The partnership means that, starting in the first quarter of 2021, users on Springbrook’s cloud will have an option to use Tableau to analyze and visualize data from Springbrook software such as budgeting, payroll and tax collection tools.
The move is reminiscent of Tyler Technologies’ acquisition of Socrata two years ago; it connects back-end systems that serve as data sources to tools designed to publish and analyze the data for everyday users and the public. Tableau itself was acquired by Salesforce last year in another move bringing together data sources with visualization tools.
In a press release, Springbrook CEO Robert Bonavito pointed out that payroll and HR concerns have shifted for government during the pandemic, with so many continuing to work remotely.
“Springbrook is investing in vital technologies that our community of customers needs to manage heightened demands in a dynamic and rapidly changing work environment,” Bonavito said in the statement.
Tableau is a widely used visualization tool inside and outside the public sector — many states use it for COVID-19 dashboards, for example — but since it includes tools such as field calculations it can also give insights into data beyond simply representing it in a chart.
Springbrook is more than 30 years old, but it just recently regained independence at the beginning of the year after spending five years as a subsidiary of gov tech company Accela. It’s now owned by the private equity firm Accel-KKR.
