Published on the 14/07/2015 | Written by Vendor - media release

A raft of announcements coming out of Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Conference point to a bright future…

Business transformation is on the agenda and Microsoft has shared technology innovations aligned to its ambitions to reinvent productivity and business processes, and to create more personal computing. With its Worldwide Partner Conference underway in Florida, it also lifted the lid on investments that it says will enable partners to leverage these innovations for customers.

Announcements from the first day of WPC include:

• Project GigJam is a new way for people to accomplish their business tasks and transform business processes by breaking down the barriers between devices, apps and people. GigJam empowers workers to summon information from their line of business and SaaS apps, spontaneously divvy up the specific information and actions needed to get work done, keep track of each part, and bring it all to closure.

• Cortana Analytics Suite is a set of services to help transform data into action. It brings together machine learning, big data storage and processing with perceptual intelligence such as vision, face and speech analysis. Cortana Analytics Suite integrates with Cortana, Microsoft’s digital personal assistant to get things done in more helpful, proactive, and natural ways.

• Microsoft HoloLens is, says the vendor, the world’s first fully untethered holographic computing device. On-stage at WPC, CEO Satya Nadella demonstrated how a partner will use HoloLens to change how design professionals and create, communicate, visualise and work.

To enable partners to take advantage of these innovations, Microsoft announced:

Expansion of its Cloud Solution Provider (CSP)program to cover additional markets (bringing the total number to approximately 131), as well as additional cloud solutions – CRM Online and Azure will join Office 365, Intune and Enterprise Mobility Suite.

Creating additional Surface opportunities: More partners will be able to sell the device – from ‘a couple hundred to a few thousand partners’ globally, in the coming months.

• Investing in mobility: Competencies for Windows 10 and Enterprise Mobility Suite, which will enable partners to differentiate and grow their mobility practices, are in the pipeline.

• Additional productivity investments: A new premium Office 365 enterprise suite called E5 will be available before the end of this year. The suite will provide a new opportunity for partners to build service offerings around real-time communication and analytics.