Dynamics CRM 2011 R8 Service Update News

Microsoft recently announced the content of their next service update for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011, codenamed “R8″, under the headline: CRM Anywhere.

The R8 service update is expected to be available Q2 2012 and promotes 6 areas of interest:

• Mobility
• Multi Browser Support
• Social Improvements
• Industry Templates
• SQL Server 2012
• Certifications

Mobility

The launch of a new product titled Microsoft Dynamics CRM Mobile, which will enable CRM Online, partner-hosted and on-premise customers with IFD to use CRM on up to three devices per user. There will be native clients, which means offline support, on all the main mobile platforms including:

• Windows Phone 7.5
• iPhone & iPad
• Android
• BlackBerry

This is a subscription service for $30 per user per month.

Multi Browser Support

This feature has finally arrived. R8 applied to your CRM server will provide access to CRM using the following browsers:

• Internet Explorer 7 or above on Windows 7, Vista and XP
• Safari 5.1.1 or above on Mac OS-X or iOS5
• Firefox 6 or above on Windows 7, Vista and XP or Mac OS-X or iOS5
• Chrome 13 or above on Windows 7, Vista and XP.

Social Improvements

Microsoft released the new Activity Feeds feature in November 2011 which provided Social features in CRM 2011. R8 introduces a series of enhancements to the Activity Feeds feature including:

• like/dislike
• enhanced filtering (e.g. @me, types of records I follow, record views)
• an updated mobile activity feeds client for Windows Phone 7.5.

Industry Templates

Building on the work of Microsoft partners and its own consulting team, the Dynamics Labs will be releasing several industry templates into the Dynamics Marketplace. The first few templates will include:

• Wealth Management
• Non-Profit
• Health

The templates will include data model customizations, dashboards, workflows and sample data. They’re designed to help customers in these specific industries visualize how Dynamics CRM can help their business, and speed up an implementation without necessarily being a fully-packaged vertical industry product.

SQL Server 2012

Microsoft has already upgraded their data centers to SQL Server 2012, and the R8 service update will bring official support for partners and customers wanting to upgrade their own deployments to SQL Server 2012. Additionally, there will be some new CRM features that make use of SQL Server 2012 new capabilities including:

• Performance improvements
• Enhanced database recovery
• Next generation BI (“Crescent”) such as pre-defined Power Pivot models, Power View reports, and time-animated reports.

Certifications

Certifications are critical to enterprise adoption, and Microsoft has been diligently working during the last year to ensure its data centers and CRM Online service meet several important certification standards including:

• ISO 27001
• SAS 70 Type II
• SOX
• SSAE 16 SOC1
• Safe Harbor
• Data Processing Agreement
• EU Model Clauses
• HIPAA compliance (supported through Business Partner Agreements).

For More Information, download the R8 Release Preview Guide from the Microsoft Dynamics CRM website: http://crmpublish.blob.core.windows.net/docs/ReleasePreviewGuide.pdf

Phil Finkler

PhilF@ehtc.com