Managed self-service BI implementation – De Vlaamse Waterweg 

De Vlaamse Waterweg is a Flemish Government agency managing waterways in Flanders. This can range from traffic management on these waterways, its bridges and locks, but also granting permissions to organize events on/along the water or applications to capture water…

The briefing

De Vlaamse Waterweg was already using Power BI as a reporting tool for both operational and strategic reporting. However, due to the constant need for fast report delivery, individual employees installed Power BI themselves, obtained direct access to source data, and started building reports directly on top of source systems. Over time this approach became unscalable: all data transformations were performed inside Power BI, no best practices were applied, and all data was loaded directly in-memory into the Power BI reports, causing performance degradation as data volumes grew. Additionally, anyone could share reports freely with one another, and end users increasingly raised concerns about incorrect data and unclear reporting. 

To address these structural issues, De Vlaamse Waterweg established an internal Information Management team focused on strategic data solutions. They engaged Cloubis to help define and implement a modern, scalable cloud data architecture and a governed reporting solution, replacing the ad-hoc, ungoverned approach that was leading to data quality issues, performance bottlenecks, and a lack of standardisation. 

Our solution

Cloubis is guiding De Vlaamse Waterweg in designing and rolling out two key pillars: 

• A modern cloud data platform based on the Medallion Architecture (Bronze > Silver > Gold), providing a structured and scalable data pipeline that progressively improves data quality, from raw ingestion (Bronze), through filtered and cleansed data (Silver), to business-level aggregates (Gold).

• A Managed Self-Service BI architecture in Power BI, where centrally managed, best-practice datasets are published as shared datasets in the Power BI Service. Report creators then connect to these datasets via live connection, ensuring consistency and governance while still empowering users to build their own reports. 

Result

The implementation follows a phased approach: 

• Data platform: Source data is ingested into a landing zone (Bronze layer) with no schema requirements, then structured and cleansed through Silver, and finally transformed into business-ready aggregates in Gold, all within Azure Synapse Analytics. 
• Reporting: Dataset creators build and publish certified data models to shared workspaces in the Power BI Service. Report creators connect to these shared datasets via live connection and publish reports to dedicated report workspaces, which are then consumed by end users. 
• Governance: Cloubis is developing a comprehensive reporting governance framework, including access controls that ensure only authorised users can access specific data models. 

The solution directly resolves the core issues: data transformations are moved out of Power BI into a proper data platform; best practices are enforced through centrally managed datasets; in-memory performance issues are eliminated by leveraging a cloud data warehouse; and uncontrolled report sharing is replaced by a governed workspace and access model.

	Before Cloubis	After Cloubis
Data transformations	Performed ad-hoc inside individual Power BI reports	Centralised in a cloud data platform (Medallion Architecture)
Best practices	Not applied	Enforced through centrally managed datasets and governance
Performance	In-memory loading causing degradation at scale	Scalable cloud data warehouse (Azure Synapse Analytics)
Access & sharing	Uncontrolled, anyone could share anything	Governed access model with role-based permissions
Data quality & trust	Frequent complaints about incorrect/unclear data	Consistent, validated data flowing through Bronze > Silver > Gold

Used Technologies

• Azure Synapse Analytics: chosen as the cloud data platform to handle large-scale data ingestion, transformation, and storage using the Medallion Architecture. 
• Power BI (Desktop & Service): used for data modelling (shared datasets) and reporting, leveraging the Managed Self-Service BI pattern for scalability and governance.