Welcome to the FP20 Analytics May 2025 Challenge!

Webinars

Learn more about ZoomCharts visuals & gain a knowledge advantage in the contest by joining the upcoming webinars! You'll also get the chance to your ask questions and get expert answers in the Q&A section.

Upcoming webinars

Build a SaaS Financial Performance Power BI Dashboard

15th May, 2025

09:00 AM - EDT

Learn how to analyze income, expenses, budget vs actuals, and revenue trends using a real financial dataset.

Learn more

Top 5 Power BI Reports for Financial Statement Analysis

27th May, 2025

09:00 AM - EDT

Explore the best Power BI dashboards for financial reporting! Join us as we reveal this month’s Top 5 reports, share expert insights, and announce the winning entry that impressed the judges.

Learn more

How to participate? 

1. Register for the challenge: 

• Download the Challenge dataset either on this Challenge page or from FP20 Analytics website. 
• Register for the FP20 Analytics ZoomCharts Challenge. 
• Activate your free Drill Down Visuals Developer License for Power BI. Read license setup instructions.
• Read the challenge brief (see "The Brief" section) for additional info about the dataset and to see what questions your report should answer.  

2. Build your report in Power BI: 

• Set up an account in Power BI using the assigned license details (if you have participated in ZoomCharts Challenges in the past, you can use the same account you set up before).
• Use the account to access the full library of custom ZoomCharts Drill Down visuals. 
• Use the dataset to build a Power BI report including at least 2 ZoomCharts Drill Down Visuals in one report page. 
• The recommended number of pages in the report is up to 3 pages, including drill-through pages. 

3. Improve your report and learn new skills: 

• To learn more about applying ZoomCharts visuals in your reports, participate in the challenge workshop. 
• If you have any questions or need advice, you can book a free individual consultation. 
• Check out the submissions from past challenges for inspiration. 

4. Submit your challenge entry: 

• Submit your report in .pbix format for validation. 
• If your submission doesn’t match the challenge criteria, you will be notified by email indicating the reason. Don't worry if this happens! You can fix the issue and resubmit your report. 
• Together with validation confirmation, you will receive a publish to web link that you can use to add the report to your portfolio or publicly share online. 
• All validated entries will receive personalized feedback from the evaluation team. You can use this feedback to revise your report and resubmit it before the deadline. Feel free to resubmit your entry as many times as necessary before the deadline. 

5. Finalize your participation to compete for the ZoomCharts grand prize: 

• Post the final version of your submission in PDF format on your LinkedIn profile. 
• Use the caption "I am participating in FP20 Analytics Challenge 25". 
• Include a summary of your report's key insights and add the ZoomCharts publish to web link.
• Use #FP20Analytics, #FP20InventoryManagementAnalysis, #builtwithzoomcharts, tag @Federico Pastor and @Zoomcharts.
  
• Additionally, post your report in the FP20 Analytics LinkedIn Community group. 
• Follow ZoomCharts on LinkedIn

6. Attend challenge closing webinar to hear the results: 

• The submissions are evaluated by ZoomCharts team (see "Judging criteria" for more info). The submissions of Top 5 ZoomCharts Challenge finalists are analyzed live during the challenge closing webinar to share the best practices and learning opportunities with the community. 
• The author of the best report is awarded with a $300 Amazon gift card.

Technical requirements

• Build your report using only Power BI 
• The recommended number of pages in the report is up to 3 pages, including drill-through pages.
• Canvas size is 16:9 (Default Power BI size) or Full HD size = w:1920 - h:1080 
• The report should contain at least 2 ZoomCharts Drill Down visuals within a single page. See a practical guide for using Drill Down visuals here

Welcome to the Financial Statements Challenge!

In this challenge, you’re tasked with analyzing the financial data of a single SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) company. The dataset includes two key components:
- A detailed transaction history of real income and expenses
- A structured budget plan that sets financial expectations

Challenge Questions: 

The questions below are designed to help you explore different aspects of the company’s financial performance. They’re not requirements, they’re here to guide your thinking and help you focus your analysis.

• Over the year, did the company spend more or less than planned?
• Was the company profitable each month, or did expenses exceed income at any point?
• Which categories or accounts show the largest difference between budget and actual figures?

• What are the main revenue sources, and which one generates the most income?
• How does revenue change over time — are there any seasonal peaks or slowdowns?
• Which clients or deals brought in the highest individual payments?
• Were there specific months when revenue was noticeably lower than planned?

• What are the top 5 spending categories by total amount?
• Which vendors or service providers (e.g., AWS, Stripe) received the most money overall?
• Are there any expense categories that regularly exceeded their budget?
• In which months did spending increase sharply, and what caused it?

• Are there any repeating monthly or seasonal patterns in revenue or spending?
• Which months show the best alignment between budgeted and actual figures?

Judging criteria

Business users use reports to make data-driven decisions. That’s why reports are called effective if they enable users to drill down and filter data quickly and intuitively to find answers to any question they might have and analyse data in all possible directions and dimensions.

Each report is evaluated based on three main criteria: intuitiveness, insightfulness, and interactivity. These factors ensure that the reports are not only accurate and functional, but also meet the target audience's needs and are ready to be presented to the end-users. 

1. Intuitive: How clear and easy it is to understand the report at a glance? (max 15 points)
   • Is the report visually appealing?
   • Choice of charts and visual elements
   • Does the report tell a story?
   • Is it not overwhelming to the user?
   • Choice of tooltips, titles, and legends
     
     
2. Interactive: How engaging and seamless is the report exploration and interaction with data? (max 15 points)
   • Clear navigation that allows user to explore the report
   • Use of slicers and other interactive elements
   • Smooth cross-chart integration
   • Is report optimized for touch devices?
   • Are tutorials and guiding elements helpful to the user?
     
     
3. Insightful: How accurate, complete, and meaningful is the data in driving decisions? (max 15 points)
   • Depth of analysis
   • Data cleaning and preparation
   • Does data show up accurately in the report?
   • Is report optimized for quicker loading time?
   • Does the report provide deeper exploration of data (drill-down)?

Dataset

My license

1:1 mentoring sessions

You can book a personal session with Senior Product Expert at ZoomCharts, Aivis Pavlovs, to gain practical knowledge about Drill Down Visuals and how they can be used to enhance data storytelling in a report.