If you’re like the finance leaders I work with, your Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) platform is an integral part of the way you do business. It helps you stay on top of your goals, minimizes errors and builds efficiencies into the processes you have in place.
But implementing an ERP solution? Well, that can be a daunting task for any finance team.
In my role at Endeavour Solutions—a Microsoft implementation, integration and training partner—I’ve seen that challenge firsthand. An ERP migration can be exceptionally disruptive to day-to-day business. After all, it’s a massive, complex project—and because of that, a lot of companies put it off as long as they can.
As a result, the news that Microsoft is sunsetting its Microsoft Dynamics Great Plains (GP) ERP platform at the end of 2029 is concerning for many businesses. But it doesn’t have to be.
As a legacy, non-cloud-native solution, Dynamics GP always had some limitations compared to other solutions on the market. Microsoft is discontinuing support for the platform for just that reason, wanting to focus on more innovative, competitive offerings instead.
But that also means, as we reach the Microsoft Dynamics GP (Great Plains) end of life, an opportunity exists for businesses to move to a solution that offers more functionality and lays the foundation for further innovation. One that's also more flexible and scalable to your business needs.
A solution like Microsoft Business Central Cloud-ERP.
And by following the right steps and keeping some best practices in mind, you can streamline your Great Plains to Business Central migration, while enhancing your ERP experience overall.
What Microsoft Dynamics GP Users Need To Know
Before we get into the how, let’s consider some key dates you need to know when it comes to the Microsoft Great Plains end of life.
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January 15, 2025: Microsoft extended the deadline for end of support of Dynamics GP from October 1, 2029 to December 31, 2029 to allow clients to have one final year-end update in 2029 if needed. Microsoft also highlighted an offer for extended security updates until April 2031 though specific details were not provided.
If your business is currently using Dynamics GP, you’ll want to start making plans to transition to a different ERP solution, so that you’re not scrambling when the end of 2029 arrives.
So, what choices do you have when it comes to migrating your ERP functions?
Assessing Your ERP Options
Before jumping into any ERP investment, it’s important that you understand your business needs and the vision of your leadership team. Some important points to consider will be:
Are there any new efficiencies that can be mined by streamlining your processes and supporting them in a new ERP? How can you best support those changes?
Once you have a clear idea of what you want in your new ERP environment, there are a variety of platforms to choose from. The Great Plains end of life gives you the chance to assess all of them against your business needs.
Here are some of the most popular options available today:
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Microsoft Business Central: Microsoft’s suggested replacement to Dynamics GP is, Dynamics 365 Business Central. Now a relatively mature Cloud-based ERP, Business Central automates and improves processes across finance, sales, inventory management, manufacturing and supply chain management. It also offers AI capabilities and built-in connections with other Microsoft 365 solutions as well as industry specific third-party systems.
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NetSuite ERP: Oracle’s ERP platform for small and mid-sized businesses, NetSuite, automates financial processes and provides better visibility into inventory, procurement manufacturing, and supply chain needs. It’s a scalable option with AI capabilities and deep industry expertise.
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Sage Intacct: Featuring automation capabilities and real-time insights, Sage Intacct offers solutions for accounting, payroll and HR, with dashboards and multi-dimensional reporting functionality.
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SAP Business One: A small business ERP solution, SAP Business One offers integrated business intelligence to help manage processes across accounting, purchasing, inventory, manufacturing and sales.
Want a more detailed breakdown of the ERP options available? Read our comparison of 15 of the best ERP systems on the market.
As you’re assessing your choices, look for outside insights from industry associations or experts. Map your key processes to the new systems you’re evaluating. Decide on the benchmarks you want to use for success, and how the functionality of each solution will help you meet them.
In other words, consider your destination, then map out the best path for getting there. This will help you determine the ideal tool for your specific needs.
For many current Dynamics GP (Great Plains) users who are used to the Microsoft ecosystem of applications, Dynamics 365 Business Central Cloud-ERP—is the most obvious choice. It’s also the alternative recommended by Microsoft itself.
So, let’s look at what you need to know if you’re considering migrating from Great Plains, now considered a legacy ERP, to a new modern Cloud-based ERP such as Business Central.
Great Plains vs. Business Central: Key Differences To Expect
Before you start a Great Plains to Business Central migration, let’s consider what you can expect from the new technology, and how it may be different from what you’re already used to.
Cloud Infrastructure
One of the key differences is that, as a legacy application, Great Plains was originally built as an on-premise platform. Only later was it updated to operate on cloud-based servers.
Business Central, on the other hand, has been designed as a Software as a Service (SaaS) cloud-based ERP with a native-cloud infrastructure. This means it is hosted in a Microsoft data centre, running on the same infrastructure as Microsoft 365, Exchange Online, Teams, SharePoint, Power BI and other cloud applications used by large multinational corporations that demand the highest level of security and data protection.
