Microsoft Dynamics AX Reviews

I'm a consultant. I'm not an end-user of it. I've been implementing on-premises and on-cloud solutions with the older versions and the new one.

It can be used for the retail industry and manufacturing in terms of the lean process industry. It can also be used for professional services as well as the public sector industry. 

It is easy to use, and it has a great UI. It has very well-structured modules. In terms of setup and configuration, they're logically placed, which makes it easy for any user to pick up information and learn more about the system, rather than just be plain key users of that business operating system.

It is scalable and customizable. Easy integration and availability of workspaces help in easily making it very role-oriented. They also make it easy for users to access and use it.

The fact that it is on the cloud makes it accessible from any device and at any given point in time, as long as you have a connection to the internet.

If I had to add something in the next release, it would probably be a mobile application for a sister application of Dynamics 365; not the ERP but the Dynamics 365 HR solution. It would definitely help if we could have Microsoft or a Microsoft partner introduce a mobile application for it.

I have been using this solution for 10 years.

It is scalable. It is customizable through extensions.

It is normally aimed at mid to large segment industries, primarily enterprise-size companies where you have more than 300 users.

Their support is okay.

It is straightforward and easy. The deployment duration differs depending on the size of the environment and the number of modules that we're implementing and so on.

It has a pay-as-you-go subscription.

I would absolutely recommend this solution to others. I would definitely rate it an eight out of 10.

We're using Microsoft Dynamics AX within a tech service. Our company is a shoe company in Pakistan, and we are using Microsoft AX in the head office and branches.

It's an ERP solution that helps us maintain the data, plan the production level and the branch level, and help the branches coordinate with the head office. This ERP solution helps in sales, helps in production, helps in inventory movement. It also gives you the profit and loss on all the basics.

I like that it's a complete ERP solution from production level to branch level. If you have a production department, they give you all the facilities for each item to make a product complete or complete a whole mission system. It's also helpful in completing incomplete information like articles. For example, receiving articles from the warehouse in our branches and online store. The software we're using isn't for the online store, but we are using it for production.

There are so many errors. For example, in some utilities, the procedure is basically for European countries and unsuitable for us. If we need to give somebody some utilities, like reports, we need to create some special reports in our environment. We need some standard utility where we're making purchase orders or something in the warehouse. 

I've been using Microsoft Dynamics AX for more than two years.

Microsoft Dynamics AX is stable. I didn't find any problem like this.

We have a contract with Microsoft, and we don't have any problem with it because we have partners in Pakistan. If you need any help in that department, they help. If they can't, they file it directly with Microsoft. That's okay and not a problem thus far.

If you do the installation for this, sometimes it will be difficult. But after some time, when you test the demo servers, it will be easy and not complicated.

I would advise potential users that it's a good solution on the technical side. I would recommend it.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Microsoft Dynamics AX an eight.

We use this product for finance applications.

The good thing about this solution is that it is easy to use. If anyone is familiar with Microsoft products then they can handle it easily.

The manuals are available for learning about the functionality.

There should be the capability for users to enhance the application by using a low-code or no-code product from the Microsoft family.

Scaling is complex and is something that can be improved.

In the future, I would like to see more applications.

I have been using Microsoft Dynamics AX for approximately seven years.

The core of the product is stable but for additional features, stability depends on the partner. 

It is not very easy to scale because you have to deal with the partner at the time. You need to spend some effort in order to scale.

I have not been in touch with technical support because I'm not dealing with any issues.

The initial setup is straightforward, but of course, you have to add a lot of features on your own because it will not provide everything.

The suitability of this product depends on your business environment and industry.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

We are using an older version of Dynamics AX and we are using their servers.  

We are a managed services company, meaning that we provide telecommunication services like VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) to our customers. We use Dynamics to log tickets, to resolve incidents, and to record changes in the platforms that we deliver to our customers.  

I have not really found very much that is valuable, at least in the version of the product that we are using. I do not think it is really suitable for the work that we do anymore. The reason for that is that we have changed our business model over the past few years. It was okay when we delivered hardware and we had to do maintenance on the hardware. But now that we have a real service organization where we have to comply with SLAs (Service Level Agreements) with our customers, it does not fit the structure. 

