Explore what Power BI can do for you


Introduction

Power BI is the collective name for an assortment of cloud-based apps and services that help organizations collate, manage, and analyze data from a variety of sources, through a user-friendly interface.

Business intelligence tools like Power BI can be used for a multitude of purposes.

Primarily, Power BI pulls data together and processes it, turning it into intelligible insights, often using visually compelling and easy-to-process charts and graphs. This allows users to generate and share clear and useful snapshots of what’s happening in their business.

Power BI connects to a range of data sources, from basic Excel spreadsheets to databases, and both cloud-based and on-premise apps.

Power BI is something of an umbrella term and can refer to either a Windows desktop application called Power BI Desktop, an online SaaS (Software as a Service) service called Power BI Service, or mobile Power BI apps available on Windows phones and tablets, as well as for iOS and Android devices.

Power BI is built on the foundation of Microsoft Excel, and as such, the learning curve from Excel to Power BI is not that steep; anyone who can use Excel can use Power BI, but the latter is far more powerful than its spreadsheet counterpart.

What Does Power BI Do?

Microsoft Power BI is used to run reports and surface insights based on a company’s data. Power BI can connect to a wide range of data sets, and “tidies up” the info it’s fed so that it can be better digested and understood. The reports and visuals generated from this data can then be shared with other users.

Power BI helps users see not only what’s happened in the past and what’s happening in the present, but also what might happen in the future. Power BI is infused with machine learning capabilities, meaning it can spot patterns in data and use those patterns to make informed predictions and run “what if” scenarios. These estimates allow users to generate forecasts and prepare themselves to meet future demand and other key metrics.


What Components make up Power BI?

  • Power Query: a data connection tool that lets you transform, combine, and enhance data from several sources
  • Power Pivot: a data modeling tool for creating data models
  • Power View: a data visualization tool that generates interactive charts, graphs, maps, and other visuals
  • Power Map: another visualization tool for creating immersive 3D visuals
  • Power Q&A: a question and answer engine that lets you ask questions about your data in plain language

Here are some of the key benefits of using Power BI:

  • - Businesses can input huge quantities of data into Power BI that many other platforms would struggle to process
  • - Built-in machine learning features can analyze data and help users spot valuable trends and make educated predictions
  • - Information can be visualized using powerful templates to allow businesses to better make sense of their data
  • - Power BI is cloud-based, so users get cutting edge intelligence capabilities and powerful algorithms that are updated regularly
  • - Powerful personalization capabilities allow users to create dashboards so they can access the data they need quickly
  • - Alerts can be set up on KPIs to keep users up to date on important metrics and measurements.
  • - Power BI has an intuitive interface that makes it far more user-friendly and easy to navigate than complex spreadsheets
  • - The platform integrates with other popular business management tools like SharePoint, Office 365, and Dynamic 365, as well as other non-Microsoft products like Spark, Hadoop, Google Analytics, SAP, Salesforce, and MailChimp
  •  - With data security a massive talking point for modern businesses, Power BI ensures data is safe, offering granular controls on accessibility both internally and externally


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