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External Partner Sharing

Use Case

One of the most common challenges organizations face is sharing internal data (such as sales performance, inventory levels, or supply chain metrics) with external partners, vendors, or clients securely and at scale.

DataCentral provides a robust, governed solution for this "last mile" data delivery problem.

The Challenge​

A large manufacturing company uses Power BI internally to track inventory and sales. They want to share specific dashboards with their 50 distributors so each distributor can see their own performance metrics.

However, the company faces several hurdles:

  1. Licensing Costs: Buying 50 Power BI Pro licenses for external users is expensive.
  2. Security Risks: Managing 50 external guest accounts in their corporate Microsoft Entra ID (Azure AD) tenant creates security and compliance overhead.
  3. Data Leakage: The company must guarantee that Distributor A cannot see Distributor B's data under any circumstances.
  4. User Experience: The distributors are not technical users; they just want a simple web portal with their logo on it, not the complex Power BI Service interface.

The DataCentral Solution​

By deploying DataCentral, the manufacturing company can solve all four challenges simultaneously.

1. License Pooling (App Owns Data)​

Instead of purchasing 50 individual Power BI Pro licenses, the company configures a single Power BI Service Principal in DataCentral. This Service Principal acts as a proxy, generating secure embed tokens for the distributors. The company absorbs the licensing cost centrally, often resulting in significant savings.

2. Isolated Identity Management​

The company creates User Pass or Mobile ID accounts for the distributors directly within DataCentral. These users do not exist in the company's Entra ID tenant, keeping the corporate directory clean and secure.

3. Governed Row-Level Security (RLS)​

The company builds a single "Distributor Performance" report in Power BI Desktop and defines a Row-Level Security role. In DataCentral, the administrator creates an Organizational Unit (OU) for each distributor and assigns the appropriate Role Code to that OU.

When a user from Distributor A logs in, DataCentral automatically passes their specific Role Code to Power BI. The report renders securely, showing only Distributor A's data. If a user moves to a different distributor, the administrator simply moves them to the new OU, and their data access updates instantly.

4. White-Labeled Experience​

The company configures DataCentral with their own corporate branding (logo, colors, and custom subdomain like partners.manufacturingco.com). When the distributors log in, they see a professional, branded portal containing only the reports they are authorized to view, with no confusing Power BI menus or extraneous options.

Summary​

DataCentral transforms a complex, expensive, and risky data sharing requirement into a streamlined, secure, and branded experience for external partners. It allows organizations to monetize their data or improve partner relationships without the traditional IT overhead.