The 17th edition of Directions EMEA took place from November 6 to 8, 2024. This time, Vienna hosted the conference. The event gathered 3,200 participants, mainly Microsoft partners, ISV solution creators, and Microsoft technology enthusiasts. Below is some information from the conference.
Business Central in numbers
As every year, this time too the conference was a great opportunity to present numbers and trends. This year’s “Business Central momentum” is as follows:
- Microsoft announced rapid growth in Dynamics 365 Business Central users, exceeding 40 thousand cloud customers and planning to reach 50 thousand in the coming months.
- The trend of moving from on-premises versions (BC on-premieres) to cloud versions (BC online) is still observed.
- 60% of small and medium-sized enterprises are opting for cloud ERP solutions.
Copilot
An important topic during this year’s edition was the presentation of the use of artificial intelligence in Business Central. It was noted that Copilot has been an integral part of Dynamics 365 Business Central since spring 2023. Currently operating AI-based functionalities include creating sales orders using chat and suggesting serial numbering. An important novelty is Chat Copilot, which will be made available in January 2025 in a public version for all countries (in English at first).
Additionally, during the conference, Microsoft showcased upcoming AI-powered features including:
- Sales item suggestions
- E-document matching
- Product swap suggestions
- Use of an “AI agent” to support accounting processes
- Ability to query Copilot for errors
- Improved e-invoice matching using Copilot
- Copilot will suggest greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
- Suggestions when creating marketing texts
Sustainability
Microsoft has not forgotten about the growing importance of sustainable development and the requirements resulting from the CSRD directive. In response to the challenges resulting from the new obligations, Business Central will allow you to monitor and manage the company’s impact on the environment, including by tracking greenhouse gas emissions and calculating the carbon footprint.
- Emissions registration
- Water and waste intensity management
- Scope 3 Emissions Automation
Power BI
The possibilities resulting from the integration of Power BI with Business Central were highlighted. Users now have access to over 70 interactive reports, enabling the visualization of processes in areas such as finance, sales, purchasing or production. Importantly, visualizations can be customized to the specific needs of the company, as well as combining data from different sources.
2025 release wave 1
A new update called 2025 release wave 1 has been announced. Below are some selected functionalities mentioned during the conference:
- Finance: subsription billing automation, non-deductible unrealized VAT, e-documents improvments (reminders, e-invoice preview, sending etc.)
- Supply Chain: improvements in quality management, subcontracting enhancements and integration with Shopify for supply chain.
- UX improvements: preview attachments in web client, better screen estate handling.
- Performance: faster client rendering, more posting throughput.
- Local versions: expansion of local versions has been announced, so we can expect the system to be available in more markets (currently covering 180 locations).
We will be announcing more news coming soon in the 2025 Release Wave 1 update. In the meantime, we encourage you to check out the new features coming in the 2024 release wave 2 in our article “Co nowego w Business Central (2024 release wave 2)” oraz w Microsoft documentation.
