How to Migrate from BusinessObjects to Power BI: Step-by-Step Guide

Enterprises are now moving towards cloud-native, AI-driven, and interactive platforms. But are you still struggling with high licensing costs, maintenance, and deployment of SAP Business Objects? 

Already, 70% of enterprises have modernized their BI platforms to reduce costs. So, if you are still using the Business Objects platform, you are surely behind in your analytics transformation. It’s time to move to a new alternative - Microsoft Power BI. Power BI offers a modern, agile, and cost-effective analytics platform.

This post will guide you through the process of upgrading your analytics platform. It will also outline the steps for a smooth and seamless BusinessObjects to Power BI migration.

Why Move from BusinessObjects to Power BI?

Business Objects has served as a robust and trusted enterprise tool. But it has many disadvantages, like high licensing costs, deployment, maintenance, and a lack of self-service BI capabilities.  Organizations move from SAP BusinessObjects to Microsoft BI for various reasons, such as 

• Cost savings: Power BI‘s Cloud-native feature is often on-premises and minimizes hardware requirements. This reduces infrastructure costs compared to Business Object's traditional enterprise model.
• Cloud-based BI platform: Unlike Business Objects, Power BI offers a modern, cloud-first architecture that can easily integrate with Microsoft Fabric and Azure services. 
• Reduced licensing costs: The Power BI licensing model is less expensive compared to the Business Object licensing price.
• User experience: Power BI provides an intuitive and interactive user interface that enables self-service analytics. Learning curve is less, so that users can easily create their own dashboards and reports without any need for a technical person. This triggers faster decision-making.
• Future-proofing: Microsoft invests heavily in Power BI with frequent updates and AI capabilities, thus ensuring long-term support and innovation, which Business Objects lacks
• Scalability: Since Power BI is built for the cloud, it can handle petabytes of data by utilizing Microsoft Azure. This feature makes it suitable for organizations to handle large volumes of data.
• Governance policies: Power BI empowers business users to create their own reports. It allows IT teams to enforce governance, security, and certified data sets.

Challenges faced during BusinessObjects to Power BI Migration and ways to overcome

Migrating from SAP BusinessObjects to Power BI is not just about shifting things. It involves several technical, architectural, and organizational challenges that can be overcome by proper planning. 

• Architectural differences: Business Objects relies on universes, a powerful semantic layer that simplifies complex data queries for end-users. Power BI uses data models and data sets like DAX for query building. Neither has a direct equivalent. They often require a revised approach for logic, joins, and calculations from the BO Universe to rebuild the data model using Power BI’s DAX language.  To overcome this, use Power Query for data cleaning and transformation, and building a star schema model. Try to replicate the business logic from the universe in Power BI data models and optimize it for usability and performance. 
• Data Integrity and Connectivity: Data accuracy and mapping complex BusinessObjects data structures, including Universes to Power BI, requires careful planning and execution. Busyness Objects integrates seamlessly with SAP systems, while Power BI needs the help of connectors or gateways to connect to SAP and legacy systems. To overcome this, use Power BI SAP connectors such as BW, HANA, and ERP for direct integration. Optimize performance using DirectQuery for real-time data. 
• Security mapping and testing: Business Objects uses a central security model while Power BI integrates with Azure Active Directory and workspace-level roles. It becomes a complex task to re-map user roles and permissions to ensure data sensitivity. To overcome this, align BO roles with Power BI workspaces, row-level security (RLS), and object-level security (OLS).
• Report and dashboard conversion: Business Objects reports many customized visualizations, calculations, layouts, formulas, drill-down features, and interactivity that can’t be directly translated to Power BI. To overcome this, prioritize critical reports and start migrating in phases. To maintain the interactivity in Power BI, wisely use its features like matrix visuals, bookmarks, and drill-through.
• Change management and user adoption: Business Objects users are used to using the pagination feature in reports, whereas Power BI offers self-service analytics and interactive dashboards. There is a steep learning curve in Power BI’s self-service and interactive environment. To mitigate this risk, invest in a training program for the users. Power BI developers should be aware of DAX and Power Query, while end-users need to be trained on how to use the interactive dashboard and self-service analytics. Establish clear data governance policies and maintain good documentation of existing Business Objects reports and data. 

Best Practices to follow for a  BusinessObjects to Power BI Migration

A Business Object's migration to Power BI indicates how an organization transforms its data in the new platform. If it is not managed properly, it can lead to significant disruption and failure to realize the full potential of Power BI. Here are some of the best practices to follow

• Clearly look out for why your organizations need to be migrated to Power BI and what benefits will be obtained by the BusinessObjects to Power BI migration.
• Engage key stakeholders and users in the initial stage to gather the migration scope and ensure the new Power BI environment aligns with your business needs.
• Start with a pilot project to validate the architecture and migration approach.  Connect Power BI to your data sources and rebuild data models using Power Query Editor.
• Manually recreate reports, including business logic, KPIs, and filters in the Power BI interface instead of just copying them.
• Implement data governance and performance checks by following role-based access and row-level security (RLS).
• Provide hands-on training to the users about the new features of Power BI and how to use them.
• Use tools like Azure Data Factory for data orchestration and Power Automate for streamlining the process.

