In December 2000 Microsoft announced plans to purchase Great Plains.
Great Plains Software was an accounting software company located in Fargo, North Dakota, whose products focused on small to medium-sized businesses.
[Solomon Software was an accounting software company that was acquired by Great Plains Software - before Great Plains Software was acquired by Microsoft].
In 2001 Microsoft announced plans to acquire iCommunicate.
iCommunicate.net was a web based solution (ASP) for Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
In May 2002 Microsoft announced plans to acquire Navision
Navision was was an accounting software company located in Denmark.
[Axapta was an accounting software company created by a group of executives who left Navision. Axapta was acquired by Navision - before Navision was acquired by Microsoft].
In January 2003 Microsoft released Microsoft CRM 1.0
In September 2003 Satya Nadella explained Project Green.
In 2003 Satya Nadella (then Microsoft Business Solutions division's corporate VP of product development) explained that Project Green was an effort to re-write the Business Solutions divisions products using Microsoft's programming languages, development tools, and APIs.
In September 2005 Project Green was renamed Microsoft Dynamics
In December 2005 Microsoft released Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0
Microsoft explained that the xRM platform that Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 was built on could be used to create many types of business application.
In January 2011 Microsoft released Dynamics CRM Online 2011
In October 2016 Microsoft announced the general availability of PowerApp and Common Data Services
Common Data Services was an evolution of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0's xRM platform.
In November 2016 Microsoft announced the general availability of Microsoft Dynamics 365
Microsoft explained that Dynamics 365 users would see that Microsoft were bringing their business applications closer together in how they look, feel and integrate with each other.
In March 2018 Microsoft announced model-driven Power Apps and Common Data Services 2.0
Microsoft explained that "If you are familiar with the Dynamics 365 platform, you are already familiar with the PowerApps platform and Model-driven Apps."
In July 2020 Microsoft announced the general availability of Dataverse
Microsoft explained that "Dataverse is built atop the Common Data Service"
In October 2022 Microsoft announced general availability of Managed Environments
Managed Environments made it easier to govern low-code apps.
December 21, 2000 |
REDMOND, Wash., and FARGO, ND, Dec. 21, 2000 — Microsoft Corp. and Great Plains Software Inc. today announced plans to join forces in an acquisition designed to provide small and medium companies with the technology necessary to thrive in an increasingly interconnected economy. The acquisition, according to Microsoft, represents a major step in the company’s entry into the small and medium business applications market.
Drawing on Microsoft’s global scale and .NET platform technology and Great Plains’ expertise in business applications for small and medium companies, both corporations say they view this as an opportunity to help small and medium business be more efficient and agile by automating interconnected business processes, bridging the gap between on-premise software and next generation connected software and services. This is also an important part of Microsoft’s strategy to deliver the power of the .NET platform to small and medium companies. At the same time, Microsoft and Great Plains will create new opportunities for partners to grow their businesses by delivering and integrating next generation solutions that take advantage of the powerful .NET foundation for small and medium business applications that Microsoft and Great Plains will provide.
On the eve of the announcement, key strategists from both corporations — Group Vice President Jeff Raikes, of Microsoft’s Productivity and Business Services Group, and Great Plains’ CEO Doug Burgum — took a few moments to sit down with PressPass to discuss the intricacies of acquisition, the significance of the deal to small and medium companies and about the new opportunities this will create for existing Microsoft and Great Plains partners.
In 2001 Microsoft acquired iCommunicate, which had 10 employees at the time. The developers behind iCommunicate.NET moved to Redmond and started developing a modern, web based CRM application together with Microsoft’s team.
https://jukkaniiranen.com/2013/09/history-of-microsoft-crm/
http://www.ithell.com/Software/CRM_isn_t_a_bad_word/crm_isn_t_a_bad_word.html
Microsoft Business Solutions Customer Relationship Management 1.0
FARGO, N.D., Feb. 25, 2002 — Microsoft Corp. today announced it will deliver Microsoft® Customer Relationship Management (CRM), the first Microsoft business solution built on .NET, later this year. Accessible from Microsoft Outlook® and the Web, Microsoft Customer Relationship Management will enable small and medium sized businesses to build more profitable customer relationships through increased sales effectiveness and more consistent customer service. Microsoft Customer Relationship Management is designed for rapid deployment, ease of use, and integration with Microsoft Office and Microsoft Great Plains' back-office solutions, increasing information reliability, employee usage and productivity.
