The Next Steps for Your Dynamics ERP | GP & NAV (Video)

This recorded webinar discusses what the next steps are for your ERP, whether you’re a Dynamics GP or Dynamics NAV user. We take a look at the Total Cost of Ownership calculator with various scenarios in mind and explain the licensing model in Dynamics 365 Business Central. We also discuss the Dynamics GP roadmap, the product evolution from Dynamics NAV to Dynamics 365 Business Central, the Dynamics 365 Business Central roadmap and Azure security.

For more information about the next steps for Dynamics GP, please see the links below:

• Dynamics GP to Dynamics 365 Business Central | Options, Process, and Benefits (Video)
• Top 5 Questions about the Future of Dynamics GP
• Forks in Your Dynamics GP Roadmap: 4 Paths Forward

For more information for Dynamics NAV, please see the links below:

• Dynamics NAV Upgrade Part I: What if I Do Nothing?
• Dynamics NAV Upgrade Part 2: Upgrade vs. Reimplementation

Contact us if you’d like to discuss your ERP roadmap going forward.

TRANSCRIPT

Tracey: Good afternoon, everyone. It’s Tracey from Encore Business Solutions. I hope everyone’s having a fantastic Thursday. And today we’re going to be doing our second segment of D365 Business Central for our Dynamics NAV and Dynamics GP clients. So, if you haven’t had a chance to watch our first installment, it is up on our blog. And we did do a precursor to that back in November as well, and so there’s a couple of webcasts or webinars, recorded webinars up there on our blog that you can go and listen to (What’s Next for Your Dynamics ERP | Dynamics GP & What’s Next for Your Dynamics ERP | Dynamics NAV). And I just wanted to give you an update. Over the past few days, I’ve probably met with 10 clients and going through these materials and getting some great feedback. And so this is our next presentation, says, “Okay. Great. You’ve been getting an overview of what your choices are, and what are you gonna do next?” So, I’ll get started.

And just to recap for those of you that have not participated or listened to those webcasts, there is a new application available to you. So, NAV 2018 R2 was the last release of Dynamics NAV and it has a transition path to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central. And for our Dynamics GP clients, the latest release is 2018 R2 and we should be having another service pack come out this fall which will allow you then to…you’ve got choices on what you want to do, you’re entitled to Dynamics 365 Business Central. Absolutely.

So, we’ll go over that Dynamics 365 Business Central and what it brings to the table in an offering for you. And it is the next generation of intelligent business applications in the cloud, and one of the key points to take away is how tightly integrated it is with Office 365. I’m just gonna just…again, we’re just highlighting the information that we went over our last broadcast. And again, it is able to leverage that power platform for those of you who might not have used Power BI or Flow or PowerApps yet. We’ve got a tight integration with those Office 365 applications.

We also reviewed where the next steps or what choices are gonna be a good fit for you in your organization. And although this slide itself has three options, we talked about four options. One option being stay exactly where you are on-premise with your Dynamics GP or Dynamics NAV. You also have the option of doing the cloud sync. Cloud Sync allows us to be on or on-premise application and sync or replicate our data up into the cloud in a D365 Business Central tenant. It’ll take your data and you can have a read-only environment so you’re able to go on, log on, and run reports, do inquiries, and see how your data would be in this new application or the newer version of NAV if you’re a NAV client. You have the option as well of transitioning from GP or NAV to D365 Business Central in our SaaS model. So, that’s in a cloud. So, software as a service. Difference there is you wouldn’t have to pay your annual maintenance anymore and your software would be up-to-date all the time. You’d never have to do an upgrade.

So, the fourth option is still transitioning to D365 Business Central but staying on-prem. So, on-prem, you would be much like you are today and you wouldn’t be paying per user per month for that licensing. So, again, if you were a GP customer or a NAV customer, you had a five-user license, you would then go on, and you wouldn’t have to pay for that software, you would be entitled to that D365 Business Central but it would be on-prem. So, today’s webinar is gonna talk about furthering of those options and where does that lead you as far as choices and how does that look for you as an organization. So, there is that GP roadmap, so we know that we’ve got a service pack to be coming out this fall. And then here’s our product evolution from NAV to Dynamics 365 Business Central. So, again, for our NAV customers, it’s not a new application, it is NAV with an updated name and it is available to be software as a service or completely in the cloud. And it can also be on-prem.

Here’s our roadmap for Business Central itself. And again, that’s some of the technical side there. Their development language changing from CAL to AL. And again, that artificial intelligence is really being definitely immersed in these applications and you have the ability to access all that artificial intelligence that your data collects over time. One question that’s come up over the last couple days when visiting clients is about security. Security is very, very important to everyone, of course. We see it in the news all the time that people have that their systems have been compromised and what are we doing to combat that?