The enhanced security measures used by Microsoft for Business Central far exceed what most users would expect to have with Dynamics GP.
Flexibility and Customizability
As a legacy solution, Great Plains can be somewhat rigid, making it difficult to customize to your business needs. Business Central doesn’t have those same restrictions, offering several customization options and a large online marketplace of specialty extensions and applications to help meet functional or industry specific needs. This makes it easier for businesses to put the platform to work for their unique use cases.
Scalability
Many finance teams liked Dynamics GP for its scalability. But the cloud-based Business Central ERP is even more scalable, especially with the speed of the Microsoft cloud platform, meaning you’ll be able to quickly adapt as your business grows.
Integrations
Like Dynamics GP, Business Central integrates with other Microsoft tools such as Excel and Microsoft Exchange. Within the Microsoft Cloud, these embedded integrations are even more widespread and happen seamlessly with Microsoft 365 without added costs or fees outside of the subscriptions for the tools themselves.
Productivity tools such as Microsoft 365, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft Teams all come pre-integrated, as well as other Microsoft products such as Power BI and Power Apps.
With the well documented Cloud APIs (Application Programming Interface) for Business Central, custom and pre-built integrations are available for a wide range of third-party applications—including Vena.
Feature Set
Unlike Great Plains, Business Central offers advanced AI features, Microsoft Copilot capabilities and a range of other advanced applications. Manufacturing and Supply Chain Management are stronger within Business Central, which also has built-in CRM functions. The comprehensive functionality of the core financials (GL, AP, and AR) along with built-in workflow automation can greatly help to enhance efficiency, productivity and collaboration for your team.
Migrating To Business Central: A Step by Step Guide
“When we transitioned from Great Plains to Business Central, we wanted all that same detail and information coming in,” says Rebecca Swank, Director of Finance and Business Intelligence for the Kansas City Chiefs.
The NFL team has already made the move to get ahead of the Microsoft Dynamics GP end of life, knowing that transitioning all of their people, data and processes to Business Central would be a huge undertaking. They planned accordingly to make the migration as smooth as possible.
And a planned out, methodical approach to your Business Central Cloud ERP migration—like the one the Chiefs took—is key.
Here’s a step-by-step approach you can follow on your own Cloud-ERP migration journey:
Step 1: Understand Your Needs—and the Risks
Before you even begin your Microsoft Dynamics GP to Business Central migration, take some time to audit your existing system and build out a map of how all the individual components connect—and how, ideally, you want them to as you go forward.
During this step, think about which processes are running smoothly—and which aren’t—and where changes could help your business run more smoothly. While some of your current workflows are critical to your business success, others may actually be slowing you down. Now’s the time to plan out how you’re going to fix that.
At this stage, you’ll also want to identify any business processes, ERP functions, and outside applications that are dependent on each other and need to stay connected in your new system. Thinking ahead to the end-user experience and flow of data will help to reduce friction within your migration project, and ultimately improve executive buy-in and end-user adoption.
Understanding these challenges early will help you mitigate risk and plan for them as you progress.
Step 2: Define Your Goals
As with any large project, scope creep can be a common hazard of an ERP implementation. To avoid it, set the expectations of your Dynamics GP to Business Central migration early.
Understand clearly what you want to achieve during the course of your migration. Then, map those goals out against your business processes, data and workflows to determine your specific needs and the top priorities for each department.
Break all of that down into manageable goals and determine the order in which you need to meet them, setting deadlines for each. Clearly define who’s responsible for every task so that nothing slips under the radar and you can take advantage of all the anticipated opportunities.
Defining your goals lets you understand and communicate your main objectives and helps you set an attainable timeline (and budget)—making the entire process more manageable from the start with fewer surprises as you reach your go-live.
Step 3: Clean Your Data Before the Migration Begins
Your data is obviously critical to your ERP success. So, don’t just dump that data into Business Central and be done with it.
Instead, ensure it’s clean, uncorrupted and accurate before you begin your migration. Then integrate Business Central with the third-party data sources you rely on.
By taking this time to assess your data and map it out appropriately, you’ll be setting yourself up for success in your new ERP environment, so that every process and workflow runs smoothly and is able to access the information it needs.
Also, don’t forget to test these data connections once they’re in place, to ensure everything is working smoothly.
Several clients we work with at Endeavour have chosen to integrate Vena with their Dynamics GP data to access the many great FP&A capabilities provided through the platform, such as scenario planning, budgeting, forecasting, and executive dashboards. As Vena works with both GP, Business Central and other cloud ERPs, you can easily keep your “clean” historical data in Vena for year-over-year trends after you’ve migrated to Business Central.
