Tag Archives: April 2024

Microsoft Planner

In April 2024 Microsoft released a new Planner app in Microsoft Teams for Office 365 E1/E3/F3, Microsoft 365 E3/E5/F1/F3 and Microsoft 365 Business Basic/Standard/Premium customers. At that time, Project Plan 1 was renamed Planner Plan 1 and includes the new Planner as well as further, premium project management features.

This month, October 2024, the Product Terms is updated for the renaming of Project Plan 3 to Planner and Project Plan 3, and Project Plan 5 to Planner and Project Plan 5.

Compare the different project management offerings here: https://bit.ly/40gTmv4, and find a useful FAQ on the changes here: https://bit.ly/4fe1WyZ.

Viva feature comparison table

There’s an updated (April 2024) Viva feature comparison table, a very useful document that covers the Viva family of products and the various components. There are a few changes made to align it with some recent Microsoft announcements.

Firstly, a new column has been added for Viva Pulse – now available as a standalone licence costing $2 per user per month (https://bit.ly/3QHtAe0).

Additionally, the reference to Topics in Viva has been removed, as Viva Topics will be retired in February 2025 (https://bit.ly/3UGfACb).

And, notably, the document now specifies which Viva product requires a Microsoft Teams license, considering that Teams is now sold separately from the Office 365/Microsoft 365 suites (https://bit.ly/3vC9SZR).

Get this updated comparison table here: https://bit.ly/3UYgBHh.

Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (April 2024) Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide which is updated for the availability of Supply Chain Management Premium. This gives new SCM demand planning capabilities powered by Copilot, and it’s licensed via a User Subscription Licence costing $300 per user per month, with a minimum purchase of 10 licences. Pages 28 – 31 of the guide are updated where it’s easy to see which features are exclusive to this new licence.

Find the updated guide here: https://bit.ly/3xFRi3i.

 Power Platform Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (April 2024) Power Platform Licensing Guide with a couple of changes.

Firstly, it’s updated for the new Finance Premium and Supply Chain Management licences – both licensed per user per month at $300.

Then there are some wording changes which make it sound like there are some new licences… Previously, use rights for Power Apps/Automate included in some Microsoft 365/Office 365 licences were called just that – “included use rights”. Now, the set of Power Apps rights included in Microsoft 365/Office 365 licences is called Power Apps Basic (see page 11), and likewise for Power Automate Basic (page 17).

Get the updated guide here: https://bit.ly/4aJbQ9m.

Changes to Office/Microsoft 365 and Teams

In October 2023, Microsoft made changes to Office 365 and Microsoft 365 licences for customers in the EEA and Switzerland. Essentially, these changes removed Teams from certain suites for customers who had never purchased Office/Microsoft 365 before. You can get up to speed on that on our blog here.

Now, from 1April, 2024 those changes are extended to the rest of the world, described by Microsoft in an article here. In essence, the news is the same as for the EEA and Switzerland, so here’s the summary:

A customer outside the EEA and Switzerland who has not purchased Office 365 E1/E3/E5 or Microsoft 365 E3/E5 before 1 April, 2024 must now buy “(no Teams)” SKUs – which, as the names suggest, don’t include Teams. If the customer does want Teams, then they need to additionally purchase a separate Teams Enterprise User SL for their users. If they HAVE purchased any of the original licences before 1 April then they can add more licences and renew existing Subscriptions. Alternatively they can buy the new licences, and even mix and match them with the new licences if they want to.

For Microsoft 365 Business Basic/Standard/Premium, customers in the affected regions will be able to choose the original offerings that include Teams or the new (no Teams) flavours. The same goes for Microsoft 365 F1/F3 and Office 365 F3.

This site, aimed at partners, has a lot of additional resources that might be useful.