So, Azure helps you gain unmatched security. So, again, if you went either with your on-prem solution but had it up in Azure or you went with the SaaS model, Azure helps you gain unmatched security. Microsoft invests more than $1 billion a year and employs more than 3500 security experts to protect your information. So, again, there’s lots of white papers and documents around Azure and around security, and if you’re already using Office 365, there’s also the M365 part of it where you can go in and see your security score. So, very, very much a part of what Microsoft’s vision is for you as a client and how they can support you. And there’s a lot more information about security in our previous presentation. And again, all of these slides are available to you.

So, one of the things I wanted to show you today was a cost calculator and where you can take information and compare it. And this is something we can share with you as a tool. So, I’m just gonna escape out of my PowerPoint for a second. Now, this particular template is actually comparing Business Central migration, comparing it to having it on-prem but also to have it Business Central in the cloud, so SaaS. So, on-prem versus SaaS. So, this scenario goes through those two comparisons but you can take this calculator and plug in your variables that you would use today. So, for example, how many users do you have in your ERP at the moment? These are premium and essential and team users. That’s what your new licensing would look like. But if you’re currently using NAV or GP, it would be full use users and limited use users. Those are the two user types. So, again, you might be asking, what are these team users? Well, team users are like our read-only and they can do limited write functionality and they’re a lot less cost than premium or essential users.

And then you can plug in. So, for example, what do you think on a yearly basis it would be for your hardware? So, anything that you might do from a hardware perspective, maybe your roadmap looks like you only replace your hardware every five years or, and then you can spread that off on a yearly basis. What would you budget for on a yearly basis and how often do you replace it? And then you’ve got the technical platform costs and then those support people. How much do they cost and how many hours per year would they be putting into the solution if you had it on-prem? And then if you’re doing upgrades, what typically is your upgrade cost and how often do you upgrade?

This total value here represents if you were going to do services and implementations. So, you can see that both of these numbers are here so you could zero those out if you wanted to. And then your solution. Again, how long you’ve been on that solution? So, for example, you’ve been on NAV for 10 or 15 years or GP for 10 or 15 years, how would you be looking at that for replacing that application? So for example, going to Business Central. And we can see here on the graph over time the comparison of that. So, again, in this situation here, based on the variables we’ve put in, it looks like cloud over a 10-year total cost of ownership horizon is definitely a wiser investment over time than going on-premise.

There’s other costs in here that again you can add those in, for example, the actual real estate that potentially that infrastructure takes up or how much you pay from an energy perspective for that infrastructure as well, that can be in there. So, there’s a variety of things. Also, in here, you know what’s the annual maintenance, etc. And that’s where this is driving from because we’ve put these users in here. It’s going down here and looking at that and calculating what is our annual maintenance. So, everyone can use this customer migration model total cost of ownership calculator. And again, we can walk you through that and look at it from the perspective if you stayed on-prem on your current solution versus migrating to Business Central versus migrating to Business Central SaaS model. So, that’s one of the tools that we’ve got available to us. Just jump back to our PowerPoint presentation. And that’s one of the tools that you can look at for planning ahead.

If we stay on-prem with D365 Business Central, there is no licensing cost for you unless, of course, you wanna add more users, etc. Much like you would do today. But if we’re going to go to the SaaS model, and again, there could be slight differences between U.S. and Canadian pricing but this is basically what it would be for an essential user is $89.60 per user per month. And I’m picking on that one specifically just to say, “Great.” So, if I had a full use user and I just use JLARAP and maybe I used…in NAV I use jobs, that’s all considered a business essential, or sorry, Business Central essential user. If I use this in manufacturing, that would be more of a premium. So, we can certainly map your current users to where they would be in this new application if that’s the choice that you were ready to make. Currently, right now because you are a Microsoft customer and obviously we value that relationship. Microsoft is offering a 40% discount on a per user per month basis. And that is good until June of 2021. So, just another…well, almost two years from now. So, you get a discount for that per user per month licensing. So that’s if you wanted to go to the full SaaS model.

So, as we stand right now, maybe you’ve made a decision, you’re undecided. What happens now? So, a great way to start is to start having these conversations. If you’re on GP 2018 and you want a trial with Intelligent Cloud, awesome. You can do that. So, NAV or GP 2018, we can set you up with that Intelligent Cloud, you can see your data, how it would look in Business Central and be able to use all of the tools, all of those PowerApps with it as well and look at all the reporting. So, again, you can basically evaluate that and see how that would go. If you’re happy on 2018 or 2015, whatever version you happen to be on, let’s look at a support window, so we know that with every release of either NAV or GP, it’s supported for 10 years. Mainstream support for five years and another five years of non-mainstream support.

