The inclination to stay with what you know when you’ve been working with a solution like Dynamics GP for some time is quite natural.
That said, as Dynamics 365 Business Central – Microsoft’s cloud ERP offering for the SMB market – gains ground, a few common motivators have been driving GP customers to migrate from GP to Business Central.
Here are 3 major reasons why Dynamics GP customers are moving to Business Central:
1. Total Cost of Ownership / Value
We’ll let the numbers do the talking but in our eyes, Business Central is a no brainer:
• More predictable costs each year. Assuming you aren’t repeatedly adding new users, you’ll see that the costs with SaaS each year are fairly consistent.
• Fewer dedicated IT staff requirements.
• Upgrades and updates included in subscription meaning you are always on the current version. You’ll never have to consider a large upgrade ever again.
For illustrative purposes, we compared the total cost of ownership of Business Central vs. NAV on-premises over a 5 year period. The conclusions from this apply to many businesses that are running legacy on-premises solutions.
2. More Features
With operational growth comes the need for more functional capabilities and productivity-enhancing features that aren’t necessarily available in Dynamics GP on-premises – no matter what version you are on. Some key wins for customers who make the move include:
• Exposure to the full breadth of the Microsoft stack. It goes without saying that the close integration with Office 365 is a game-changer for businesses who are already using Office. For example, with Business Central’s Outlook integration, users are able to create Sales Orders in their ERP directly from their email. Additionally, many GP customers want to take advantage of the built-in analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) tools within Business Central for improved visibility and decision making.
• Access to advanced functionality. Finally, GP customers get access to more advanced functionality (from NAV) that they didn’t have previously such as multi-company consolidation and inter-company transfers.
3. Cloud
Moving from an on-premises system to the Dynamics 365 cloud is like night and day from a cost and efficiency perspective. Many Dynamics GP customers struggle with remote connectivity and slow performance issues, so they decide that the lower overhead costs, automatic upgrades, and fast performance are strong enough reasons to replace their current on-premise system.
