Power BI is being used as a primary reporting tool across whole organization. It provides attractive GUI compare to other existing tools such as Qlikview and Qliksense. Also it enables end users to build their own reports if data model is ready as development is very easy (drag and drop approach).
Pros
Attractive GUI compare to other tools
Development is easy
very low maintenance
Easy connectivity with other Microsoft platforms
Cons
Connectivity with more sources such as SAP
functionality to maintain history (snapshots)
Likelihood to Recommend
If you have perfect data model ready and ETL team to build the data as per business need then its very amazing tool with eye catching GUI and development will be very quick.
but if you need to build snapshot kind of logic and need to maintain the history then this tool will not work.
The Microsoft Power BI has been used within the company for a number of years. It is most commonly used in the financial sector of the company and has been delivering excellent results and handling facilities for managers. It shows in detail each value, graphic and is very easy to understand. In the presentations, the software is entering the place of excel.
Pros
Helps to create machine learning models and find cognitive insights
Connects to virtually all existing data sources (Google Analytics, SalesForce, and others)
High performance and high compression ratio
Very easy to implement
Cons
Need to have more advanced knowledge in excel
Some elements are limited
Likelihood to Recommend
The Microsoft Power BI is used to hold global meetings in the financial industry. It has good dynamics and makes it easier to understand values and graphics. However, to use it, you need to have a little knowledge in Microsoft Office Excel, as you may have difficulty using it otherwise. The cost of the license is low, I believe it compensates the investor.
Power BI is being used primarily by our donor relations team to create visual dashboards of giving profiles, linked with other data sources. This helps us to easily spot trends in donors and gifts, linked to location and other anonymous demographic data. It is a powerful but easy to use visualization tool for modeling data.
Pros
Data visualization - it's easy for users to visualize data using many built-in controls.
Distributing reports and dashboards and delivering in real time on the web. Reports can be updated in real-time and display updated results automatically to decision makers.
Pulling data from diverse data sources. Data can be pulled from a wide variety of databases, even flat-file text.
Cons
Power BI is not a classic reporting tool, so it can't easily be used for financial reports.
It can be quite expensive. Even those just viewing reports need a paid license to consume shared content.
Error logging is very unhelpful. When something goes wrong with a dataset, it can be very difficult to see where the problem is.
Likelihood to Recommend
If you're already using Office 365, Power BI for O365 is an easy choice. Start playing around with the free version and then easily add individual Pro licenses with little risk. However, if you anticipate using this with many users, it can get expensive quickly.
PowerBI is used within our organisation to display various data and metrics in a visual way, but also allows exporting where required to allow users to interact with the data directly in Excel. It is used by all staff at our organisation. For some it is a simple snapshot view of some data to show where we as a company are right now, for others they use it to drill into sales or product data to give them a quick way to see this data without having to use the clunky reports/interface of our ERP system. The product has allowed us to move from just Excel-based reports to dashboards that show visually what is happening. It also provides the option of simple controls to slice and filter the data to requirements. It is simple to use and create visualisations where previously we had to use a separate system for that.
Pros
Easy to make visual dashboards from SQL queries. Previously we had to use a third party application that had to run on a web server that was so complex to setup and run. PowerBI removes all that.
Ability to control who/which group has access to each dashboard or report. Ties in well with the rest of the Office 365 ecosystem.
Has many connectors to allow pulling data from various systems, both onsite (via gateway) or external (via APIs), and join the data to create a report/dashboard.
Ability to show data but also export the data, if permitted.
Easy to show PowerBI dashboards on SharePoint or on other websites via embedded code.
Cons
Once a report uses a Pro feature, it needs a Pro license, but a lot of these are just basic features and the users are just viewing and not using any of the advanced features. It would be nice to have a Pro / Viewing license and Pro / Interacting license.
Limited amount of refreshes per 24 hours period. 5 refreshes as of Dec 2018.
The emailing of reports is there but kind of basic. It will do a screen grab of a report, which doesn't turn out very well.
Likelihood to Recommend
If you want to create a visual dashboard or report that utilises various data sources then PowerBI can do this. It is great in that it takes your on-premises data and stores it on Microsoft servers where it can interact with it faster, reducing load on your own servers, while being efficient in what it transfers out.
We have found it not well suited if you wanted to publish a simple report to many staff as they may all need a Pro license which can get expensive. Even if embedding the report onto a shared platform like SharePoint, it will not display if the users doesn't have a PowerBI Pro license.
VU
Verified User
Manager in Information Technology (11-50 employees)
Power BI for office 365 (now simply become {Power BI}, is a unique and general platform for managing business intelligence through Microsoft tools. The platform is then subdivided into services rather than desktop or mobile. Thanks to this, in my experience, it was possible to create customized and performing BI tools.