"Microsoft Customer Relationship Management fills a significant need for a single integrated view of customers that delivers on the promise of increasing customer satisfaction, customer loyalty and more profitable customer relationships," said Doug Burgum, senior vice president at Microsoft Corp. and president of Microsoft Great Plains Business Solutions. "Microsoft Customer Relationship Management represents a substantial business opportunity for our partners to deliver an entirely new category of integrated solutions specifically designed for the unique needs of our small and medium-sized customers."
Microsoft Customer Relationship Management will be available as a standalone product as well as an integrated solution to Microsoft Great Plains® Dynamics, Solomon and eEnterprise. Its expected availability in North America is in the fourth quarter of 2002. Availability outside of North America will be phased and is expected to begin in the first quarter of 2003. It will be sold and implemented through Microsoft Great Plains' reselling partner channel, and support will be provided by partners and Microsoft Great Plains' award-winning customer support team. The solution will be available on-premise or as a hosted solution through select partners.
"We're excited about Microsoft Customer Relationship Management and what it means for us and for customers," said Dan Taylor, president and CEO of ManagedOps.com Inc. "As a partner, it's a significant addition to our solution offerings, and customers can be assured of the commitment and service Microsoft Great Plains is known for."
https://web.archive.org/web/20051013143714/http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2002/feb02/02-26midmarketpr.mspx
Microsoft to Acquire Navision
May 7, 2002 |
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, May 7, 2002 — Microsoft Corp. today announced it has reached an agreement to acquire Navision, a global provider of integrated business software solutions. The acquisition will bring together the complementary geographic and product strengths of Navision with Microsoft Great Plains Business Solutions, enhancing Microsofts ability to deliver interconnected .NET business solutions for small and midmarket businesses.
The acquisition is structured as a stock and cash purchase based on an offer to shareholders of 300DKK per share. The total transaction value is estimated at approximately $1.3 billion (U.S.)/1.4 billion EUR/10.8 billion DKK.
https://news.microsoft.com/2002/05/07/microsoft-to-acquire-navision/
Microsoft Business Solutions Customer Relationship Management 1.0 was released in January 2003.
https://jukkaniiranen.com/2013/09/history-of-microsoft-crm/
The rationale for Project Green was that, in order to get the kind of deep and wide integration that increasingly defines all Microsoft software, the company had to write applications using its own programming languages, development tools, and APIs.
In September 2003 Satya Nadella (then Microsoft Business Solutions division's corporate VP of product development) explained that Project Green was an effort involving about 40% of Business Solutions' 1,700 programmers.
https://www.informationweek.com/software/microsoft-is-keen-on-green
In September 2005 Project Green was renamed "Microsoft Dynamics"
'Project Green' Renamed Microsoft Dynamics
BY SCOTT BEKKER SEPTEMBER 07, 2005
The realignment of the Microsoft Business Solutions product set previously referred to as "Project Green" got its official name Wednesday -- Microsoft Dynamics.
The announcement came out of Microsoft's new Business Summit on the Redmond campus, where the company is focusing on the needs of medium-sized businesses, which the company defines as having 25 to 500 PCs.
In an executive e-mail sent early Wednesday, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer framed the problem by saying that in doing market research at midsize companies, Microsoft found that "today's business software doesn't look enough like today's businesses."
"We have designed the next generation of our business solutions, which we're calling Dynamics, around 50 of the most common roles in a midsize company. These solutions expose and connect the specific activities, processes and reports people need for real jobs inside a company, whether they're the president, the finance manager, the warehouse worker or the support clerk. And they'll have the familiar look and feel people know from using Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office today," Ballmer wrote.