Step 4: Design and Optimize Your ERP Environment
Not to be overlooked, a strong analysis and design will help you (and your Microsoft partner if you’re working with one) configure Business Central to reflect your unique needs.
Although your company may have commonalities with others in your industry, you will no doubt have business processes and reporting needs that are unique to your organization. Thanks to Business Central’s flexibility, you can hone your ERP environment to meet your unique requirements.
And by aligning your ERP environment to your real on-the-ground processes, it becomes that much easier for your users to complete their day-to-day tasks efficiently.
A word of caution, be sure to talk to your users about their processes and how they’re currently carrying them out in Dynamics GP. Although both GP and Business Central are Microsoft ERPs, they behave and function quite differently and have different legacy vs. cloud interfaces.
Step 5: Get Your Users on Board
The most critical factor determining if your ERP migration is successful is whether end-users are actually adopting the new platform. That’s why it’s important to have a change management plan in place early on to ensure users are brought along for the ride.
To get your users on board, you’ll want to build out a training plan that teaches them everything they need to know about the new platform, both in terms of the application functions and the business processes themselves (especially considering any optimizations you’ve made as part of your review).
Openly communicate your goals and expectations throughout the migration process. This way users have a clear framework of what they need to know and why, and when to expect any and all changes.
User Acceptance Testing (UAT) is a good way to let users practice new functions in Business Central in a sandbox environment before final testing and preparation for go-live.
Step 6: Go Live and Continuous Improvement
After you’ve tested your new ERP environment and made any necessary changes so that it works as smoothly as possible, it’s time to schedule your go-live.
But, the project doesn’t end once you’re live.
You may need to continue to make tweaks to ensure your Business Central instance is set up exactly as you need it. Most consulting firms offer a two-to-four-week period of Hypercare support, to help users with their day-to-day operations, as well as key events such as your next period-end close.
This added level of guidance, paired with feedback from your end users helps to further refine your system and business processes. Referring back to Step 1 and Step 2 (understanding your business needs and setting organizational goals), a post go-live review will help measure the success of the project and identify areas for potential investments in future phases.
By doing so, you can continue to optimize your Business Central environment to ensure your team is getting everything they can from it.
4 More Tips for a Successful Migration
Any ERP migration is a complicated, multi-faceted project. The more knowledge you have going in, the better.
With that in mind, here are a few additional tips I’ve picked up working with our ERP clients:
1. Don’t Repeat Past Mistakes
Many organizations, when migrating to a new ERP, will simply move over the processes already in place—whether they actually work or not. But those processes may be inefficient or broken as is. In fact, it could be that they were originally designed to accommodate workarounds and make up for inefficiencies in your previous ERP. Moving over those processes as is will only repeat the same inefficiencies in your new system.
2. Protect What Makes Your Business Special
Your business, like most, likely has a “secret sauce” that makes it unique. And whatever that secret sauce is—your supply chain, maybe, or your billing model or planning insights—you want to protect it. So, pay attention during your ERP migration, to maintain and reinforce the processes that add to your own business’s unique formula.
3. Get Executive Involvement
Involvement from key executives—ideally right from the beginning of the migration process—goes a long way in overcoming resistance to change among your team and ensuring you have the resources in place to see your ERP implementation through.
In fact, I always recommend that several department heads get involved as early as the design phase of your ERP implementation—offering their input and signifying buy-in from the start.
4. Choose the Right Partner
If you’re working with an implementation partner, ensure you choose one that fits your business needs. Not all partners are the same, and neither are all finance teams. That makes finding the right match critical. For example, if your business’s main roadblock is in-house talent, strong project management skills may be particularly important in a potential partner.
Simplifying Your Business Central Migration with Vena
“We totally changed our Chart of Accounts,” Rebecca says. “We worked really closely with Vena to create a mapping table ... just making sure that everything that historically has been in Vena coming from Great Plains would still be accessible to people as they look at their forecasts or their budgets a year from now.”
The connector allowed the Chiefs to seamlessly integrate data from their new ERP, while updating reports and templates for a smooth transition. It also let them refresh the data connection between Vena and Business Central on their own, at any time, with minimal IT involvement.
Today, the Chiefs have introduced new best practices and efficiencies to their Vena and ERP usage. “With the Business Central connector, it’s an easier process than how we were pulling in Great Plains data in the past. So we’ve been really happy with the connector so far,” Rebecca says.
Moving Forward in Your New ERP Environment
Moving to a new ERP platform may be a complex undertaking, but with it comes an opportunity to reflect and improve on your processes, adding new best practices and efficiencies to the way you do business.
You should approach your Great Plains to Business Central migration with that in mind. But by following the steps above and considering the tips I’ve provided—and with help from third-party tools like Vena’s Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central connector—it doesn’t have to be as complicated as you think.
Before you know it, your business will be benefiting from the many advantages Business Central has to offer.
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