Rob Ashe, Cognos CEO

Cognos is undertaking a series of strategic customer support initiatives to address growing demand for large-scale standardization and performance management deployments.

The changes coincide with a trend by more and more of Cognos' large customers to standardize their business intelligence and performance management software. A recent Gartner survey found most organizations want to standardize BI software across their business, while an AMR Research poll showed 53 per cent of the large companies surveyed have either completed or are in the early stages of standardization.

"These new customer initiatives once again raise the bar for Cognos and our industry. They reflect our ongoing commitment to help Cognos customers deploy our solutions quickly and achieve significant, measurable returns on their investment," president and CEO Rob Ashe said in a statement.

Among the new initiatives is creation of a business intelligence roadmap that will guide Cognos customers and consultants through the BI implementation process. The company is also expanding its customer advocacy program, a group of technical experts who work with clients as part of a premium support package.