Elly Yates-Roberts |
This year’s Directions ASIA conference took place earlier this week, focusing on the launch of the Dynamics 365 Business Central April 2019 Release to the Dynamics 365 Partner community.
At the event, Microsoft executives, such as technical fellow Mike Ehrenberg and group project manager Claus Busk Andersen, highlighted that user productivity, performance improvement and general platform hardening are the most important developments of the new release. They also discussed the replacement of Windows Client with the Modern Client starting with the October 2019 release. This involves changing development tools from C/AL and C/SIDE to AL and Visual Studio Code.
The Directions ASIA event attracted record numbers; over 450 people attended from 157 companies and 32 countries. This increasing number corresponds to the growing trend in the Dynamics 365 partner channel discussed by Dave Miller, vice president of Microsoft Dynamics ASIA. A 41% increase in customers and 50 new Dynamics 365 Business Central partners each month have created an optimistic market, particularly when combined with the new partner readiness programmes. However, the recent shifts in Microsoft’s product strategy, such as migration to the cloud and integration capabilities within the Dynamics 365 ecosystem, are triggers of even greater competition among partners.
The October edition of the conference, Directions EMEA on 9-11 October in Vienna, Austria aims to provide a deeper insight into the Dynamics 365 Business Central Roadmap with the Modern Client and unveil new opportunities and Microsoft’s programmes for partners. The registration for Directions EMEA opens soon.