Every organization reaches a point when they require a new ERP solution but are unsure of what’s next. In such a competitive world of enterprise resource planning (ERP), Microsoft Dynamics 365 has emerged as a powerhouse, offering a suite of applications designed to streamline and optimize business processes. Among these applications, Microsoft offers two primary ERP solutions: Dynamics 365 Business Central and Dynamics 365 Finance.
While their feature offerings are quite distinct, as are their capabilities, both are scalable, flexible, future-proof, and customizable to suit varying business needs. But which is better for your business? Let us compare Business Central vs Finance and operations so that you can choose the best for your needs.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central – An Overview
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is an advanced ERP software that includes apps for managing finance, supply chain, sales, and customer service. As a comprehensive business management software, it offers you modern features to manage your core operations. The ERP solution comes with analytics, reporting, compliance support, artificial intelligence, automation, integration capability, and other related features.
How Can Business Central Benefit Your Business?
Known for its user-friendly interface and ease of implementation, Business Central is an attractive choice for those looking to streamline their operations without the complexity of a larger ERP system. Here’s how the solution can benefit your business.
- Financial Management – Get efficient cash management using AI, predict customer payments, control financial data, automate bank reconciliation, robust reporting, track fixed assets, and expand your business globally.
- Improves sales and services – Seamlessly manage your entire sales process, attend to and resolve customer issues smoothly, track customer interactions, and use insights to increase sales, exceed customer expectations, and achieve exceptional service delivery.
- Supply chain management – Optimize your supply chain operations, improve inventory management, streamline demand planning, optimize warehouse operations, and streamline manufacturing processes.
- Business Intelligence – In-built analytics to help you gain insights from your business data to make improved business decisions.
- Integration – Seamlessly integrated with other Microsoft tools such as Microsoft 365, Power Platform, other D365 apps, and more.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance – An Overview
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance is ERO software designed to handle various financial and operational aspects of your business. It offers you a range of modern features to manage the challenging financial and supply chain process. This dynamic app is built for finance, human resources, commerce, and supply chain management.
How can Microsoft Finance Benefit your Business?
D365 Finance is a sought-after ERP solution to manage your complex supply chain operations aligned with seamless finance management. Here’s how integrating the ERP solution benefits your business.
- Achieve Financial Excellence – Manage your cash inflow and outflow, precisely predict customer payments, make smart budget proposals, automate invoicing processes, make data-driven decisions, and monitor global financial operations in real-time.
- Supply chain management – Gain deep insights into supply chain operations, efficiently manage inventory through advanced inventory management, create agile manufacturing processes, and advanced inventory management.
- Human Resource Management – get access to modern features, including payroll processing, benefit management, talent management, and simplified HR operations.
- Adaptability – Adapts to various business environments, making it favorable for diverse industries and meeting rising business challenges.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central VS Microsoft 365 Finance
While both ERP solutions are designed to help your business manage your operations more effectively, there are some key differences between them. Here’s a brief overview of Microsoft Dynamisc365 Business Central VS Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance to help you determine the right solution for you.
| Features | Dynamics 365 Business Central | Dynamics 365 Finance |
| Microsoft positioning | An integrated business solution for businesses that have outgrown their entry-level accounting system | Integrated enterprise-class business platform for mature and evolving organizations with previous ERP experience |
| Type of companies | Small and medium enterprises (no more than 250 users) | Medium to large organizations and groups of enterprises with a global footprint (200 users up to thousands) |
| Industry | Manufacturing, distribution, and professional services | Retail, manufacturing, distribution, professional services, non-profits, public sector |
| Global operation | Supports global businesses with less complex structure | Supports international organizations multi-plant and multi-schedule |
| Depth of manufacturing functionality | Premium package offers additional functionalities for service management and manufacturing | Designed to support most of the manufacturing functionalities; an integrated for discrete, lean, and process manufacturing; other core functions, such as advanced warehousing with mobile solutions, etc., are included |
| Ease of international functionality and interoperability | Multi-currency, multi-language support for 25 languages, country-specific localizations for 42 countries in a separate database with multi-company consolidations to one database | Multi-currency, multi-language support for 52 languages, country-specific localizations for 43 countries and multi-company within one database |
| Capabilities and integration with other Dynamics 365 components | Core functions include connected financials, sales, purchases, inventory, projects, services, and operations | Provides out-of-the-box connectivity with other D365 apps, deep integrations with CRM, HR, Talent, Customer Service, Marketing, and others; completely covers traditional back-office processes |
| Integrated development environment (IDE) | Visual Studio Code | Full lifecycle services tools to develop on dev box in Visual Studio using TFS, PowerShell |
| Availability | 133 countries | Available globally |
| Localization | Limited localizations: some tasks are covered by partner solutions | Processing of regulated accounting, tax, and statistical reporting, including declarations and payments to non-budgetary funds, supported by the vendor |
| Analytical accounting | Manual creation and use of financial dimensions | Unlimited financial dimensions based on system entities; rich, rule-based system for defining valid combinations of main accounts and financial dimension values; inventory dimensions |
| Intercompany | Multi-company is handled within separate companies, and intercompany functionality is available | Operate multi-company within a single database with easy interoperability between companies |
| Deployment | Cloud-based or on-premises | Cloud-based or on-premises; Edge in the roadmap |
| Workflow system | Integrated document approval mechanism; integration with Azure Logic Apps, Microsoft Flow | The integrated system runs on the Application Object Server, integration with Azure Logic Apps, Microsoft Flow |
| Business intelligence | Power BI, as well as several other business intelligence apps, are available in AppSource. | Power BI as well as BYOD options; entity store included in the subscriptions |
Factors to Choose the Right ERP Solution
It can be tricky for most businesses to differentiate between Business Central and Finance. Here are some factors to consider choosing the right one for your business.
- Business Complexity
If your business has a more complex process, then you require the capabilities of Dynamics 365 finance. Even though you can configure the business central to support complex processes, it can be expensive. Moreover, it is not designed to support many process requirements as D365 finance.
- Customization
System customization is simpler and smarter in Business Central than in finance. You can add custom fields, tables, and pages without any coding. However, Dynamics 365 finance has more complex customization options that require you to have coding knowledge and technical expertise. So, if you have simple customization needs and limited technical knowledge, go for Business Central.
- Integrations
Business Central comes with off-the-shelf interactions with other Microsoft applications such as Office 365, Power BI, and Power Apple. However, you have to invest in another warehouse management system (WES) or manufacturing execution system (MES) separately, integrating it with business central at extra cost. Dynamics 365 Finance, on the contrary, has in-built WES/ MES modules with the mobile user interface. You can also integrate it with third-party applications like Salesforce, Oracle, and Azure services for advanced analytics and machine learning.
- Goals for Growth
Every business grows at varying paces, and your choice of ERP solution should be made based on your growth strategy. You can choose Business Central if you are planning to take things slowly and have no immediate need to scale up your growth. On the other hand, if you want to grow or diversify quickly, then you can implement D365 finance.
Wrapping Up!
Business Central is well-suited for startups looking for a streamlined and affordable solution, while Business Finance is designed for larger enterprises with intricate operational requirements. Are you still unsure where your business is in terms of Microsoft Dynamics? Identifying the best-fit Dynamics 365 solution for your ERP needs can be challenging when you are simultaneously running your business. But worry not and leave the task to us! We at Stream Solutions have decades of experience in Microsoft product deployment. Our experts will help you choose the right solution between Microsoft 365 Business Central and Microsoft 365 Finance, tailoring the system to help you achieve greater efficiency, productivity, and growth.
