Azure Analysis Services (AAS) is extending its reach today. Microsoft's analytics processing engine for the cloud platform is making its debut in four new Azure regions. Since making AAS generally available last April, Microsoft has been rolling the service out to more cloud regions.
In the latest expansion, Azure Analysis Services is making its debut in four new U.S. regions. Specifically, customers in East US and West US have access now. Microsoft has also released AAS to Azure Government in the USGov-Arizona and USGov-Texas regions. AAS made its debut on Azure Government in September.
Azure Analysis Services is an enterprise grade OLAP engine and BI modeling platform. It first reached preview in November 2016. It is a managed platform-as-a-service (PaaS) and is built on the same base as SQL Server Analysis Services. With AAS, users can build BI Semantic Models. These allow analytical and interactive solutions for services like Power BI and Excel.
AAS comes with a number of important features. Among them are rapid server creation, the ability to pause and resume servers, and access to the Azure Active Directory. Since launching fully last year, Azure Analysis Services has expanded to the following regions:
- Australia Southeast
- Brazil South
- Canada Central
- East US
- East US 2
- Japan East
- North Central US
- North Europe
- South Central US
- Southeast Asia
- UK South
- West Central US
- West Europe
- West India
- West US
- West US 2
- USGov-Arizona
- USGov-Texas
AAS Evolution
Southeast Asia and East US2 regions received the service in January, ahead of the general availability.
In June, Microsoft introduced a BI sample model for AAS. The feature gives the ability to see modelling features from the Azure Analysis Services suite. Previously customers needed to create a model on the suite before they could use the service.