I spent a lot of time at the Microsoft office last week in Waltham, including the Quarterly Partner Briefing on Tuesday 3/24. One of the sessions I attended on BI put on by Bob Lincavicks and Tara Seppa clarified some recent announcements about PerformancePoint being rolled into SharePoint. When I first heard about this in January I did not understand it, but after last Tuesday the roadmap and economics are much more clear.
Summary: If you have Microsoft Office SharePoint Server, MOSS Standard Cal, MOSS Enterprise Cal, and Software Assurance, you are now entitled to get PerformancePoint Server at no additional charge starting yesterday 4/1/2009. No, this is not an April Fools! You download some new bits and can install and use them. PerformancePoint is Microsoft's full-blown BI platform that sits on top of SQL Server (SSIS/SSRS) and allows you to do all the reporting, dashboarding, scorecards, drill downs, etc until your heart's content. Learn more about PerformancePoint here: http://www.microsoft.com/bi/products/performancepoint-server.aspx
and about the licensing announcement here: http://www.microsoft.com/bi/products/announcement.aspx
Most companies we have run into are either already in the situation stated above, or in one of the two following "YOU ALMOST HAVE IT!" states:
1. Have MOSS ECALs as part of a package they purchased, and have considered implementing MOSS (may be running WSS at the moment, or not)
2. Have MOSS server with standard CALs
If you are in either situation, consider stepping up to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) with Standard & Enterprise CALs w/Software Assurance. Chances are your step-up costs won’t be that big, and will pale in comparison to PerformancePoint's old $25K/server & $195/Cal price tags. You'll get the Enterprise capabilities of MOSS (Excel Services, Forms Services, BDC, etc) which are worth it in and of themselves, and then be free-rolling on the PerformancePoint. In 2009, who doesn't want to use a tool like PerformancePoint to get a better handle on the strategic and operational aspects of their business to spot trends, make better and more timely decisions, and target cost cutting? Getting this capability as part of the package can help loosen up budgeting that might not otherwise apply.
Fine print: PerformancePoint will release one more Service Pack as a standalone product this summer, and then if you INSISTED on running it standalone forever, mainstream support would end in 2013, and extended support would end in 2018. See details here: http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?p1=12922 Microsoft will be rolling the Monitoring and Analytics pieces of PerformancePoint directly into SharePoint in the Wave 14 (next year this time) timeframe. When they do that they will drop the Planning module from PerformancePoint. There are three capabilities currently in PerformancePoint (Monitoring, Analytics, and Planning). If you're not using Planning now (everyone in the above scenarios) you're not going to miss it and don't need to worry about it.