To manage the service levels, we have to meet the agreements. For example, we have to resolve priority one incidents within four hours and we have to resolve priority two incidents within eight hours. I find that the Microsoft Dynamics product is not suitable for that. We had to make a lot of adjustments and tweaks in the software just to meet our goals. The reporting for our customers was a problem because there are no portal service level reports. We had to develop all of those solutions ourselves.  

The product is no longer going to be supported by Microsoft next year. For that reason, I do not think that they will improve anything. Putting that fact aside, I think that the whole IP module can be improved. They need to improve logging, tracking, and tracing service tickets, as well as reporting towards the customer. They need to create a customer portal where the customers can view and create their own tickets. That would be a lot of work to do for a product that Microsoft will no longer be supporting.  

I would suggest that Microsoft use a real top-class ITSM (IT Service Management) with the replacement product (Business Central) and then integrate that with Microsoft Dynamics rather than developing it themselves. Integrating a dedicated product will be better.  

I am with my current company since January, but I know that the company has been using Dynamics for about ten years now.  

Considering the fact that Dynamics AX is going out of support and they are not continuing, the product is not being properly updated and that leads to stability issues. The new version of the Microsoft solution is called Business Central. I do not know exactly what functionalities it has or what has changed. In other words, it might be the case that Microsoft has already improved the solution in the new version of the product.  

Scalability has been a problem for us. That has somewhat to do with the fact that we use the 2009 version of Dynamics. It runs on Windows Servers, and we had to upgrade those servers. So that led to having some compatibility problems and that affected scalability and stability. But the lack of scalability is also an issue because we use it on-premises. In a private cloud or a SaaS service, it might be better. That is why we want to move towards a SaaS service.  

The product is being decommissioned so technical support is all but non-existent.

We have different components to use with the Dynamics solution and that can affect the price, but the price for the product is relatively high any way you look at it. You pay per seat for the number of users. Then we have, of course, the hosting costs for the server it runs on. Because we host it ourselves in a private cloud we do the maintenance on the OS level. I think that moving to a SaaS will decrease the cost a little bit.  

We are currently looking at TOPdesk and ServiceNow and doing some research into these products. I know that one of our competitors is changing from TOPdesk to ServiceNow. They must have a reason, so that warrants a comparison on our part as well.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best. I would rate Microsoft Dynamics as only a five-out-of-ten in general. It does not meet our needs and will essentially be decommissioned.  

We have implemented it for retail companies (e.g., fashion, toys, etc.). We have also implemented the same solution for FMCG and supermarket business models.

All its features are valuable.

It needs better financials and reporting from the system, not through Excel.

The most valuable feature for us is the manufacturing module. It addresses our product costing for tuna canning.

It keeps product costing close to the actual cost of production. It also gives us better handling of the approval process (workflow system).

The database requires a huge CPU and memory resources.

We have been using the solution since 2014.

We encountered an issue with stability. There was a problem on the workflow, which required escalation to Microsoft for resolution.

We encountered an issue with scalability. Hardware requirements are quite large compared with other ERP solutions.

I would give technical support a rating of 7/10.

The previous ERP solution did not have a good local technical support facility. Escalation to the product proprietor was even worse.

Like any other ERP system, the initial setup is straightforward:

• Business requirement analysis
• Business/office procedures
• Gathering of forms and reports
• System mapping
• Customization
• Testing
• Go-live

• Go for cloud implementation, if cost is critical.
• Know the solution provider's fiscal period, as you can get a better discount if the contract signing is near the end of the fiscal period.
• Identify your end-user role, as the license is based on user role/access.

We evaluated SAP and Oracle.

Look for a solution that has multiple partners in your area (i.e., country). The system integrator should present a similar successful project implementation for reference.

Negotiate for implementation contingency (man-days). All business processes and procedures should be documented to ensure no surprises during and after implementation.

Handling change management is critical to the success of the project.

Master planning is the most valuable feature.

Moving our production process from forecasting only to a master plan, including demand forecast and supply forecast wish, is great progress.

• Production planning

I have been using it for one year and it works perfectly.

In the beginning of our project phases, we faced a lot of issues related to collecting the master data but after that, every thing goes smoothly.

We have not encountered any stability issues related to the database; just some connection issues due to VPN connection stability.

We have not encountered any scalability issues yet.

Customer service needed more improvement.

For all of the issues we faced, we found solutions in TechNet and handouts.

We previously used MS Dynamics GP. Production and master planning is better in Dynamics AX.