BIOS: Technology Means Business

Microsoft has today announced the general availability of Dynamics CRM 3.0. The latest iteration of Microsoft's CRM offering, which has been released earlier than expected, has been designed with customer usability in mind; the interface can be embedded within Outlook making it familiar to users of the product.

The big barrier to successful CRM in the past has often been persuading staff at the grass roots level to use it and Microsoft is attempting to overcome this. The other big development with CRM 3.0 is the choice that it offers customers in terms of hosted or non-hosted access via partners.

Microsoft's new customer relationship management solution for small businesses, midsize companies and large enterprises, provides a suite of marketing, sales and service capabilities. Extensive new configuration, customisation and integration capabilities should make it easy for customers and partners to deploy highly tailored solutions that drive measurable business results and offer a low total cost of ownership, claims the company.

The product is offered in a Professional Edition and a Small Business Edition, and is immediately available in English worldwide. Dutch, French, German and Russian versions of Microsoft CRM will be available 1 Jan 2006, and 17 more language versions will be released in the coming months.

'Businesses demand a CRM solution that is easy to use, adaptable and affordable,' said Jeff Raikes, president of the Microsoft Business Division. 'Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 delivers a major breakthrough in the CRM marketplace. With its native Microsoft Office and Outlook experience and a flexible platform that gives customers a true choice of deployment options, we are bringing the power of CRM to information workers, enabling them to better understand their customers, be more productive and have a positive impact on their business' bottom line.'

Microsoft CRM is built to address the three key challenges that determine the success or failure of most CRM initiatives: user adoption, business fit and total cost of ownership. The software delivers roles-based CRM capabilities within a native Microsoft Office and Outlook experience. Users can choose to use a rich Outlook client or access the system through a browser-based client or a mobile device.

Event-driven workflow capabilities should help your company to drive consistent process execution across the organisation, and powerful reporting and analytics capabilities based on Excel and SQL Server Reporting Services offer real-time visibility into business process and customer interaction.

The new release of Microsoft CRM offers a new version designed for small businesses. The new Small Business Edition is designed to run on Microsoft Windows Small Business Server (SBS) and offers a full CRM suite that can be installed with just 10 clicks, claims the company. It provides wizard-driven configuration of the application, integrates tightly with SBS features such as fax management and integrated server management, and offers an easy migration path from Microsoft's Office Outlook 2003 with Business Contact Manager.

As of 1 Jan 2006, Microsoft will offer subscription-based licensing to partners that deliver hosted solutions based on Microsoft CRM. This continues Microsoft's strong commitment to providing a choice of flexible and affordable CRM functionality in both on-premise and hosted deployment models. Since the same code is used in both models, customers can choose whichever deployment model fits their business and technical requirements at any point in time.

The product is available through Microsoft's Volume Licensing programmes, and the price will depend on the license programme being used. The full-suite Professional Edition is priced between $622 and $880 per user and $1244 and $1761 per server. Full-suite Small Business Edition is priced between $440 and $499 per user and between $528 and $599 per server. All prices include one year of Software Assurance.