Several members of the TrinSoft team attended Inspire this week, which was held virtually this year. Microsoft made several key update announcements around Microsoft 365, Teams and Microsoft business apps. Here are five big takeaways:
Source: CRN
Emphasis on Teams
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella discussed some of the new and forthcoming updates for Teams during his Inspire keynote, including “Together Mode,” which is expected to launch in general availability in August.
“Together Mode is a new experience in Teams that uses AI to digitally place participants in a shared background. This makes it feel like you’re sitting in the same room–reducing background distractions [and making] it easier to pick up the nonverbal cues that we miss,” Nadella said. “So conversations are much more natural–and more importantly, more inclusive. Our research shows that the brain exerts less effort when participating in a meeting using the Together Mode, compared to the standard grid view.”
Read more about the Teams updates here.
Azure Updates
In connection with Inspire 2020, Microsoft announced new hybrid migration, data, security and compliance, and developer offerings around the Azure cloud platform. The products and services include the next generation of Azure Stack HCI, new Azure Migrate features and Azure Lighthouse security enhancements, and third-party connectors for Azure Sentinel, Microsoft’s security information and event management offering.
You can read more about the Azure updates here.
Accelerating Cloud Shift
In his keynote at Inspire, Judson Althoff said he sees an increasing role for partners to play in the accelerated shift to cloud that is going on now.
“If it looked good to get out of your data center, pre-COVID, it looks really good to get out of your data center now. The growth of the cloud is still very important to helping customers achieve these economic goals,” Althoff said. “Our solution areas, our cloud capabilities–from modern workplace through security, business applications, apps and infrastructure, data and AI–across Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365 and Azure, these are the ingredients that will help customers persevere in these difficult times.”
Dynamics 365 Customer Voice
Among the other notable product announcements at Inspire 2020 was Dynamics 365 Customer Voice, which aims to improve customer responses by enabling organizations to incorporate feedback into their customer view in real time.
Read more about Customer Voice here.
Growing During a Pandemic
Even as Inspire was taking place on Wednesday, Microsoft also reported the financial results from the fourth quarter of its fiscal 2020–which saw revenue grow 13 percent year-over-year, beating Wall Street analyst expectations.
For more takeaways from Inspire, check out this article from CRN.
