Category Archives: Uncategorized

Windows 365 Frontline is generally available

Microsoft announce that Windows 365 Frontline is generally available. Users need to be licensed with Windows 11 Enterprise, Microsoft Intune and Azure Active Directory Premium Plan 1, and Window 365 Frontline plans start at $42 per 3 users per month.

Get an overview of Windows 365 Frontline on our blog here: https://bit.ly/479OhFT, pricing information across the 11 different Cloud PC configurations here: https://bit.ly/44Oywm3, and the excellent announcement article with lots more useful information here: https://bit.ly/3rLf8aZ.

Changes to Power Automate licensing

Microsoft announce that a new product – Power Automate Process Mining – will be available from 1 August, 2023, and that there will be other changes to Power Automate licensing starting on that date too.

First of all, a new Power Automate Premium licence replaces both the Per User ($15 per month) and Per User with Attended RPA ($40 per month) licences. The price of the new licence will be $15 per month, and allows users access to Cloud Flows (DPA) and Desktop Flows (RPA) in attended mode. This is what the old Per User with Attended RPA included, but the new licence also gives entitlements to the new Power Automate Process Mining capabilities.

Next, there’s a new Power Automate Process licence. This can either be used for running unattended Desktop Flows (replacing the Unattended RPA licence) or for Cloud Flows used by an unlimited number of users in an organisation (replacing the Flow licence).

Power Automate Process Mining is a tool which can help customers to understand what is happening across their business and to reduce the complexity of their processes. Organisations can get started with Power Automate Process Mining using the entitlements in the Power Automate Premium licence and then (as required) purchasing a Power Automate Process Mining Add-on licence for an additional 100 GB of Process Mining data storage which will cost $5,000 per tenant per month.

Find the announcement article with more information on Power Automate Process Mining here: https://bit.ly/476AP5Q.

Azure Active Directory becomes Microsoft Entra ID

Microsoft announce that Azure Active Directory will be renamed to Microsoft Entra ID from 1 October, 2023.  There are no changes to any functionality or costs, and there’s no action for customers.

You can find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3Ddt9km, and this page has further useful information including some FAQs: https://bit.ly/43EgdPr.

Teams Rooms licensing enforcement grace period

Teams Rooms devices must be licensed with device licences rather than user licences from 1 July, 2023 (see our blog: https://bit.ly/3rdKRkS). However, there’s now a grace period delaying technical enforcement until 30 September, 2023 to give customers more time to get compliant.

Find details of this and other useful information in an FAQ here: https://bit.ly/43ft7mu.

Reservation utilisation alerts

Reservations are a great way of saving money in Azure if you can commit to a 1-year or 3-year term for services such as virtual machine compute. However, savings are only made if the Reservations are used, stopping Pay-As-You-Go charges. Administrators have historically been able to view utilisation rates in the Azure Management Portal, but there’s now a new alert feature which sends an email whenever a Reservation exhibits low utilisation.

See the announcement article here: https://bit.ly/3qZSxah, and find information on how to set these alerts up here: https://bit.ly/44ocFRN.

Azure Standard Support plan offer extended

Customers buying their Azure services through an Enterprise Agreement or via the MCA-E have long been eligible for a free 12-month Azure Standard Support plan, and Microsoft confirm that this offer will be extended from 1 July, 2023 to 31 December, 2023.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3JA2cuD, terms of the offer here: https://bit.ly/3CTFrhq, and a useful comparison of all the Azure Support plans here: https://bit.ly/44i3x1h.

Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (June 2023) Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide with a couple of updates. Firstly, the Base and Attach licences table is updated on page 4 to show that Business Central Premium licences qualify as Base licences for Dynamics 365 Sales Enterprise and Customer Service Enterprise Attach licences. Then there’s additional information added on pages 57 to 59 to clarify the Power Platform use rights included in the Dynamics 365 product licences.

Get this updated guide here: https://bit.ly/3NbJGv6.

Azure Advisor custom lookback period

Azure Advisor can help with recommendations on how you can save money in Azure, and one thing it does is to look back at virtual machine usage to see if it can identify idle or underutilized virtual machines. The default lookback period is seven days, but now customers can adjust the lookback period to 14, 21, 30, 60, or 90 days if it’s more relevant for their business. Find the announcement article here: https://bit.ly/3pULS0s.