So, where we wanna be having conversations with people is if they’re using, for example, in the GP world using Canadian Payroll. Well, tax tables are only offered for the first five years. So, if you’re on GP 2018 and you’re using Canadian Payroll, you’re gonna need to make some decisions before 2023. So, that’s why we wanna get in and have these conversations early to make sure we can support you. So, again, you might decide to say exactly where you are and that’s completely fine, you might decide to upgrade to 2018 version so that you can use the Cloud Sync to try out Business Central, or you might be ready to actually make that move. So, I encourage all of you to connect with your account manager so that you can build out a roadmap.

I was at a client today and we’re going to be meeting every month to map out what it’s going to look like. They’re not ready to upgrade right now, they’d like to do it next summer but we’re gonna build out that map and make sure that we’re picking the right solution that can address all of these resources within the organization. And that’s a great conversation to be having because with this new Business Central and how tightly integrated it is with Office 365, there is so much power with all of those applications of Office 365. And Business Central really can harness that power. So in really, really great webinars, and I don’t know if you guys check out our blog for our Office Hours that Ziad does out of our Calgary office.

We offer some free training through our Office Hours. We’ve got more events coming up, there’s Collaborate Canada coming up in September in Vancouver and various other countries…sorry, countries, in various other cities in Canada. As well as there’s Summit which is the annual user group in Tampa in October. Again, lots of great information online and you can always reach out to your AM or myself. I’d be happy to show you some of the cool applications and how they work very well with Business Central. So, again, if you’re looking for a workflow, if you’re looking for forms, you wanna build your own little mini-application, PowerApps is awesome for that. And then Power BI for data visualization, very, very cool.

So, again, we’re gonna build out that map to make sure that you’re aware of all of the benefits that you can get. Regardless of whether you stay where you are, you’re going to make that transition, we’re gonna help you get there. And again, there’s…and Microsoft is completely supporting you if you just wanna stay on the version you are. But again, I want us to look at, what’s that timing, what does that timing look like if I’m using Payroll, if I’m not, or maybe I’m on NAV 2015 or NAV 2013 and it’s time to upgrade, maybe you could just go to 2018 and stay on that because it’s supported until 2028. So, lots of choices. We just wanna make sure we’re being proactive and give you as much information as we can and understand what the needs are of the business to make sure that we create the right roadmap for you.

For those of you that might have noticed that you’re not getting as many emails from us, we’ve changed to an opt-in model to be compliant with CASL and GDPR. So, that means you have to go on and update your preferences. So, if you get an email from me, I’ve got the link right in my email. If you need to have that link sent to you, please reach out to us. And for those of you that have been getting many phone calls from our marketing team asking you to update your preferences, we’d really appreciate that because we send out our newsletter every month and all the emails about events. And if you’re not getting them, that’s why. Just to let you know.

All right. So, looking for more information, there is the Microsoft Business Central website where you can get more information about it, we also have…there’s a Dynamics transition webpage. You can have your free trial. So, there’s a 30-day free trial for Business Central. There’s also for PowerApps and for Flow as well. I just thought of something. I can’t remember what it was just thinking of. Shoot. It’ll come back to me. But again, making sure that you’ve got lots of information. If people are saying to you NAV’s not supported anymore or GP is not supported anymore that you’ve got the right information now. So, we know when our releases happen, they’re supported for 10 years, mainstream versus on-mainstream. So, again, the main thing being about if you’ve got payroll, that’s important to think about. But again, there’s gonna be a great opportunity for you regardless of what you decide to choose. And we wanna make sure that we’re being proactive and having that relationship and making sure that you’ve got all the information that you need.

I’ve just got a little slide about Encore Care there. I’m not sure. I’m gonna go back here. And Tess, could you open it up for questions in case there’s any questions.

Tess: Yes. We’ve actually had a few submitted already so we can start with those. One is just a comment about looking forward to using the cost calculator. So, that’s good. The next question says, “We’re still on GP 2016, how will the transition be if we are interested?”

Tracey: Awesome. Great question. So, a couple things I’d wanna make a decision about first is great. Do you wanna just try out the cloud sync? So, upgrade to 2018 and try the cloud sync to see how it is or maybe you think about, “Oh, Business Central,” also known as NAV in its previous life, “It has some great things, for example, I really want that dimensional chart of accounts. I’ve really been looking forward to that,” or, “I really wanna use jobs.” Maybe there’s a piece of functionality that is super important to you. So, that’s a great question. Currently, right now we do not have a tool that will bring the history over for Dynamics GP clients and we’re waiting for that tool. So, we’re not in a rush to move people over.

But let’s imagine that there was a tool. Currently, we have a tool that will bring over the master records and opening balances. And I’m not sure that a lot of people…some people are okay with that because they wanna do a reimplementation anyways, they wanna start from scratch. So, really what it would look like at a high level is we would meet with you and map out what route you wanted to go. Do you wanna start fresh? Do you wanna start with a new chart of accounts and dimensions? Do you want your history there? Do you wanna bring everything over? What does that look like for you? And we would have that conversation.

