This introductory technical session provides a structured overview of Microsoft Power BI, the business intelligence platform developed by Microsoft. The session explores Power BI from a system and data architecture perspective rather than a purely end-user approach.

Participants will examine the Power BI ecosystem, including Power BI Desktop, Power BI Service, and gateway architecture. The session will cover data connectivity to diverse sources (SQL databases, cloud services, APIs), ETL processes using Power Query, data modeling principles (relationships, normalization vs. denormalization), and an introduction to DAX (Data Analysis Expressions) for calculated measures and columns.

Additionally, the session will discuss dataset optimization, refresh strategies, security implementation through Row-Level Security (RLS), and deployment considerations within enterprise environments.

By the end of the session, attendees will understand the technical foundations of Power BI, its integration capabilities within modern data infrastructures, and best practices for building scalable, maintainable BI solutions.