Ben Grech 2011 Ben has been working in the IT industry for the last 13 years. He has designed, consulted, managed, implemented and supported various system roll outs for multinational companies including Safeway Stores, FujiFilm, Demajo Group, Microsoft, and Phonak. How many years have you been a Dynamics VAR / ISV? I have been in Dynamics for the 11 years+, having working on different versions of MS NAV and also MS Retail Management System. I was fortunate to implement NAV in different countries across a range of industries. Why should an end user purchase Microsoft Dynamics? The track record of the Microsoft Dynamics products speaks for itself, before and after Microsoft started acquisitions. They are very trusted, stable systems which steadily continue to deliver solid business benefits to the end users coupled up with operational cost savings. And with the innovations which came about, and still to come around in the system platforms and UX areas, I’m sure things will get more interesting, both for partners and for end users.   What has been your biggest success within Microsoft Dynamics? Two big successes come to mind right now. One of them was when I start off a Dynamics NAV Division in a software house I work for 8 years, to end up having built and trained a good number of Developers, Consultants & PMs. Another one is when together with a team of Consultants and Industry Experts we build a product (a NAV vertical) which was rolled out in different countries, and was fantastic seeing the product performing exceptionally well and delivering the benefits. What is the biggest competitive advantage you have added to a client? I had a egaming/ebetting customer and we had to build a complex billing engine for them. It was a great challenge due to the amount of billing exceptions, but when we delivered and implemented the finished product, the client was able to process the billing cycle in less than 4 hours, whilst before it used to take around 200hrs processing, also risk having human errors. And no matter how many customers they were adding to the system, the billing cycle processing time was still very contained. Another big competitive advantage was interfacing NAV with SAP for Order/Delivery/Invoice Processing including product attributes configurations…..it was an amazing experience, apart from the long nights at work!! But the process streamlining and subsequent gains were well worth it!!! How can a client best maximise Microsoft Dynamics? First you have to look at your processes and make them lean. Sometimes people forget about the KISS concept (Keep It Simple) and make their systems unnecessarily complicated. If there is a strong case to have a complex process, then let it be, if its delivering the required benefit. But complex processes require more investment in customisations, training etc, and people should ask themselves if the complexity is really necessary. To maximize on your Dynamics Investment, people should focus on simplifying their core operations, and automating most of them, so you let …

Derek Warburton May 2011 Derek Warburton; TenDigits Vice President, Sales. He is responsible for developing and executing the corporate sales strategy, including growing and managing the sales teams in support of corporate growth plans. How many years have you been a Dynamics VAR / ISV? TenDigits has been Dynamics CRM ISV for 7 years. During that time, we’ve been 100% focused on delivering robust mobility solutions for Dynamics CRM. It’s all we do. Many customers and partners have said that we were ahead of the curve as the market demand for Dynamics CRM (and by extension, mobility for CRM) 6 or 7 years ago was not that great. Our R&D and customer experience from those early days, has served us very well though, as our products a now very mature and comprehensive. It’s great that we got in this game early, as it’s allowed us to stay far ahead of the new entrants into the space. Why should an end user purchase Microsoft Dynamics CRM? With respect to Dynamics CRM, Microsoft has done a great job with recent versions and especially CRM 2011 to provide a world class CRM offering that is highly adaptable and configurable compared to others, relatively cost effective to implement and maintain, all for a fraction of the cost of similar caliber CRM systems. If that’s not enough, the integration with Outlook is far superior to that of other CRM’s. What has been your biggest success within Microsoft Dynamics? The best successes are when we win in tandem with a Dynamics VAR and/or Microsoft. A great example of this is from a little over a year ago. Microsoft and a Dynamics CRM VAR were competing against SalesForce for a 6000 seat CRM deal. Mobility was a key requirement and SalesForce brought in their CEO who told the customer the reason to go with is offering was that the mobility solution for Dynamics CRM was weak. Microsoft and the VAR called TenDigits for help. Within a few days, we illustrated to the senior executives at the customer that the TenDigits Mobile CRM solution was in fact far superior to the SalesForce mobility solution, and a much better fit for their business requirements. This became a key turning point in the sales cycle, causing SalesForce to be quickly ruled out as a potential vendor choice, and leading to a collective a win for Microsoft, the VAR and TenDigits. What is the biggest competitive advantage you have added to a client? With HealthSouth http://www.healthsouth.com/ , a multi-billion $ US based healthcare company, their use of Dynamics CRM combined with the TenDigits Mobility solution, has allowed them to re-engineer a critical business process. In the US, healthcare is private (not run by the government), and healthcare companies compete for customers (patients). They had a need to improve the process by which their 1000 Patient Liaisons (effectively sales staff) accessed and updated patient information, to ensure they get referred to the appropriate rehabilitation healthcare facility and doctors. The business process was quite manual, and was costing the company significant money, while at the same time negatively impacting the effectiveness of and efficiency of …

