Tag: Analytics

Internetnews: Microsoft Adds SQL Server Note to 2007 Drumbeat

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It’s really very good to see how product development is aligned to bring all our ‘moving parts’ together into 1 very well integrated platform en evenly important 1 integrated user experience. No one can do this quite as well as Microsoft …

… REDMOND, Wash. — Microsoft (Quote) released enhancements to SQL Server 2005 that it hopes will make it a more significant player in the business intelligence (BI) space.

The new features, which are part of the new Service Pack 2 (SP2), tie in closely with reporting capabilities in Excel and Visio that were introduced with Office 2007, and ultimately should help Microsoft sell PerformancePoint 2007 when it is rolled out later this year.

Francois Ajenstat, director of SQL Server marketing at Microsoft, said that SP2 includes data mining add-ins for the 2007 Microsoft Office system that enable data mining functionality from SQL Server Analysis Services to be used directly within Excel 2007 and Visio 2007.

Repeating the company’s mantra that customers can get more out of their line of business applications when they are presented in familiar Office productivity tools, Ajenstat told internetnews.com that “we’re bringing BI to where the users live.”

SQL Server 2005 now also allows users to seamlessly consume and manage reports in SharePoint Server.

“So now SharePoint can host BI info and users can access both structured and unstructured data in the same environment,” he added. …

… “Our goal is BI for everyone,” noted Ajenstat. …

Source : Internetnews.com

Microsoft Advances Its Business Intelligence Solution

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Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 to bring performance management to all employees.

REDMOND, Wash. — Dec. 5, 2006 — Microsoft Corp. today announced the release of the first community technology preview (CTP) for its integrated performance management application Microsoft® Office PerformancePoint™ Server 2007. Scheduled for general availability in mid-2007, Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 brings together next-generation monitoring, analytics and planning capabilities in a complete performance management application. Beginning today, customers can visit http://connect.microsoft.com/site/sitehome.aspx?siteid=181 to download the first bits of code and test the product’s capabilities in a real-world business environment.

Office PerformancePoint Server CTP 1 will combine the planning, budgeting, forecasting and financial consolidation capabilities of the product code-named “BizSharp” and the scorecarding functionality of Microsoft Office Business Scorecard Manager Server 2005. CTP 2, scheduled for early 2007, will incorporate the functionality of CTP 1 and analytics from ProClarity® 6.2. Microsoft plans to release either one or two additional CTPs before the general availability of the product scheduled for mid-2007.

“We continue to invest in our business intelligence solution to bridge the gap between people and the information needed to drive business success,” said Chris Capossela, corporate vice president of Microsoft Business Division. “Today’s milestone brings us one step closer to our goal of enabling decision support and superior performance management across the enterprise.”

Continue : Microsoft PressPass

Microsoft’s BI porposition is really taking shape with Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 on the horizon … In the slipstream of this CTP I expect more information / handson experience to be shared. I haven’t looked, but I do think the product team must have a blog as well. Will come back to that …

Microsoft is Announcing Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007

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The introduction of PerformancePoint Server 2007 is another major step forward for Microsoft and turns BI capability in the hand for potentially every Information Worker ….

… REDMOND, Wash. — June 6, 2006 — Microsoft Corp. today announced Microsoft® Office PerformancePoint Server 2007, a complete performance management (PM) application including business scorecarding, analytics and planning functionality that enables companies to more effectively plan and manage their businesses. This new application expands Microsoft’s growing line of business intelligence (BI) products with a new focus on performance management solutions. Microsoft has established a unique position in expanding the delivery of BI to everyone by focusing on an easier-to-use experience while also delivering the high performance and outstanding price performance businesses require.

Microsoft’s vision for business intelligence is based on three major goals:

  • BI for everyone. By providing a user experience in the Microsoft Office system along with the scale and high performance of Microsoft’s BI platform, organizations can afford to deliver the right information to more employees so they can make the right decisions — small or large — every day.
  • Enterprise-grade reliability, high-performance platform. Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 delivers comprehensive capabilities for data integration and transformation (Integration Services); analytical query, calculation, and data mining (Analysis Services); and reporting (Reporting Services); thus helping people at all levels in an organization transform valuable data into shared information they can act on.
  • Business view above the data. Managers can synthesize information across multiple systems and multiple parts of the organization to give them a more strategic and forward-looking view of the business than they can get from transactional enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.

…

Read on : Microsoft.com

Should you be interested in learning more about Microsoft’s BI strategy, then there a Q&A on this topic for you with Lewis Levin, the corporate VP of Microsoft Office Business Applications

Q&A: Microsoft’s Business Intelligence Strategy 

The corporate VP of Microsoft Office Business Applications, Lewis Levin, discusses the new performance-management offering, Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007, and the company’s approach to business intelligence.