Power BI : Reporting Server Licensing Alternative

[sukhi]

Hello Experts 

This question is regarding sharing the Power BI reports vis-a-vis licensing with reference to a small organisation. 

The organisation has around 20 users who needs to view Power BI reports. Now, I understand that (now not so) recent changes in the licensing, Power BI is favourable to large organisations. However, I think of following two options to fit it to my purpose. Your opinion on feasibility will be highly appreciated.

1. Install Power BI on all 20 machines. All 20 users will have power BI pro license (which is just $ 10 per month). The .PBIX file will be on network drive. The users can open and view the exact same report any time. (I know this is a silly option but perhaps workable ?)
2. Publish Power BI in the Sharepoint site. Purchase 20 Pro licenses and give users read only access (as I do not want them to edit the report).
3. Okay, one more option-**bleep**-question : Is it possible to have a report on stand-alone .net portal to which the user will have their own sign-in credentials (no single-sign on or integration to existing credentials). Once they sign-in, the Power BI report will be shown. In order to show the report, only one Pro license will be used. This, if this is possible, I can reduce the cost of overall solution without purchasing additional licenses.

Thanks in advance for your response. 

[Anonymous]

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@sukhi wrote:

1. Install Power BI on all 20 machines. All 20 users will have power BI pro license (which is just $ 10 per month). The .PBIX file will be on network drive. The users can open and view the exact same report any time. (I know this is a silly option but perhaps workable ?)

Not my favourite. But it is a way. Cloud is not a option?!

1. Publish Power BI in the Sharepoint site. Purchase 20 Pro licenses and give users read only access (as I do not want them to edit the report).

Why 20? What do you mean with "publish"? Sharepoint on prem or online?

1. Okay, one more option-**bleep**-question : Is it possible to have a report on stand-alone .net portal to which the user will have their own sign-in credentials (no single-sign on or integration to existing credentials). Once they sign-in, the Power BI report will be shown. In order to show the report, only one Pro license will be used. This, if this is possible, I can reduce the cost of overall solution without purchasing additional licenses.

The Pro licence for the report server is only needed for publishing. Views are freee, because you have bought a Enterprise with SA.

However, on prem is only for big organisations or organisations with a high budget. Online is scaleable.

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[sukhi]

Thanks Philip for your response. Appreciate it.

#1. Unfortunately not - with Cloud option, as I understand, user needs to go to PowerBI.com where he/she can view the shared reports. However, since powerbi.com is a generic site (not country or region specific), client is little concerned about country specific laws around data privacy. Please let me know in case there's a solution. I found a paper from Microsoft where they claim complaing to all the laws. However, it is with reference to Azure (and not powerbi.com site).

#2. By 'publish', I meant, embedding the code to Sharepoint site. On powerbi.com, I find this option. However, after posting the oroginal question, I found that the Power BI embeded license needs to be purchased for this. And even in this, the embeded link is powerbi.com/xxxxxxxx. So, I am not sure if I can use it.

I have not purchased enterprise license with software assurance.

Thanks Philip for your response again. I'll mark your answer as 'accepted solution' in some time (or tomorrow) unless you or someone else have comments on above.

[healthEteam · Accepted solution]

When you set up your Office 365 tenant space (for Power Bi Service Portal) you get to dictate what datacenter you want to store tha data in.  Microsoft has data centers in many different regions of the world.  It is possible that you could dictate that it reside in a data center in your country (I don't know where you are located).  The Power Bi Service is, behind the scenes, provisioned azure resources.

Your scenario would be best accomplished (and by far the easiest) by using the Power Bi Service and controlling the Active Directory within the O365 space so that you can provision users/accesses.

PBI Report Server requires you to either have a Power Bi Premium Capacity ($5k month) OR a SQL Server Enterprise 2016 License with Software Assurance (it is a SA benefit).  Seems a much more costly scenario especially if you arent absolutely certain that the client is averse to the web in general.

[Anonymous]

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@sukhi wrote:

#1. Unfortunately not - with Cloud option, as I understand, user needs to go to PowerBI.com where he/she can view the shared reports. However, since powerbi.com is a generic site (not country or region specific), client is little concerned about country specific laws around data privacy. Please let me know in case there's a solution. I found a paper from Microsoft where they claim complaing to all the laws. However, it is with reference to Azure (and not powerbi.com site).

Which region do you need?

#2. By 'publish', I meant, embedding the code to Sharepoint site. On powerbi.com, I find this option. However, after posting the oroginal question, I found that the Power BI embeded license needs to be purchased for this. And even in this, the embeded link is powerbi.com/xxxxxxxx. So, I am not sure if I can use it.

This functions- embedding or embed into sharepoint online, needs powerbi.com - the online version.