Microsoft Dynamics Profile: First-time MVP Mike Glue on embracing the Dynamics 365 Business Central Extension model

For the past year, first-time Microsoft Dynamics MVP, Mike Glue, has spent much of his time working with Microsoft building products using the new Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central extension platform.

Currently, Glue, who was named an MVP earlier this month, is senior product architect at Mississauga, Ontario-based IndustryBuilt Software, which was acquired by Aptean in March.

"We've been an ISV for 13 years and we've always been on the edge of new platforms with Microsoft," Glue says. "But it's probably been the last two years or so where we have become more involved in the beta programs and the Insider programs all around the new extension developments. That's where I've been playing [a role] - as the key person from the IndustryBuilt side working with Microsoft."

As part of that process, IndustryBuilt has started building a new product called BuildFood, a cloud-based business management software for small food companies.

"It started with one app, a recipe app. Then we will segue into more apps from there," Glue says. "That was our process to learn the process [of extension development] from Microsoft."

A NAV developer since college

Glue first started working with Dynamics NAV some 17 or 18 years ago as a college student doing a co-op position for an Accpac ERP dealer. Accpac was later acquired by Sage.

"That was around the time that Navision started coming to North America and they jumped on the Navision train," he says. "It was a small company - there were ...