Microsoft Office Business Applications (OBA) enables companies to connect Line of Business (LOB) systems with the people who use them everyday.
Knowledge workers, such as buyers and sellers, managers and the like, typically use a variety of custom or off-the-shelf LOB applications such as CRM or ERP to accomplish daily tasks. Meanwhile, some 400 million people worldwide use Microsoft Office applications, giving these people access to tools they could use to parse data and make business decisions. I first experienced this synergy using Excel to connect to BizTalk applications, creating custom dashboards for executives to monitor business activities.
With OBA, you have a type of application built on tools and services that integrate with LOB applications, extending them to the more familiar Microsoft Office Clients.
Some of the concepts are new to developers, and getting your development environment sorted can be a challenge. However, there is help. DevX.com posts:
Office Business Applications (OBA) PerformancePoint Server Business Intelligence in Office 2007 Introduction to Office Business Applications (OBA) Get your OBA on!