Microsoft unveils business intelligence changes

Microsoft revealed on 27th January that it will be changing its business intelligence strategy. The IT giant will be incorporating Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 into Microsoft Office SharePoint Server Enterprise edition, rebranded as PerformancePoint Services.

Over the next ten years, Microsoft will continue to support customers using Office PerformancePoint Server 2007. In mid-2009, PerformancePoint Server 2007 Service Pack 3 will be released, which allows users to update to the current Planning Server. Following the release of SP3, Microsoft will no longer offer a stand-alone version of Office PerformancePoint Server 2007.

Ravi Sankar of Inatech outlined what this means for users: “Monitoring & Analytics will live on and is to be incorporated into future versions of MOSS Enterprise. So M&A is staying but will be considered a part of MOSS, to be known as ‘PerformancePoint Services’.

“The Planning part of the PPS product is being retired. Naturally, it will still be supported up until its end-of-life but that will be it. Aside from a to-be-released SP3 no further PPS Planning development will happen.

“Budgeting & forecasting functionality as is currently provided by Planning will no longer be part of the MS BI stack.”

Kurt DelBene, Senior Vice President of Microsoft Office Business Platform Group, explained the advantages of the changes: “We frequently sum up our mission as bringing ‘BI to the masses’,” he said. “Incorporating Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 features into Office SharePoint Server helps us fulfill that mission and sets us apart from many of the BI vendors that require the purchase of specialized applications.

“Analyst firms have told us that BI solutions offered by these other vendors are typically only adopted by about 20 percent of employees at any given company. Part of the reason for such low adoption rates is the expense of licensing additional seats and the learning curve required to become a proficient user.

“Microsoft’s BI solution, on the other hand, relies on familiar, widely used tools such as SharePoint Server and Microsoft Office Excel. The ease of use and broad accessibility of our BI offering is part of the reason behind our success.

“The way we look at it, the more employees who have access to business data, the greater a company’s ability to anticipate changes and make adjustments.

“This move will not only provide greater access to BI features, but also will deliver them alongside the search, collaboration and content management features most people are accustomed to using in SharePoint.