The evaluation of external data resources for business intelligence applications: the example of the Czech Republic

Contemporary business requires relevant data for appropriate, effective and reliable decisions. The concept of Business Intelligence which has been successfully established in a lot of organisations necessitates gathering relevant internal as well as external data which are often hardly acquirable. The aim of this paper is to analyse both the quality and availability of the sample of the external data resources on the basis of selected criteria and to enable the evaluation of their potential. The research reveals that the resources are currently not as suitable and utilisable for the purposes of Business Intelligence as they are expected to be. Although there are exceptions such as data provided by particular governmental or national institutions, the majority of external data resources does not correspond to the requirements posed to their availability, credibility, update regularity, stability and technical accessibility.