Use of big data in audits¶
European BI tools suited for auditors¶
Tool |
Why it’s relevant for auditing |
Estimated pricing & comments |
|---|---|---|
Jedox (Germany) |
Combines BI, planning, and budgeting — good fit for audit and finance departments. Provides full audit trail, role-based access, EU hosting and on-prem options. |
“Base Packages” start at €885/month for 3 users. Smaller setups ~ €50/user/month. Implementation support available EU-wide. |
Toucan Toco (France) |
Focus on accessible, narrative dashboards — strong for presenting audit findings and compliance reports to management. |
“Pack Start” from €890/month for internal users. Cloud hosted in EU; on-prem Docker install also possible. |
Pyramid Analytics (Netherlands) |
Enterprise-grade BI with advanced governance, version control, and full audit logging. Designed for large or regulated organisations. |
Pricing not public; typical enterprise licences run €10k–€20k per year for ~30–50 users. Expect TCO around €30k+ for full deployment. |
Metabase (Europe-hosted) (open source) |
Open-source BI platform with good audit-use potential: versioning, access control, query logging. Self-host on EU servers or choose EU SaaS region. |
Free self-hosted. Cloud plans start €90/month for 5 users (EU-based hosting available). |
Apache Superset (open source, ASF EU mirrors) |
Fully open-source data-visualisation platform. Highly customisable for internal audit dashboards; integrates well with PostgreSQL and data warehouses. |
Free to use. Typical small EU VPS setup ~ €25–€50/month infrastructure cost. Implementation effort moderate. |
KNIME Analytics Platform (Switzerland/Germany) |
Open-source analytics workflow tool with BI extensions; excellent for data lineage, audit trails, and repeatable processes. Strong EU roots and privacy posture. |
Free desktop/server community edition. Enterprise server licences start around €10k/year. |
Versus Microsoft Power BI¶
Comparison of the EU-focused BI tools versus Microsoft Power BI, using auditor-relevant criteria: data analysis, visualisation, data cleansing, collaboration, and monitoring.
Tool |
Data analysis |
Visualization |
Data cleansing |
Collaboration |
Monitoring |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Microsoft Power BI |
Excellent: large datasets, complex formulas, DAX for calculations; widely used in audits for ISMS insights, training records, BIA reports. |
Very strong: bar, line, scatter, maps, custom visuals; interactive filtering & drill-down. |
Strong: remove duplicates, merge tables, calculated fields, Power Query for ETL. |
Excellent: dashboards and reports can be shared internally or externally; alerts & subscriptions supported. |
Very strong: KPI tracking, control monitoring dashboards, scheduled refreshes. |
Jedox (Germany) |
Very good: Excel-like formulas, OLAP cubes, planning & forecasting models; suitable for finance and audit data. |
Good: dashboards, charts, and scorecards; less variety than Power BI but sufficient for audits. |
Good: data import/merge, calculated fields, formula-based cleaning; Excel familiarity helps. |
Good: dashboards and reports can be shared; write-back capability allows collaboration on forecasts. |
Very good: KPI dashboards, tracking of plans vs actuals, alerts possible with configuration. |
Toucan Toco (France) |
Moderate: focuses on digestible metrics rather than deep formula-based analysis; more narrative-driven. |
Very good: designed for clarity and storytelling; interactive dashboards for management. |
Limited: primarily for visualizing pre-processed/cleaned data; not focused on data transformation. |
Excellent: dashboards shareable with stakeholders; story-driven collaboration. |
Moderate: KPI tracking available, but advanced monitoring less flexible than Power BI. |
Pyramid Analytics (Netherlands) |
Excellent: enterprise-grade data modelling and OLAP support; handles large datasets. |
Strong: wide range of charts, dashboards, and drill-down; less marketing polish than Power BI but highly functional. |
Good: data integration and transformation tools; can handle complex data cleansing tasks. |
Good: sharing and role-based access built-in; collaboration possible but depends on enterprise setup. |
Excellent: dashboards and KPIs, with automated monitoring for large organizations. |
Metabase (open-source, EU-hosted) |
Moderate: supports queries via GUI or SQL; suitable for basic to medium-complexity audit analysis. |
Good: standard charts and dashboards; less interactive than Power BI. |
Limited: some data filtering and transformations, but no advanced ETL; often combined with pre-processing. |
Moderate: dashboards can be shared; collaboration is basic (links, embedding). |
Moderate: simple dashboards with filters; no advanced alerts or automated monitoring. |
Apache Superset (open-source, EU-hosted) |
Good: SQL-based queries, supports large datasets; suitable for auditors comfortable with queries. |
Good: charts, dashboards, drill-downs; highly customizable with plugins. |
Limited: minimal built-in data cleansing; usually relies on upstream ETL. |
Moderate: dashboards shareable; basic access control; collaboration more manual. |
Moderate: dashboards and KPIs available; no built-in alerting, but can integrate with external tools. |
KNIME Analytics Platform (Switzerland/Germany) |
Excellent: workflow-based analytics, repeatable processes, supports complex calculations; strong for audit repeatability. |
Moderate: dashboards possible via KNIME WebPortal or integrations; not as polished as Power BI. |
Excellent: ETL and data preprocessing built into workflows; ideal for cleaning and validating audit datasets. |
Moderate: collaborative workflows via KNIME Server; desktop edition limited. |
Good: workflows can be scheduled for monitoring KPIs; alerts possible with KNIME Server. |