The moving of the data is relatively simple, it’s not a huge involved project. But having conversations about the mapping and the data that you want to have brought over and how you want it to look, there are some services with that. And then we’re coming up with packages for training. So, we have different QuickStart packages that would get you up and trained. And in my other presentation, I did some click-through demos. So, again, for Dynamics GP customers, you wouldn’t get lost. It’s not like you’d be like, “Oh, my gosh. I don’t know how to use this.” And we’re actually gonna do a series of webinars that will show you, “Hey, in GP, this is how I do a journal entry, here’s how I do it in BC, here’s how I add an account, here’s how I do it in BC, here’s how I do an AP transaction in GP, here’s how I do it in BC.” So, you can get that feel for that.

So, the first step would be, get in touch with your account manager. They can help you work out a plan. But yes. It’s not like we’re gonna press a button and the next day you’re gonna be in your new environment. There are some conversations that have to happen, bring the data over, make sure you have the support and the training to be able to use Business Central to your advantage. And then it’s gonna be an ongoing thing where you’re gonna learn a lot. There’s a lot of great information we can supply that you can go through, and I don’t know. I’m out of breath. I’m so excited about this webinar. You can go on and learn yourself. So, there’s lots of materials that we probably say, “Hey, sit down and I want you to go through these materials.” And then we’re gonna come in and bring in the value add that you need to help you get…to feeling back where you felt like in GP that you were super efficient.

So, we’ve moved a variety of NAV customers over because to them really it’s a upgrade/transition. With GP, we’ve taken some clients databases and moved them over in a trial environment just so we could see how that would work. We want to make sure that we can offer the best for our customers. And with no history right now, we’re not feeling that right now, today is the right time to do that and that’s why we’re having these conversations about planning things out. We hope that we’re gonna have a tool in October that will bring over the history. So, I’m super excited about that.

Tess: Awesome. Thanks, Tracey. The next question is at $89.60 per user, is there a minimum number of users?

Tracey: Great question. Absolutely not. You can have a one user system. And you can have one user in January and February, add two. March, go down to one, April, go up to five.

Tess: Awesome. The next question is, what is considered non-mainstream?

Tracey: Great question. Actually, I have a little blurb about that, Tess, so that we can add in here, we can go and update the PowerPoint.

Tess: Okay.

Tracey: Mainstream means that you and I have found the undocumented feature in the solution that they address with a service pack or a tax table update that’s in the first five years. After five years, it means there is not going to be a service pack or a tax table update released. So, if in year seven you find that, “Oh, my goodness. It won’t translate foreign currency because the rate change and it won’t revalue and it got stuck,” Microsoft is not going to release a service pack for that. In my experience, I’ve been here 21 years, never seen anything happen after 5 years that needed to be addressed. I’ve had a situation where clients are in such an older version that they have to upgrade to make that situation go away.

Tess: Awesome. And we will be sharing out these slides, correct, Tracey?

Tracey: Correct. Absolutely.

Tess: Yeah. Sounds good. The next question is, my power user tells me there is less functionality in the cloud model. That’s a resistance to moving to off-prem. Is there a difference in functionality?

Tracey: Great question. That was true two years ago. It’s no longer true.

Tess: Okay. The next question.

Tracey: It’s exactly the same. Exactly the same.

Tess: Okay. Awesome. Next question is, how would integration work with D365? We integrate data from two separate production systems.

Tracey: So, if we’re going to go with Business Central on-prem, same as it was always, you would integrate the data. Up in the SaaS model, it’s a little bit more challenging but we still do it and we have clients that are doing it now that we’ve done integrations for. So, it is still doable. On-prem, a little bit easier, up in the SaaS model it’s a little bit more challenging. I remembered what I wanted to say earlier. For clients who are concerned about SaaS and where the data is, you can choose to have it in Ontario or Quebec so it can be hosted in Canada.

Tess: Perfect. And our last question that’s been sent in for now is, does Business Central offer a more robust procurement suite than GP 2016?

Tracey: That might have to be an offline question because I’d have to know what they meant by more robust procurement.

Tess: Okay. Sounds good. We will follow up with you on that. And that’s all the questions for now. And thanks, Tracey.

Tracey: Awesome. And we kept in under our 30 minutes. Please feel free to reach out to myself or your account manager and update your subscription preferences please, so that we can communicate. And we look forward to our next webinar which most likely will be probably splitting it off between the NAV and the GP groups by showing the functionality of GP and how you would do that in Business Central.

Tess: That’s awesome. And I will be sending out the slides probably tomorrow or Monday. So, you can look, look for that and the calculator.

Tracey: Awesome. Okay. Thanks, Tess. Thanks, everyone. Have a fantastic Thursday, Friday, and weekend.

Tess: Thank you, everyone.

Contact us if you have any questions about the next steps for your Dynamics ERP.