The goal of the event is to notify partners about the plan of action for the year ahead, share the recommended practices and exchange contacts between partners from around the world. In addition, Microsoft presents its financial results and reveals the direction of long-term development of the company.
The Inspire Conference has been taking place in an unchanged form since 2003 (formerly Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference). This year’s edition was attended by over 15,000 participants from 140 countries.
- Business Central is considered a very stable solution.
- The growth of clients operating at Business Central exceeded expectations, in particular in Great Britain and the United States. The UK is currently the number two market in terms of BC customers.
- Microsoft executives (SLT) see Business Central as a major advance in the SMB market.
Key changes for Microsoft partners
- According to earlier announcements, from July 2020 the IUR license was to be available only for development purposes. Currently, Micorosoft withdrew from these plans (at least for the time of the next fiscal year), which is confirmed by the note available under the link: https://blogs.partner.microsoft.com/mpn/updates-program-change-announcements/
- A new competence has been added – New Security.
- It was mentioned that existing competences must keep pace with customers’ needs and the development of cloud technologies. With this in mind, the requirements for certain competencies, e.g. Cloud Business Applications, may be updated.
- It was noted that companies that have competencies that will undergo changes will be notified in advance.
What topics were discussed during this year’s edition?
- Azure Lighthouse available to partners from July 11
Azure Lighthouse is a new service that will be available to partners from July 11. It should provide the ability to manage customer relationships on a large scale, enabling partners to distinguish managed services and enjoy the benefits of greater efficiency and automation. The whole will be done from the level of one control panel without additional charges.
- Azure Migration Programme
Microsoft revealed the Azure migration program, which, he said, will help customers transition to the Azure cloud. Azure Migration Program is a combination of proven practices, methodologies (Cloud Atoption Framework of Azure), tools (Azure Migrate) and resources at every stage of transition to the cloud.
- AI Accelerate program
A new program aimed at helping partners in creating and implementing solutions in the field of artificial intelligence for clients. The areas that will be supported under this program are:
– Azure Machine Learning
– Knowledge Mining
– Cognitive Services
– Azure Bot Services
In addition, Microsoft pointed out the application HoloLens 2, which is to be available in Dynamics 365. HoloLens2 is a technology based on mixed reality. More on this topic can be seen on the video:
- Microsoft Teams
Microsoft Teams is an important area for Microsoft all the time. Satya Nadella announced that currently Teams has 13 million active users per day and 19 million active users per week.
Below is a video from the whole speech: