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Artificial Intelligence and Dynamics 365 Business Central

Artificial intelligence and the technology surrounding it has well and truly exploded. We believe that capitalising on this incredible boom will set you on the right path for decades to come. When discussing your ERP, Microsoft have begun to leverage this alongside Dynamics 365 Business Central, empowering your business and your users. Read on to find out how!

Artificial intelligence technology

Artificial intelligence (AI) technology has found extensive applications in the business world, transforming various industries. It enables businesses to automate repetitive tasks, analyse large volumes of data for insights, personalise customer experiences, enhance decision-making processes, optimise operations, and detect patterns or anomalies.

Our specialism in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central means our interest lies in how to make your Enterprise Resource Planning solution gain efficiency, improve productivity, reduce costs, and gain a competitive edge in today's data-driven and fast-paced marketplace.

We'll explore how artificial intelligence is currently being used, what Microsoft are working on and what we're doing here at TNP to harness this technology.

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What are Microsoft doing with artificial intelligence?

Microsoft is deeply involved in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), integrating AI technologies into their products and services. They offer AI-powered tools like Microsoft Cognitive Services and Azure Machine Learning, empowering developers to incorporate AI capabilities into their applications.

Microsoft have invested a substantial amount into OpenAI and the surrounding technology, integrating it into products such as Office 365 (which includes Word, Teams, Excel, etc.) and Microsoft 365 to make our lives easier.

For Dynamics 365 Business Central and beyond, Microsoft have developed Copilot. Copilot, as the name suggests, aims to act as your artificial intelligence assistant, reducing menial, repetitive tasks across your favourite productivity tools.

 

Microsoft Copilot for Business Central

In April 2023, Microsoft released the first wave of improvements to Dynamics 365 Business Central. This release wave introduced the first edition of Copilot and its impressive capability. We're excited about the future enhancements that Microsoft will be making, so that Copilot is smarter and more intuitive every day.

Dynamics 365 Business Central now benefits from product descriptions that are generated by artificial intelligence, making life much easier for users. This is in addition to the artificial intelligence features for cash flow forecasting and late payment prediction.

By analysing historical data, Business Central can predict future cash flow and highlight those customers who are later than usual in making their payments, allowing you to take action.

 

What are TNP doing with AI?

Our techy guys love to be at the forefront of all things new in the IT world, especially when it comes to making Business Central even better.

We are working every day to find new ways to exploit artificial intelligence for the benefit of our Dynamics NAV and Business Central users. From our Teams chatbot known as nOra, to using the power of the AI system's data matching capabilities, we continue to innovate.

Here are some things we have been working on:

  • Ask nOra - read more about nOra here.
  • Data matching - when businesses upgrade from older systems, whether that be Dynamics NAV or any other ERP, they often need to tidy up data often contained in text fields. We have built a mechanism to help a system administrator train AI on a small amount of badly formatted data, following which the AI can produce newly formatted data in the form requested.
  • Demo data creation - we've internally used AI to generate item names, inventory amounts, prices, ledger entries and much more, saving hours of human time and allowing our demos to better reflect the customer we are speaking to.
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Ask nOra

Accessible through your Microsoft Teams app, our Ask nOra chatbot can provide you with immediate access to the information in your Dynamics 365 Business Central system.

This could be in a tabular form where you specify the columns to include, through a written answer as though you've asked a colleague for some information or ask what a certain item of stock looks like, so nOra will send you a photo.

nOra is spoken to as an extension of your own team, just like an additional colleague! Read more about Ask nOra and see videos on how she works!

 

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Nora Balance and Sales
nOra can show customer balances and sales this year in a tabular format. Columns can be removed and swapped.
Nora Salesperson Email
nOra can tell you a customer's salesperson and use the genius of ChatGPT to compose an email chasing a customer for payment.
Nora Define Slow Moving Stock
nOra can be taught definitions so that, when you use a term that is not universal, nOra can understand to your personalised requests.
Nora Purchase Order Creation
nOra can show you current inventory for defined items and then, on request, create a purchase order in Business Central for the low stock.

Benefits of early adoption

Being an early adopter of artificial intelligence (AI) technology can provide several benefits for businesses:

  1. Competitive advantage: Early adopters can gain a significant edge over their competitors by leveraging AI to automate processes, improve efficiency, and deliver enhanced customer experiences.

  2. Increased efficiency and productivity: AI can automate repetitive tasks, allowing employees to focus on more strategic and creative activities, leading to improved productivity and operational efficiency.

  3. Data-driven insights: AI enables businesses to analyse vast amounts of data and extract valuable insights. Early adopters can make data-driven decisions, identify patterns, and uncover opportunities for innovation and growth.

  4. Enhanced customer experience: AI-powered solutions can personalise customer interactions, provide real-time support, and offer tailored recommendations, resulting in improved customer satisfaction and loyalty.

  5. Cost reduction: AI can automate manual processes, reduce errors, and optimise resource allocation, leading to cost savings and operational efficiencies.

Make use of the technology now

You can start getting artificial intelligence technology into your business in the following ways:

  • Get our Ask nOra chatbot into your business - get in touch with our team to discuss how we can make this happen for you
  • Make use of Microsoft Copilot across the Microsoft 365 suite of products, including within Excel, Outlook, Word and Teams
  • Set up cash flow forecasting within Dynamics 365 Business Central using Azure AI - read more from Microsoft here.
  • Use the sales and inventory forecasting extension to show you when to expect stock outs - read more from Microsoft here.
  • Predict late payments from your customers using artificial intelligence based on previous payments made - read more from Microsoft here.
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Power BI

Our business analytics solution of choice for this is Microsoft Power BI. Power BI is an interactive tool built to visualise data and provide actionable insights from that data.

Power BI is Microsoft's analytics solution, providing businesses with:

  • A live, interactive, automated visualisation tool​
  • The ability to distribute reports via browser or mobile app​
  • Native integration with Teams, SharePoint and the Power Platform


This solution can be used to integrate with many data sources, including your Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution, your CRM, your third-party warehousing solution, and much more.​ We're huge fans of what this solution is capable of and what it could bring to your business, alongside our project methodology.

Speak to a specialist

If you’d like to know more, our team of experts will be happy to help with your queries.

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