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What’s trending at the Dynamics 365 Technical Conference? (CDS, then the rest.)

by Greg Williams
Dynamics Practice Manager, Western Computer,

CDS was the most commonly-used acronym by the Microsoft product managers at the Dynamics 365 Technical Conference in Seattle this week. It was almost the secondary theme of the event.

CDS is Microsoft's Common Data Service - a simplified data service that enables accelerated setup and management of the data, the user interfaces, and integrations in the cloud. Eventually, CDS will allow seamless data across all the Dynamics 365 applications, for example from Order to Cash, as well as integrate data from other third-party apps.

CDS felt like a secondary theme (after Dynamics 365) because it is a symbol of just how ambitious Microsoft is getting in both the scale of their investment in Dynamics as a core part of their intelligent cloud strategy for the enterprise, and as a service that represents one of the promised benefits of the cloud - data ubiquity across applications.

Conversations about the business impact of unlocking more insights and action from the data in Dynamics 365 applications were everywhere this week.

In addition, there were three other topics that were trending:

  • New deployment options: On Monday, Microsoft announced new deployment options for Dynamics 365 for Operations that will be available in Q2 2017. In addition to a pure-cloud environment, organizations can now choose from two other options. The first is a hybrid deployment (called Cloud and Edge) where critical operations processes, as an example, can remain in an on-premise database, but the power of the cloud can be harnessed for additional scalability. The second option was, essentially, on premise. Microsoft calls this option Local Business Data, where Dynamics 365 resides in your existing datacenter.
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About Greg Williams

Download Western Computers' Distribution eBook to learn more questions that distribution CFOs should ask and what capabilities your ERP system should support. 

Greg Williams leads the Dynamics practice at Western Computer. With over 15 years experience leading ERP implementations, Greg is focused on aligning Western's product and services offerings with the needs of Western's current and prospective customers.

In Greg's words, "At Western Computer, we're ready to help organizations' plan and implement their upgrade to Dynamics 365. We've trained our developers and consultants. We are working to get customers live on Dynamics 365 for Operations today. We are investing in the AXUG community, and we are accessing the best upgrade tools and best practices for older versions of Dynamics ERP. We can help you plan effectively for this upgrade and accelerate your implementation." To contact Greg, please go to http://www.westerncomputer.com/contact/.
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