Microsoft made a big announcement at their recent conference in their path to a cloud- only mode which started 5 years back, when they moved Office to the cloud, and named it Office 365. This fall, they will be bringing in CRM and ERP to the cloud under the banner of Dynamics 365. This will ensure that all data which currently sits on your Office 365 servers will now be accessible and available for use from with the Dynamics suite of applications.
The Upside
This is a huge step considering now Dynamics 365 will be sharing the same common data model as Office 365 and who doesn’t use an office product out there! The different nomenclature which is in use across the Dynamics suite of solutions only makes it all the more difficult to integrate the different solutions even when within the same organization. This new single data model, which is synced with Office 365 will make life simpler for all.
And this also ends the whole buy everything for the one thing you need. No more software bundles, you pick and choose what you need, and create your own business solution. And what more, you can even cater to the different needs of team members with different licenses. The flexibility of choice of products and licenses just makes Dynamics 365 truly cloud.
Dynamics 365 is expected to have extensive Power BI capabilities inbuilt so as to enable every user to be in line with the needs of big data, IoT and analytics in the times ahead.
Another great introduction this year on is the Appsource, where you can just go ahead and find the small add-ons which you need to make your business solution more productive and more suited to your specific needs. Third party developers can develop and share add-ons to a wider audience through Appsource.
The Downside
Wonderful changes are just wonderful when they can get you there without too many hassles. And that is the only aspect which might be a little tricky. Existing deployments will have a tough time adopting the change, and would need some technical assistance in getting there. And it is yet to be seen whether the tools and add-ons which are currently in place with the current versions of Dynamics suite of products will work with the upgraded platform.
At Nalashaa, we have extensive experience helping companies, across business verticals, in tailoring their business requirements to address the needs around sales, customer service and marketing. As part of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Implementation we assist and advise the client in all aspects of project life cycle including End-User and Admin-User Training, Go-Live Support, Ongoing Maintenance & Support.
