2021 Dynamics 365 Release Wave 1 Highlights

The release plan for the 2021 Dynamics 365 release wave 1 brings many new innovations to empower you to transform your business. The release describes all the new features that will be released from April 2021 through September 2021. We are most excited about the new features coming to Dynamics 365 Sales, Service, Customer Voice, and Customer Insights. This release also features updates in the areas of Marketing, Finance,  Human Resources, Commerce, Fraud Protection, and Business Central. The release plan may either be viewed online or downloaded as a PDF file.

The Microsoft Power Platform features coming in the release wave 1 have been summarized in a separate document. The release plan can be viewed online or downloaded as a PDF.

Key dates for the 2021 Dynamics 365 Release Wave 1

These delivery timelines and projected functionality may be subject to change.

Sales

The updates to Dynamics 365 Sales concentrate on adding productivity enhancement for sellers and providing more access to data-driven insights to help in decision making. The three areas of focus here are:

1. Saving salespeople time

• • More automation and sequences that will adapt to the changing needs and behaviors of customers.
  • Customize workspace to your unique business requirements and trigger key action with the record side panel – all in the same place.
  • Quickly view the right deals and get all the right context with the Deal Manager – all in one click.

2. Providing salespeople intelligence at their fingertips

• • New out of-the-box data visualizations to help inform day-to-day decisions.
  • Conversation Intelligence provides important insights on top of video calls and calls with multiple participants.
  • Easily locate opportunities by searching, quickly setting a column filter, or choosing a time-based slicer.

3. Helping salespeople on-the-go

• • New intuitive mobile experience – offers salespeople quick access to customer information from wherever they are. In addition, the new mobile experience makes it easy for salespeople to log in and share information in real time. The new mobile experience features the following functions:
    • Microsoft Teams customer calls or online meetings can be transcribed and assigned to a Dynamics 365 record.
    • Easily manage activities and take follow-up actions promptly.
    • Get up-to-date LinkedIn information on meeting participants, insights about a deal, account and contacts integrated with AI.

To learn about the updates to Dynamics 365 Service, Customer Voice, and Customer Insights – visit our blog.