Microsoft Dynamics Business Central (D365 BC) is a business management solution otherwise known as an ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning solution) designed for small and mid-sized businesses to help automate and streamline business processes.
The product is part of the Microsoft Dynamics 365 suite of products and shares the same codebase as the hugely successful predecessor, Microsoft Dynamics NAV. It is used across the globe by over 100,000+ businesses and available in over 43 countries and supports 25 languages and is available either via on premise or as a SaaS (Software as a Service) option.
What modules are available within Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central?
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central enables you to run your entire business within a single solution. Thus, allowing you to streamline your processes, make smarter decisions and accelerate growth. Out of the Box functionality includes modules across:
- Finance
- Sales and Marketing (inc CRM)
- Purchasing
- Projects
- Warehousing
- HR
- Manufacturing
- Service
1. Finance
Through the power of having an integrated solution Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business central allows you to manage your financials by helping you with:
- Make informed decisions using connected data from reports, charts, and Microsoft Power BI dashboards across finance and accounting, sales, purchasing, and stock. The late payment prediction extension helps you reduce receivables.
- View charts and reports in real time through built-in reports, Excel, or Power BI. Use unlimited dimensions for your data to identify patterns and trends.
- Accelerate financial closing and reporting by using the integrated sales ledger and payable capabilities. Streamline the process with approval workflows and Microsoft Power Automate integration.
- Track financial performance with custom general ledger (G/L) and account schedules reporting. Evaluate cost, revenue, or profit reporting in the cost accounting module.
2. Sales & Marketing
As well as the integration into additional Microsoft applications such as word and excel. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central helps businesses just like yours to accelerate your sales process though the ability to:
- Prioritise leads based on revenue potential. Keep track of customer interactions and get guidance on the best upsell, cross-sell, and renewal opportunities throughout your sales cycle.
- Optimise revenue and address customers’ needs, with flexible pricing and discount structures for individual customers and customer groups.
- Keep an overview of agreements with sales order and blanket sales order processes. Quickly give customers details about prices, discounts, delivery dates, product availability, and fulfilment status.
- Address customer returns with sales return order management, including credit notes, repairs, or replacements.
As well as standard integration into Office 365 and Microsoft Outlook
3. Purchasing
Knowing how and when to optimise your supply chain using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central will enable you and your business to manage when to:
- Predict the best time to replenish stock using built-in intelligence. Use sales forecasts and expected stock-outs to automatically create purchase orders.
- Get a holistic view of your stock, and use the same costing method or different methods for your stock items. Freely move items between locations, and control the quantity on hand using cycling counting.
- Engage with your suppliers proactively and cost-effectively. Register potential suppliers, send enquiries, and convert the best offers to orders. Configure required approvers to help ensure compliance with internal and external policies.
- Use system-generated suggestions to replenish stock based on actual and forecast demand and availability.
Also integrate with AI functionality to understand trends of what to purchase and when.
4. Projects
For project orientated companies Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central offers businesses to be able to manage and deliver projects on time and on budget. With the ability to recognise revenue and allow users to:
- Create, manage, and track customer projects using timesheets and advanced job costing and reporting capabilities. Develop and modify budgets to ensure project profitability.
- Manage resource levels by planning capacity and sales. Track customer invoicing against planned or actual costs on orders and quotes.
- Make effective decisions using real-time insights on project status, profitability, and resource-usage metrics.
5. Warehousing
The ability to manage and run your warehouse efficiently across single or multiple locations comes as standard and gives you the opportunity to:
- Optimise your storage facilities by setting up bins and zones in Business Central to reflect the layout of your warehouse and its racks and shelves.
- Streamline receiving and storage by using a template to determine the best placement of items based on type, size, and bin capacity.
- Get recommendations on where to move items to optimise the space and the picking process. Speed up shipments and reduce friction caused by cross-docking.
- Use real-time data on every item’s zone, bin, and quantity to better fulfil your customers’ orders.
Integrate this with mobile technology to give you a paperless start of the art warehouse facility at low cost and easy to implement.
6. Manufacturing
As part of the premium licence the integrated manufacturing functionality available withing Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central offers a plethora of functions that will help the most diverse of business to reach the optimal level of output through;
- Produce within your supply and capacity constraints. Implement your manufacturing process according to plan, even in agile and complicated environments.
- Specify a list of sellable item , raw materials, subassemblies, or resources as a bill of materials that comprises a finished product or a kit.
- Use assembly orders to replenish items to stock. Capture customers’ special requirements in a bill of materials, and use it directly from the sales quote and sales order line in your assembly-to-order processes.
- Use works orders for more complex processes. Register consumption and output, and manage multiple bills of materials and routes. Reconcile scrap and deviations in consumption and output.
Delivering more through limited resources and having greater financial visibility whilst integrating into shop floor data capture and IOT devices make the the manufacturing module a great fit across many differing industries.
7. Service
Also requiring the premium licence, any business that sells, manufactures or distributes products which require servicing then Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central service module enables you to live up to your service promises and obligations through:
- Gain a comprehensive overview of your service tasks and workloads to effectively assign personnel to work orders. Keep track of service agreements to deliver reliable service to your customers.
- Ensure a smooth transition from sales to after-sales by automatically registering shipped goods as service items. Keep the required details in one place for optimal service.
- Manage after-sales issues, whether adjustments require a full replacement or a simple repair.
- Track repair details, including used service items, spare parts, and labour charges, in one service order. Boost customer loyalty by providing spare equipment to customers while their equipment is under maintenance.
So as you can see there is a lot to offer through Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central.
How much does Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central Cost?
SaaS model
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is priced based on a per user per month pricing model. There are three pricing tiers;
- Business Central Essentials @ £52.80 per user per month
- Business Central Premium @ £75.40 per user per month
- Business Central Team Member @ £6.00 per user per month
On-premise model
On premise pricing (bought up front) is also a three tier model;
- Premium User: £1,878
- Essentials User: £1,341
- Team Member: £268
All are subject to 16% annual maintenance.
Download the Dynamics 365 Business Central Licencing Guide for further details by clicking here
How long does Microsoft Dynamics Business Central take to implement?
Implementing a new ERP such as Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central will be dependent upon a number of different factors:
- Modules required to be implemented
- Customisations
- Integrations
Are all factors that can increase the timeline of an implementation project. Other factors that need to be considered are:
- Business processes
- Change management
- Data Migration
- Reporting
- Available resources
All that being said, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central can be implemented in as little as 2 months. However, we find that most new ERP projects are between 3-9 months.
Why should I choose Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central?
Choosing the right ERP solution is not an easy decision to make due to the varying options that are available to you as a decision maker.
However, we believe that choosing the right ERP such as Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central should consist of having:
- The right functionality
- A good solid roadmap
- Priced accordingly
- A solid implementation plan
- Ability to integrate with other applications
- Accessible anywhere
- Updated regularly
- Extend the product through low code / no code applications
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central delivers all of the above and more. If you want to organise a demo or would like a Free trial then click on the link to contact us.