Pros
perfectly integrated with microsoft tools
objects can be easily shared in mobile environments
attractive dashboards
Cons
in the standard version it is not possible to do analysis by excel
the Pro version is required for sharing jobs
only a few data sources allow real time connections
Likelihood to Recommend
If you want to get closer to the world of BI and work in a Microsoft environment you can definitely evaluate the tools of Power BI and see if they are right for you. I recommend you buy the PRO version otherwise you can not use the most useful features of BI. The cost is moreover certainly less than many other competitors.
VU
Verified User
Technician in Information Technology (51-200 employees)
We are using Power BI to create better visual representations for both internal use as well as customer facing analysis. It's not adopted across the entire organization yet but we are in the process of doing so.
Pros
Ease of data import
Easy to learn the basic operation of the software
Cons
Like many Microsoft products, you can get by with a small understanding of the product, but to truly realize the entire potential does take a while to learn.
Hooking up SQL databases to the cloud version is a more complex than just querying right into the database from the desktop version.
Likelihood to Recommend
We frequently use the mapping feature to overlay areas in which we have strong operations and areas in which our customers have needs to quickly visualize opportunities to new and existing clients. We are also beginning to develop internal scorecards with it. One downside is we haven't discovered a way to automate a data refresh from the SQL connection, so you have to remember to refresh the data (which can take a little while depending on how much data your looking for) every time.
I am a single person putting together reports/dashboards to send out for others to interpret. The biggest problem right now is there is no direct connection to Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012.
Pros
The visuals are excellent
The interaction of data between graphs and charts
The way the program saves how data sheets are manipulated.
Cons
Connection to Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012
Dashboards need to automatically update when I upload a report
Increase speed
Likelihood to Recommend
It's well suited for analytics for sales, utilization, downtime, and spending.
It is used for pilot projects to asses the benefits of use.
Pros
Beautiful visuals
Ease of use
Powerful data manipulation language
Cons
I'd like to be able to use visuals based on different data sets in the same page.
The visuals are limited - I'd like to see a ribbon plot for example.
Would like to be able to use different data representations on the same visual. There's currently an ability to put lines on histograms but no ability to, for example, add points to a histogram or line plot. I understand some of these may be in development but you will never be able to create visuals for each possible combination. You need a way of combining two visuals into one - e.g. line and points.
DAX is very powerful but a bit complicated for some users. I think you need to make some of the functionality that's available in DAX exposed at the UI level.
The R visual gives the flexibility to plot a lot of stuff but it is limited by only being able to plot what's passed in the dataset.
You need a text entry box that you can filter datasets by.
Likelihood to Recommend
Power BI Desktop does not make for good presentations. It would be good if there was a presentation mode.
I've supported Power BI for companies within the job recruiting area. We implemented the software for staff or more importantly the recruiters to upload data such as health care, real estate, IT, hedge funds and law firms to see what markets were most active and how to distribute staff for recruiting needed employees for their clients. There was no problem; it helped my clients focus on the needed markets with the visuals and dashboard so managers and "higher ups" can put together a strategy.
Pros
The dashboard is super easy to use. The GUI is flexible and updates as needed
Customization was key for individuals and presentation purposes.
Integration with Office 365 is another plus. The licensing made sense when pitching the proposal when a client is already running Office 365.
Cons
Well in general Microsoft support needs CPR.
There are bugs such as some items you'd think were allowed on the dashboard are not options however from reading they are continuing to improve these concerns/features.
Implementation can be finicky depending on how the current environment is configured.
Likelihood to Recommend
It's very flashy, and cost effective (if you are a gold partner which my clients were so we bundled their packages). It also does a great job compiling printable/email-able PDFs for reference. Another great feature is being able to display statistics on TVs for either internal or external use. It lets everyone know whats going on; being transparent.
This differs from company to company. I have implemented solutions for a single line of business within a company and across all lines within a company. Typically during a deployment, we will develop and release content for a single business line and then move to others. Power BI specifically will display the data you have prepared in the background. It can also be used, by power users / analysts, to explore their own data and to make their own analysis without having to go through IT once a solid data model is in place.
Pros
Easily create graphs and visualizations.
Distributing dashboards & content packs
Finding inconsistencies in data.
Cons
If a data source is deployed directly to PowerBI.com without using Power BI desktop, you will not have the ability to troubleshoot connectivity issues which often arise during Metadata and other changes to the model.
Not for typical static reporting.
No row based security within Power BI itself.
Likelihood to Recommend
It is appropriate for creating graphs and visualizations. These can be created & then deployed or a data model can be deployed and power users can create their own graphs and visualizations.