Microsoft will rebrand the core Microsoft Business Solutions products with the Dynamics name as new versions roll out next year. The grand plan is to roll four of the core products into one product in 2008, while offering Microsoft's CRM product both as part of the suite or separately.
In 2006 the product names will change from:
Microsoft CRM to Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Microsoft Business Solutions-Great Plains to Microsoft Dynamics GP
Microsoft Business Solutions-Axapta to Microsoft Dynamics AX
Microsoft Business Solutions-Navision to Microsoft Dynamics NAV
Microsoft Business Solutions-Solomon to Microsoft Dynamics SL.
The 2006 releases, called the wave 1 releases of Microsoft Dynamics, will include a more unified look and feel, contextual business intelligence, a greater emphasis on portals and increased integration with Web services.
Wave 2, in 2008, is supposed to deliver "best of" features and functionality of Axapta, Great Plains, Navision and Solomon. A separate version of Microsoft CRM that will be released in wave 2 will be available with or without the rest of Microsoft Dynamics.
To reduce the licensing uncertainty surrounding product consolidations, Microsoft is promoting a current licensing option called Transformational Assurance. "The Transitional Assurance benefit of the Enhancement Program is that when customers license Microsoft Business Solutions-Solomon, including the Standard editions, as well as Microsoft CRM, and stay current on the Microsoft Business Solutions Enhancement Program, they will be able to move to the future business application suite without having to reacquire the functionality they already license," Microsoft corporate vice president in the Microsoft Business Solutions Group Tami Reller said in a Q&A posted on Microsoft's site.
Microsoft Business Solutions is one of seven divisions at Microsoft. The company will continue to refer to the division by that name internally. Microsoft will also keep the current names for the division's other products: Microsoft Point of Sale, Microsoft Retail Management System, Microsoft FRx and Microsoft C5.
https://rcpmag.com/articles/2005/09/07/project-green-renamed-microsoft-dynamics.aspx
So in December of 2005, Microsoft released Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0, the first to carry the Dynamics brand name. 3.0 was also the first release to include basic marketing including campaigns and static marketing lists. Professionally I had moved onto another Microsoft partner and was becoming interested in Dynamics CRM 3.0 as an application platform. I invested in this book and read it in a weekend. I still have a copy of this book about five feet from me, and while I haven’t opened the book in years it is a reminder of the early days of Dynamics CRM.
Dynamics 3.0 introduced the idea of XRM – CRM could be extended beyond simple contact and sales management. Instead, CRM 3.0 made customization simple but still not as simple as CRM today. While forms could be customized within the applications, Workflows were developed in an external Workflow manager that existed on the CRM server.
https://www.encloud9.com/blog/dynamics-crm-personal-history/
Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 allowed the creation of custom entities.
Microsoft explained that the xRM platform that Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 was built on could be used to create many types of business application.
Here is a description from the Microsoft Video:
One Platform. Many Applications. Infinite Possibilities.
Introducing the xRM platform underlying Microsoft Dynamics CRM that allows organizations to rapidly develop many different unique line of business applications, ranging from the simple to the most complex.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yru5CkANOKA&t=34s
https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2011/01/17/microsoft-announces-global-release-of-dynamics-crm-online-2011/
Microsoft Announces Global Release of Dynamics CRM Online 2011
Jan 17, 2011 | Microsoft blog editor - Microsoft News Center Staff
Today, Microsoft announced the worldwide availability of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online 2011.
The new cloud service will be available in 40 markets and 41 languages and delivers familiar, intelligent and connected experiences to customers.
https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-general-availability/
Announcing general availability of PowerApps
Headshot of article author Darshan Desai
Darshan Desai, Group Program Manager, PowerApps, Monday, October 31, 2016
We introduced the public preview of PowerApps in April 2016. In the six months since, over 124,000 users from 46,000 organizations in 143 countries have created web and mobile apps using PowerApps. We thank all of our preview users for their invaluable feedback, which has helped shape PowerApps into a better product.
Today, we are very happy to announce the general availability of PowerApps. PowerApps is ready for production use, across 6 regions and in 42 languages, with the 99.9% SLA customers expect from a Microsoft service.