8 Step BusinessObjects to Power BI Migration Process

Migrating from SAP BusinessObjects (BO) to Power BI is not about replacing one reporting tool with another; it is about modernizing analytics to support decision-making, self-service BI, and cloud scalability. To ensure a smooth transition, here is an 8-step migration process

1. Assess the environment: First step is to assess the business objects environment and identify all the reports, universes, and users, and prioritize critical content that needs to be migrated first. Check the BI reports and classify them into categories such as frequently used, rarely used, or obsolete. This will help to focus on high-value content.
2. Define migration Strategy: Now, with all the inventory details, develop a comprehensive deployment plan and governance model for Power BI. Plan for a phased rollout, starting with a small project and a small number of high-priority, high-impact reports. Create a migration backlog and identify key metrics for measuring success after the migration is complete.
3. Prioritize and Rationalize reports: Categorize the reports by priority (e.g., high, medium, low) based on business impact and strategic objectives. Try to consolidate multiple BO reports into fewer interactive Power BI dashboards to give an enhanced user experience.
4. Rebuild the Semantic layer: This phase is to convert the BO universes to Power BI Data models. Map Business Objects elements to Power BI equivalents. Deconstruct the joins, aliases, contexts, and custom objects with your universe. Rebuild the logic in Power BI using Power Query for data transformation and DAX (Data Analysis Expressions) for complex calculations. This step will show how Power BI will connect to your data sources with options like direct query, import mode, and hybrid models for flexibility.
5. Extraction and Conversion: Export source content in CSV/Excel and reconstruct the universes into Power BI data models. Adjust the calculations and logic in Power BI to match it with Business Objects.
6. Governance and security: The Next step is to plan your Power BI workspace environment. Define a security framework to map your existing BusinessObjects group and folder permissions. Set up role-based access, row-level security (RLS), and workspace permission in Power BI. Set up a data gateway to ensure a seamless connection to your Business Objects data sources.
7. Rebuild reports and dashboards: Redesign and recreate reports in Power BI using Power Query Editor for data transformation and modelling. Try to use Power BI’s interactive features such as Drill-through analysis, AI-powered insights, interactive visuals, and natural language processing. Roll out Power BI gradually while running both Business Objects and Power BI in parallel.
8. Testing and validation: Rigorously test each migrated report. Ensure that the data, formulas, and visual outputs are identical when compared with the original reports. Gradually deploy the new Power BI reports and dashboards to the users. Migrate users and their permissions to the Power BI environment.

What to Do After You Migrate from BusinessObjects to Power BI

A well-implemented BusinessObjects to Power BI migration will ensure that users experience real-time insights. The post Power BI migration phase is very critical for ensuring a smooth transition, driving user adoption, and maximizing the return on investment on the new BI platform.

• Validate test reports: Compare the new migrated reports with the old Business objects’ reports and check for their data integrity and accuracy. 
• Monitor and Optimize: Continuously monitor Power BI usage, report performance, and user feedback.  Do a parallel run of both Business Objects and the Power BI interface and compare the results. 
• Training and User Enablement: Provide training sessions to educate users on how to navigate and use the features of Power BI. Continuously optimize performance and redefine the dashboard based on user needs.
• Decommission Business Objects: Gather user feedback and change things accordingly in Power BI. Once everything is stable and users have gotten used to Power BI’s dashboard, start decommissioning Business Objects gradually and move on to Power BI. Uninstall Business Objects to reduce resource usage.

Why Choose Entrans for Your BusinessObjects to Power BI Migration?

BusinessObjects to Power BI migration is not just about switching tools; it gives an enhanced user experience with interactive visuals and data-driven analytics.

Partnering with a team of migration experts like Entrans takes away the risks that come with manually migrating from SAP Business Objects to Microsoft Power BI. Our technical team has deep knowledge of both Business Objects and Power BI. From pre-migration planning to post-migration optimization, we ensure a seamless transition and manually rebuild difficult layouts and securely move all your content and images. 

Want to know more? Book a consultation call today with no obligation!.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. Can we fully automate the migration from BusinessObjects to Power BI?

No full automation is possible. The data architecture and data models of Business Objects and Power BI are different, which requires manual work to rebuild reports and data logic.

2. How can we verify that our Power BI reports are accurate?

Run both Business Objects and Power BI in parallel side by side, and then verify the accuracy of both reports. Manually compare key metrics and data points to ensure data integrity.

3. What happens to scheduled BusinessObjects reports and alerts?

Scheduled Business Objects reports and alerts need to be recreated in Power BI as they won’t automatically get copied during the BusinessObjects to Power BI migration. We need to recreate reports in subscriptions, alerts, and scheduled refresh.

4. Can business users create their own reports in Power BI?

Yes, users can create their own reports in Power BI as it supports self-service reporting. With proper training and access to certified data models, users can create reports and dashboards.

5. How do we handle Business Objects Universes in Power BI?

Business Objects universes are handled by rebuilding in the Power BI data model. We need to map the universes to datasets, semantic models, or a data warehouse for Power BI using Power Query.