Last week we looked at a database that was adding new content, but sometimes our databases completely reinvent themselves.  Such is the case with Business Insights: Essentials, a database from the Gale Corporation.

Formerly called Business and Company Resource Center, Gale fully reengineered the search interface, making it much cleaner and easier to use.  You can search by topic, industry type, company name, or ticker symbol, and it will recognize your syntax and return the appropriate information.  So, if you type in ‘environmentalism’, you’ll get articles about green companies and initiatives.  If you type ‘msft’, you’ll get corporate information about Microsoft.  If you type ‘consumer electronics’, you’ll get related industry profiles, and links to companies that manufacture them.  You don’t need to memorize any complicated field codes – BI:E recognizes the type of information for you!

But they did more than just change the search engine.  They’ve increased the amount and flexibility of the information, too.  In addition to news and journal articles, there’s plenty of business specific information.   Trying to find key financial ratios for a certain company?  They can be hard to tease out of most databases, if they’re included at all, but it’s easy with BI:E.  SWOT analysis?  Financials?  Market Share reports?  Stock information?  Company history?  List of companies they own, or are owned by?  Before, you might have gone from Business Source Premiere to Mergent Online to Hoover’s Company Records to collect all that information.  But it’s all easily accessible in Business Insights.

And if you’re interested in statistics, try the comparison charts – customize your own with different companies within an industry, or across industries.  They’re perfect for creating graphs and charts to illustrate your paper – or to plan an investment!  Check out the new Business Insights – and, if you have any questions, please contact us at iueref@iue.edu!