Microsoft Dynamics 365 Overview

by Bobby Haggard, TrinSoft Microsoft Dynamics Consultant

We thought with the new release of Dynamics 365 Business Central that we should put together a quick video outlining exactly what is and what is not Dynamics 365, as there certainly is quite a bit of confusion on this topic.

In the past, Microsoft has released several products with the term 365 including:

• Office 365
• Microsoft 365 Business and Enterprise Editions
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations Business Edition (which went away after April 2nd, 2018)
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations Enterprise Edition (which also went away after April 2nd, 2018)

The Dynamics 365 that we are discussing is not any of these things.

Dynamics 365 is two things:

First, it is an Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP solution with two different types or flavors:

• Dynamics 365 Business Central, which is a new cloud version based on Dynamics NAV (previously known as Navision)
• The 2nd level is Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations, which is based on Dynamics AX (previously known as Axapta)

Secondly, Dynamics 365 is also a Customer Relationship Management Tool or a Customer Engagement Plan for how you interact and work with your customers. There are several different modules with the CRM platform, and these include Dynamics 365 Sales Enterprise and Dynamics 365 Sales Professional.  The Sales Professional is new with the April 2nd release. There is also Customer Service, Field Service, Project Service and Automation, and Marketing.

Dynamics 365 is all of these things, so we need to be precise in what we are talking about when discussing with clients, customers, and co-workers.

At TrinSoft we focus on the small to medium size business, so we will primarily zero in on Dynamics 365 Business Central.

Dynamics 365 Business Central is made up of two options:

• There is Essentials, which is the Finance module and includes the GL, chart of accounts, customers/vendors, AR/AP, a little bit of inventory, etc. Essentials is $70 per user per month.
• The Premium option includes both the Finance Module and the Operations module, which is the manufacturing and service components.  The Premium option is $100 per user per month.

It is key to point out that when we discuss the Finance and Operations modules we are not referring to the AX version of Dynamics 365. We are instead talking about the two options of Dynamics 365 Business Central.

Finally, there is also a Team Member license. This is $8 per user per month, and with this option the user gets READ access to all applications, but only write access to a select set of tasks.

Learn more about Dynamics 365 Business Central.

by TrinSoft, LLC a Microsoft Dynamics ERP Partner in Kentucky