibilities are limited to a $5 million maximum.

Down Payment Requirements for a Business Loan

Down payment requirements for buying a business commonly vary from 10% to 25% or more. The specific amount will depend on business experience of the borrower, requirements for business opportunity business finance, type of business and credit scores.

Business Opportunity Financing and Business Loan Interest Rates

Interest rates for a business loan are generally higher than residential financing and rates up to 13% and even higher are possible. It is possible to obtain both fixed and variable commercial mortgage interest rates. Business opportunity financing typically has interest rates 1-3% higher than a comparable commercial real estate loan situation.

Appraisals for a Commercial Mortgage or Business Opportunity Loan to Buy a Business

It is normal for commercial property and business opportunity appraisals to require over a month to complete. Commercial appraisals are much more complex and expensive than residential appraisals. Business opportunity financing and commercial loan value is traditionally based on business income rather than a comparable property analysis used in residential appraisals.

Business Loan Personal Guarantors for Buying a Business

A personal guarantee from all principal owners is usually a standard requirement for business finance situations even when a business is titled under corporate ownership. Because of this, individual credit scores of the business owners will be an important factor to qualify for a business loan. Individuals should expect to personally guarantee a commercial mortgage if they own over 20% of a business.

Other Important Business Loan Differences Compared to Residential Financing

As noted previously, there are too many differences between residential financing and business finance situations to describe adequately in one article. Some of the critical issues discussed in separate reports are how to avoid common business loan problems, SBA loan financing, balloon and recall provisions for a commercial mortgage, business opportunity financing and special purpose commercial properties.

The cast of characters. Everyone knows what a bank is. Most of us understand what a lender is – an institution from whom money is borrowed. Adding the word “commercial” to describe a lender simply means that the financial entity deals with businesses as opposed to individuals. Black’s Law Dictionary defines “commercial loans” as: “loans made to businesses as distinguished from personal-consumer credit loans.” Although a lender could make both commercial and consumer loans, this blog is dedicated primarily to commercial matters.

The field of law. To me, commercial foreclosure law refers to the rules and procedures applicable when a business defaults on a loan secured by some kind of collateral. So, if you work for an institution that loaned money to a business, and if the borrower defaulted under the terms of the loan agreement, then commercial foreclosure law provides the judicial framework for the protection of your rights. Typically, those rights involve the ability to collect money owed by the borrower through the sale of the loan collateral.

Collateral. Black’s states that collateral is property pledged as security for the satisfaction of a debt. If a business defaults on a loan, the lender can initiate a foreclosure action to compel the sale of the loan collateral and therefore collect the amounts owed by the borrower through proceeds from the sale. There are all kinds of business-related collateral. Perhaps the most recognizable is real estate – the land a business owns. Some of the most interesting cases, however, deal with personal property collateral, which can be any property imaginable that is owned by a business – a fleet of cars, office furniture or intangibles such as accounts receivable.

Lien. A lien is a description of an encumbrance on property: “a claim . . . on property for payment of some debt.” Black’s. In the context of my blog, a lien arises by written contract between a lender and a borrower – either a real estate mortgage agreement or a personal property security agreement. The lien granted by a borrower to a lender gives a lender the right to foreclose upon the subject property (collateral) for payment of the debt in the event of a default.

Commercial foreclosure. Turning again to Black’s, a foreclosure is defined, in part, as the “enforcement of a lien . . . or mortgage . . ..” Paraphrasing Black’s, foreclosure is the legal process by which real or personal property subject to a lien is sold in satisfaction of a debt. To foreclose means to terminate a borrower’s rights in the subject property. A foreclosure that is commercial merely refers to the termination of a business borrower’s rights in its property.

A form of collection. Commercial foreclosure law is a special kind of collection law. It’s a body of rules governing how banks and financial institutions recover money by asserting rights in, and selling, collateral that a business granted to secure the loan. It’s the set of legal principles applicable to a lender needing to collect money owed by a business, which failed to make its loan payments or otherwise defaulted under the terms of the loan documents. If any of these matters are relevant to what you do for a living, I welcome your visits to my blog and hope that you will e-mail me with your questions or comments.

Commercial mortgage lenders will frequently have very specific requirements stipulating that purchase funds must have been in a verifiable account for a specific period of time, often 3-6 months or longer (this is called seasoning because it is tantamount to requiring that the funds have matured by being in the same place for a while). Seasoning of ownership for commercial mortgage loans is similar to seasoning of funds, except this requirement involves the minimum time someone has owned a commercial property before they can refinance the property. Most traditional banks require a minimum holding period (usually a year or more) before a commercial mortgage loan can be refinanced. That minimum period is the ownership “seasoning limitation”, and if it is one year then it means that a commercial mortgage loan cannot be refinanced for at least a year.

That is not a particularly troubling limitation EXCEPT in the case of refinancing after a 1031 Exchange. In the case of Commercial 1031 Exchange properties, commercial borrowers should benefit from commercial mortgage loans for 1031 Exchange Refinancing without seasoning of ownership limitations , and there are a limited number of sources which do not impose ownership seasoning limitations on refinancing 1031 Exchange Properties.

WHAT IS UNIQUE ABOUT THE 1031 EXCHANGE REFINANCING SCENARIO?

In simplified terms, with a 1031 commercial real estate exchange, owners are required to reinvest their equity in a subsequent qualified purchase. Commercial mortgage borrowers who have properly completed 1031 Exchanges might want to tap into some of their equity shortly after a 1031 Exchange is completed via 1031 refinancing. These borrowers will usually encounter seasoning of ownership limitations from most lenders that will effectively prevent such a refinancing. If a commercial mortgage borrower wants to consider 1031 Exchange refinancing and has recently completed the 1031 Exchange, they should seek out a lender without seasoning requirements or limitations. However, there are many technical issues surrounding a 1031 Exchange and 1031 refinancing that will require commercial borrowers to consult with a qualified 1031 Exchange advisor before proceeding with refinancing of commercial 1031 Exchange properties.

CIM Group, which is backed by Calpers and California State Teachers on opportunistic buys, closed on Hollywood & Highland, the troubled entertainment/retail complex in Los Angeles. In a transaction brokered by Eastdil Realty, CIM paid $120 million for a 640,000 sf of retail/entertainment space–including the 3,650-seat Kodak Theater, where the Academy Awards ceremony is held.

In a transaction brokered by Jones Lang LaSalle, CIM paid an additional $80 million for the adjacent 640-room Renaissance Hollywood Hotel. Trizec Properties, the seller of both parts of the complex, spent $615 million constructing the facility, which opened two years ago.

Two German players teamed up to pay $130 million for a 97% stake in 515 North State Street in Chicago. The corporate pension plan for Siemens and asset management firm KG Allgemeine Leasing (KGAL) bought the 725,000-sf building from local developer John Buck Co. (which is retaining a 3% stake) and investors Marvin Davis and Morgan Stanley.

The building was attractive to the German players in part because American Medical Association leases 60% of the space. The deal was the first U.S. buy for KGAL. No broker was used in the transaction.