Microsoft’s 2024 release wave 2 for Power Platform focuses on automated development and insights

Microsoft has published their 2024 release wave 2 plans for Dynamics 365 and Power Platform. These plans will identify specific feature plans and broader product priorities planned between October 2024 to March 2025. 

Each release wave offers a huge volume of planned updates, both for production and preview features across each app and service. In Power Platform, Microsoft is emphasizing the ability use generative AI and agents to launch new app, flow, and reporting resources. The wave will also focus on governing Copilot adoption and securing low-code assets, according to Microsoft's Ryan Darby Martin, Director of PM for “Business & Industry Copilot”.

Power Automate will improve generative AI for flow development. AI capabilities will also assist in troubleshooting and managing the automation estate. Improvements in process mining will improve automations that use Microsoft 365 integration. 

• See also: Microsoft Build 2024: Power Platform’s copilots navigate toward more human workloads

In a new video reviewing the release wave plans, Microsoft MVP Lisa Crosbie explained that she believes AI flows are “the space to watch” because Microsoft could increase its effort to add AI into agents rather than copilots. Microsoft describes this feature as follows: 

Instead of building out complex rules-based processes from beginning to end, you work with AI to create an automation plan. When you execute the plan, the large language model (LLM) considers all the resources available to it and dynamically selects the most appropriate actions to achieve the desired outcome.

AI flows are scheduled to reach public preview in August 2024 and GA in February 2025.

Power Apps will add AI-assisted development features. On his blog Rajeev Pentyala noted top features including new Canvas App code view, real time collaboration on canvas app creation, and enhanced delegation of the PowerFx functions UpdateIf and RemoveIf in conjunction with Dataverse. Crosbie also noted co-authoring in canvas apps and the code view, which she believes will be exciting for developers. Grid feature improvements in model-driven apps 

Power Pages will improve site building. In her review, Crosbie noted the highly requested file upload enhancements around drag and drop, malware scanning, and configuration. 

Microsoft Copilot Studio will advance its IVR support with Customer Service and will expand geographically to UAE and Germany. In her review, Crosbie noted three top enhancements here: performance insights, image analysis (like providing a photo of a receipt), and suggested prompts for the user. Those prompts could be especially useful as copilots connect to more data sources and users might not appreciate all the possible prompts they could use.

AI Builder is investing in Prompt Builder for creating and deploying GPT prompts with enterprise data. Intelligent Document Processing will have a new validation station in Power Automate. And Microsoft promises improved AI governance by including AI Builder capacity in the Power Apps developer plan.

Dataverse will integrate Enterprise Copilot in Microsoft 365 and improve connectivity to external data and knowledge sources. Two Fabric-related integration capabilities already in public preview are planned for GA in September 2024. 

• The feature “Build apps with insights in Fabric using virtual tables” will, according to the description, enable “extending your data and insights in Dynamics 365 and Power Apps in Fabric”. 
• The feature “Insights in Microsoft Fabric are available in Power Apps” also, according to the description “enables extending your data and insights in Dynamics 365 and Power Apps in Microsoft Fabric.” Examples of such scenarios involve working in Fabric with current business data from Dynamics 365 or Power Apps, both native Dataverse tables and virtual tables, ins combination with other current or historical sources pulled into Fabric. Then build apps and flows that utilize those insights from Fabric.