In this release, we are pleased to announce a lot of new capabilities, and here are the key new features.
PowerApps Red heart SharePoint: fully integrated with SharePoint lists
In August, we started rolling out the preview of PowerApps integrated in SharePoint Online modern lists. You can create an app right from the command bar of a SharePoint Online custom list. That app then appears as a custom view of your SharePoint Online list, and users can access it both from the web as well as from the SharePoint Mobile app. This experience is now available to all SharePoint Online users. PowerApps also supports connecting to on-premises SharePoint lists for SharePoint 2013 and 2016 using the on-premises data gateway. Learn more about creating apps from SharePoint Online modern lists.
SPO-PowerApps
General availability of Common Data Service
With the general availability of PowerApps, Common Data Service is also now ready for global production use. Common Data Service is included as part of PowerApps plans and is the unifying backbone for your business data across PowerApps, Microsoft Flow, and pro-development tools. It provides an instantly available and scalable data store and a common data model with standard entity schema and behavior. It also provides a powerful data access layer with support for data import and export, security, and integration with Microsoft Office for Excel and Outlook. We’ll soon provide a software development kit (SDK) for professional development scenarios. We’ve incorporated lot of feedback from our preview users as well as from customers who are building business apps using Dynamics 365 and Office 365. You can learn more about the new features and the roadmap for Common Data Service in Arif’s blog post.
CDS-Overview
https://loudblogs.microsoft.com/dynamics365/bdm/2016/11/01/microsoft-dynamics-365-now-generally-available/
November 1, 2016
James Phillips, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Business Applications, Platform and Intelligence Group
Jujhar Singh, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Last month we unveiled and provided a first look at Dynamics 365, showing off the capabilities our customers can expect from our latest generation of intelligent business applications. Today, we are excited to announce that Dynamics 365 is generally available.
The first thing users will see with Dynamics 365 is that we are bringing our business applications closer together in how they look, feel and integrate with each other. To better enable end-to-end business processes, we have unified the navigation and core user experience across each of the Dynamics 365 applications. It remains clean, beautiful, and familiar and it gives you the ability to seamlessly move from one application to another without switching windows.
...
Simple, consistent navigation is only the beginning. Dynamics 365 delivers significant new capabilities across all application areas, moving our proven industry leading in-market solutions to the next level:
Dynamics 365 for Sales adds new social selling capabilities enabling people to share knowledge and participate in social conversations, find and connect with new companies and people to generate new leads. In addition, gamification is moving from preview to global general availability. It will expand beyond sales scenarios to help teams across the entire organization collaborate and compete in fun, engaging contests. With highly visible contest results, users are motivated to perform their best for themselves and their teams, leading to increased performance, productivity, and adoption.
Dynamics 365 for Customer Service, helps agents use relevance search to quickly find related content and use faceting to filter to the right record. Agents are now able to edit records directly in a grid while respecting the business rules for the entity.
Dynamics 365 for Field Service, helps organizations improve resource productivity by enabling service organizations to fit in more appointments each day by automatically optimizing technician schedules to minimize driving distance between appointments. Connectivity with IoT is now seamlessly integrated at the platform level enabling connected device signals received to initiate many business processes, such as automatically dispatching a technician for preventative maintenance, as well as the ability to send back commands directly from within the application, for example resetting a sensor.
Dynamics 365 for Project Service Automation, enables unified resource scheduling and service billing experiences, allowing organizations to leverage scarce resources and skillsets not only across field and project-based services, but any source of resource demand.
Dynamics 365 for Operations, the evolution of Dynamics AX on Azure, is our complete business management solution with industry capabilities around Retail, Distribution, Manufacturing, Public Sector and Service industries, across the spectrum of backend operations into Financials for upper mid-market and larger customers. With this update, Dynamics 365 for Operations will add country specific versions of the app for 18 new markets. Also, as announced last month, we will provide a Cloud Connected on-premises deployment option (available in first half of 2017), with all the inherent benefits of the cloud. The Fall update adds a Vendor Collaboration portal to streamline key processes including Invoicing, a reimagined approach to Cost Accounting, enhanced deployment options for Retail store environments, out of the box support for US Payroll, including Affordable Care Act Reporting, and myriad additional functional enhancements across the product.
