Microsoft Dynamics 365 | AI Functionality in Business Central (Demo)

Microsoft has introduced a number of AI enhancements into Dynamics 365 Business Central. Let’s take a quick look at these.

Analyzing Customer Ledger Entries

The first thing I want to look at is the customer Ledger entries from Business Central. I’m going to download those into Excel and then run Copilot on it using this prompt right here.

Accessing Business Central Data

Here’s my Business Central tenant, and I’m going to open up the customer Ledger entry. This is a standard list in Business Central, and I’m going to look just at the invoices.

Uploading Data to Copilot

Once downloaded into Excel, I’ll upload the data to Copilot so it can analyze this data. As soon as I do that, it activates Copilot. You can see it load up here.

Generating Results

This is the way it looks in the Office apps. It’s an icon. Here. I’m going to click on that. The way that generated AI usually works is that the user provides a prompt. Copilot will take that and give results. So I’m going to put my prompt in right here.

Generating Marketing Text with AI

Creating Marketing Descriptions

Now, let’s generate marketing text or descriptions for an item in Dynamics 365 Business Central. I’m not going to generate the description that’s over here. I’m going to generate something that would be used on a website or an e-commerce platform.

Using Copilot

I’m going to create with Copilot here. This is the name of the feature in Dynamics 365 Business Central. So it’s generated the description.

Customizing Output

There are different formats I can use. I could just use the tagline which is the first line in the marketing text. Or I can use a paragraph which is a further description of this item.

Reconciliation with Copilot

Matching Transactions

Let’s explore Copilot’s ability to match transactions from Business Central to a few entries from your bank statement. Here’s my bank reconciliation. Now, let’s take a look at reconciling with Copilot.

Previewing Matches

Copilot will look at all the data in the bank reconciliation module and attempt to make a match between the bank statement and the Business Central data.

Accepting Matches

Here you can see it comes up with some matches and it allows you to preview the matches before you accept them.

Forecasting with Business Central

Forecasting Methods

In this section, I’ll delve into forecasting methods available in Business Central, exploring how to set up and run forecasts for items.

Running Forecasts

Let’s update the forecast. This is a combination of those two methods that we looked at earlier.

Interpreting Results

You’ll see it change slightly. So now it’s moved up. It’s just using the one method and the forecast is a little higher.

AI-Powered Predictive Analysis

Predictive Invoice Analysis

Business Central’s AI capabilities include predictive analysis for invoice payments, helping forecast payment behavior based on customer history and invoice data.

Reviewing Predictions

One way to look at the results is to go to the Role Center for the business manager. These are invoices predicted to be overdue.

Analyzing Confidence Levels

The system also assigns confidence to this prediction. You can see in this case it’s very high.

Enhancing Cash Flow Management

Cash Flow Forecasting

Business Central offers robust cash flow forecasting tools, allowing users to visualize and manage cash flow effectively.

Customizing Forecasts

I can also add manual revenue or expenses. Let’s do that.

Leveraging AI Insights

If you’re not yet using cash flow forecasting and Dynamics 365 Business Central, you should really try it out.

Creating User Documentation and Presentations with Copilot

Document Creation

With Copilot, I can easily create user documentation, such as guides for creating general journal entries in Dynamics 365 Business Central.

Formatting Assistance

This is why it’s nice to have Copilot inside of Word because it will do the formatting for you.

Presentation Development

Additionally, Copilot streamlines the creation of PowerPoint presentations, enabling quick generation of slides based on user prompts.

Streamlined Workflow

This is an easy way to start on the presentation. If you’ve got an idea, something you want to do in PowerPoint, you can start it off with Copilot and then work from there.

We just took a quick look at a number of AI enhancements that Microsoft has put into Dynamics 365 Business Central. They’re easy to set up and easy to use. I think you’ll find them useful in your business.