Jimmi Jakobsen   May 2011 AX development guru and developer of Bidatask Finance 2011 is a Finance system designed for small and medium sized companies together with private households. The system is integrated with bidatask.com portal so you can start sell your own services, used products and post your projects for bids.     What was your first job in Microsoft Dynamics? My first job was when I started my own accounting business as an 18 year old guy in 1996, too ambitious. This required a finance system that could support multiple client accounts. I managed that by purchasing Concorde C4 from Damgaard Data. C4 was a console based application. My first experience with Dynamics AX or AXAPTA was when I was employed into a support function in a software consulting business in Denmark. I think the first Axapta version I got installed was 1.0. That was back in September 1998. What has been your biggest influence/s in Microsoft Dynamics? While sitting in the support function for Dansk System partner A/S supporting accountants, engineers and architects using their software I was asked to be involved in a proper AXAPTA project for a company called Dansk Revision. I remember being asked by the lead project manager/consultant called Peter Rask if I could help testing the functionality that was developed for AXAPTA. Of course I could and that was my main introduction to Dynamics AX and has influenced me that much that I am still working with Dynamics AX today. What has been your biggest achievement/s in Microsoft Dynamics? My biggest achievement has been the knowledge I have gained through various projects in all modules of Dynamics AX. Being able to combine both consultant and developer role helps a lot in successful implementations for my clients. With that over the last 6 years I have been building my own financial system called Bidatask Finance 2011. Now it is finally being released. What is the best thing Microsoft has brought to the community? As the biggest player in the market Microsoft has brought loads of interesting and useful things. It is difficult to pinpoint the best one, the most exiting for me was when Microsoft bought Navision and Dynamics AX became a Microsoft product. Why should an end user purchase Microsoft Dynamics? There is no doubt that Microsoft Dynamics AX is very flexible and the number of verticals you can purchase is huge. With the integration to C# you get a fully integrated platform collecting all your business data. Imagine the analysis you could do on your business. It enables you to pinpoint each weak spot and get it optimized. What are the biggest challenges facing Microsoft Dynamics in the ERP market today? I believe that ERP is complex and the issue of getting a big enough experienced resource pool to assist companies install and implement Dynamics AX is expensive and takes years. Most of the projects you see implemented from an inexperienced (Dynamics AX) pool of resources tend to fail. A lot of projects are …

Nico Tissink May 2011 Nico Tissink CEO and founder of AXtension. My goal is to create a respectful relationship with the AXtension partners and inspire them to create a sustainable business for themselves, based upon our great solutions. What was your first job in Microsoft Dynamics? I was one of the founders of Pulse in 1986 and I have worked the Software Industry since that time. The moment Microsoft Dynamics™ AX (Damgaard Axapta) was born we started working with it, selling it and implementing it. I was involved in that process as a Consultant, Sales manager and Managing Director in our VAR business called Pulse Business Solutions. In 2008 we started a very successful ISV business under the name AXtension. The Pulse group now consists of three companies: Pulse Business Solutions (Dynamics AX implementations worldwide), AXtension (ISV solutions for Dynamics AX worldwide) and MigrAX (Automated Migration software for Dynamics AX). Who has been your biggest influence/s in Microsoft Dynamics? My biggest influences where Erik and Preben Damgaard, as founders of the first object oriented ERP system in the world. What has been your biggest achievement/s in Microsoft Dynamics? My biggest achievement in Microsoft Dynamics has been founding the AxPact network, which now consists of more than 35 worldwide AX partners, working very successfully together in worldwide implementations. Amongst other things, I also think that building trust and healthy, honest relationships as a partner is also one of my most important achievements. What is the best thing Microsoft has brought to the community?   With respect to Dynamics, I think the best thing Microsoft has brought is their enormous development capacity. They were able to invest the amounts of money that were necessary to make AX the professional product it is now. Why should an end user purchase Microsoft Dynamics? There are of course a lot of reasons, but one of the most important is that with Dynamics our customers are able to increase their profit by working much more efficiently. Microsoft Dynamics enables them to be very flexible and adaptable to changes in their business environment. This means that Dynamics users always have the ability to change their software according to their changed business processes, without having to make enormous investments. What are the biggest challenges facing Microsoft Dynamics in the ERP market today? Understanding the needs and the pain of the market they are in. Which add-on has made your clients life easier? Of course, this must be our AXtension solutions. What do you want to see happen with Microsoft Dynamics in the future? Continuous investment in the product to make it more usable in the cloud environment.

Brad Foot, agilesWorkflow Product Manager. Brad started his career as a consultant implementing Navision

Shane Hall, the inventive Director of Reporting Central, the company behind the award winning The Closer

Ronald Lemmen is the Microsoft Dynamics CRM MVP currently working as the Solution Director for Avanade Netherlands

Practice Director at Cognitive group since October 2007, Jonathan Keen draws on 7 years experience as an active member of the Dynamics Community