Dynamics 365 for Financials, our comprehensive business management solution for small- to midsize- businesses (SMBs), that has generated tremendous excitement through its public preview program as Project “Madeira” is now also generally available, delivering everything SMBs that have outgrown their basic accounting software require, powered by the Microsoft cloud.
...
https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-model-driven-apps/
Introducing model-driven apps – a new way to create
Headshot of article author Adrian Orth
Adrian Orth, Principal Program Manager, Wednesday, March 21, 2018
We are happy to announce the preview of the Model-Driven Apps within PowerApps. PowerApps is the platform on which Dynamics 365 apps are natively built. Model-driven apps provides a no-code or low-code component approach to app development.
Model-driven apps run with the new Unified Interface client which provides a responsive accessible design running in browsers and on popular mobile devices. This app type composes multiple component types including dashboards, forms, views, charts, and business processes which together form a great UI. If you are familiar with the Dynamics 365 platform, you are already familiar with the PowerApps platform and Model-driven Apps.
Both model-driven and canvas apps allow you to easily build business apps. They both share access to the Common Data Service providing standard and custom entities. Canvas apps start with your user experience, crafting a highly tailored interface with the power of a blank canvas and connecting it to 200 data sources. Canvas apps can be built for web, mobile, and tablet applications. Model-driven apps start with your data model – building up from the shape of your core business data and processes in the Common Data Service to model forms, views, and other components. Model-driven apps automatically generate great UI that is responsive across devices.
https://powerapps.microsoft.com/fr-ca/blog/introducing-project-oakdale-a-new-low-code-data-platform-for-microsoft-teams/
Introducing Dataverse, a new low-code data platform for Microsoft Teams
Headshot of article author Charles Lamanna
Charles Lamanna, CVP, Low Code Application Platform, Tuesday, July 21, 2020
The COVID-19 crisis has rapidly changed the way we live and work, and many organizations have shifted to remote work or are implementing a hybrid remote work approach as they reopen physical locations. To support this shift to hybrid remote work, we continue to improve the Microsoft Power Platform integration with Microsoft Teams to enable our customers to tailor Microsoft 365 to their needs and empower everyone to be a developer using low-code tools.
Today, we are excited to announce the release of Dataverse. Dataverse delivers a built-in low code data platform for Microsoft Teams, and provides relational data storage, rich data types, enterprise grade governance, and one-click solution deployment. Dataverse enables everyone to easily build and deploy apps and intelligent chatbots in Teams with Power Apps and Power Virtual Agents. Dataverse is built atop the Common Data Service, which reached general availability four years ago. Since that time, the Common Data Service added over 1,000 features and introduced support for Dynamics 365 and Power Apps.
https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-the-general-availability-of-managed-environments
Announcing the general availability of Managed Environments
Headshot of article author Ryan Cunningham
Ryan Cunningham, VP, Power Apps, Wednesday, October 12, 2022
We are pleased to announce the general availability of Managed Environments.
Enabling people with diverse technical and nontechnical skills to contribute to the development process through low-code tools has unlocked an explosion of apps. While low-code has accelerated companies’ abilities to innovate, it has also introduced new dimensions to scaling and managing your developer community.
For IT, the rapid growth of apps brings new challenges of managing, securing, and governing these decentralized technology stacks. With so many apps being created, we need to make sure they are secure and scalable. Figuring out the right way to balance governance without stifling innovation is not easy. That’s why we created Managed Environments—to make it easier than ever to govern low-code apps and ensure they’re safe for the entire organization. With just a few clicks, IT administrators can immediately light up features that give more visibility, more control, and require less effort to manage all of their low-code assets.
Dive deeper in our Managed Environments general availability announcement and learn how you can gain more visibility and control over your application ecosystem today.
https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-the-general-availability-of-managed-environments/
