Retail business platform vs Retail analytics projects

One can run an analytical process in the retail industry as a project which requires expensive capital expenditure or on a retail business platform which requires a monthly operating expenditure. Which are the right analytical process to run in project mode and which are the right retail analytical processes to run in platform mode. This could depend upon a multitude of factors like
1. What is the frequency of the retail analytical process ? Weekly ? Monthly ? quarterly ? or real time
For example a real time recommendation to be made to a customer thru a contact center may well be coupled/embedded to the core application instead of routing it thru an offline business platform to derive cross sell propensity scores
2. Does the analytical process lend itself to competitive differentiation ? For ex cross sell models can be a source of competitive differentiation whereas a market mix model can leverage a platform
3. Is the data to be transferred under the purview of regulations ?
For example customer data and risk scores may need to satisfy European data protection act which may introduce additional complexities in the retail business platforms