Digital transformation has become a top strategic priority for companies as 94% of organizations have initiatives underway to adopt new technologies and 66% expect to accelerate these efforts post COVID-19 according to research by Everest Group.
The demand for solutions to digitize processes, build intuitive apps, derive intelligence from data and automate repetitive tasks has skyrocketed. At the same time, constraints around specialty skills and software development costs are pushing companies to consider simplified low-code approaches.
This is where Microsoft Power Platform comes in as a gamechanger.
What is Microsoft Power Platform?
Microsoft Power Platform is an enterprise low-code platform to boost business productivity through solutions built around four key workstreams:
- Power Apps – Quickly build custom line-of-business apps
- Power Automate – Automate workflows across systems
- Power BI – Connect data and derive analytical insights
- Power Virtual Agents – Create no code chatbots
Leading companies like Adobe, Schneider Electric, Toyota Material Handling are using Power Platform to digitize processes, embed intelligence in apps, automate high-volume repetitive tasks and derive unified data insights.
Over 10 million monthly active users leverage Power Platform today indicating its rapid mainstream adoption.
Power Platform evolved from Microsoft‘s earlier products – PowerApps, Power BI and Flow which merged under one banner in 2019. With deeper integration, Microsoft has taken Power Platform beyond being just a collection of low-code apps to an enterprise automation engine.
Let‘s explore the key components in more detail:
Power Apps – Build Apps 10x Faster
Power Apps enables anyone even without traditional software development skills to build custom line-of-business apps tailored to business needs.
Forrester projects over 500 million app developer jobs in the market by 2024 indicating the scale of this opportunity.
Some examples across industries:
- Field technicians use inspection and work order management apps
- Healthcare providers digitize patient engagement with self-service apps
- Engineers build apps to collect and analyze quality metrics
- IT uses apps to manage assets, resolve tickets faster
Flexible development
Apps can be built via 3 approaches in Power Apps:
-
Canvas apps – Blank canvas for maximum customization and advanced embed capabilities
-
Model-driven apps – Quick no-code development based on Common Data Model
-
Portal apps – Customer-facing websites with forms, case management etc.
Power Apps has over 300 connectors to seamlessly integrate with essential platforms like SharePoint, Excel, Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, Salesforce, SAP, Oracle and more.
Apps are fully responsive for mobile devices supporting desktops, laptops, tablets and mobile experiences.
Faster delivery with greater control
According to IDG survey, Power Apps delivers 5x faster development with 40% cost reduction versus custom coding.
Forrester study shows Power Apps has the lowest total cost of ownership over 3 years compared to Appian and Outsystems.
It brings IT more close to the business side by enabling citizen development while still providing oversight through admin controls.
Power BI – Uncover Data-driven Insights
Forrester notes analytics translates to $3.1M average annual benefit based on their industry research.
Power BI makes it possible to easily connect 1000+ data sources, uncover insights to drive forecasts and projections, deliver interactive reports and create automated datasets refreshed from source systems.
It empowers a self-service analytics approach with AI capabilities like:
- AutoML for predictive modelling
- Natural language queries
- Anomaly detection
- Forecasting
- Personalized recommendations
Leading companies leverage Power BI across use cases:
- Sales leaders use it to track regional targets
- Marketing teams gauge campaign ROI
- Finance controls budget vs. actuals
- Service delivery improves turnaround times
- Operational efficiency is optimized via utilization reports
Seamless integration with Office 365 and availability across web and mobile makes Power BI highly intuitive for business users without extensive training. With push dataset feature, Power BI proactively keeps dashboards updated enabling faster decisions.
Power Automate – Minimize Manual Work
Be it Employees spending over 60% of time on mundane tasks or Customers waiting weeks for information, lack of workflow automation causes inefficiencies across the board.
Power Automate provides a straightforward approach to link commonly used apps thereby eliminating repetitive and error-prone manual steps between business systems like Office 365, Dynamics 365, SharePoint, SAP, Oracle Cloud and hundreds of others.
Some examples of automation scenarios:
- Auto populate SharePoint lists by syncing data from SQL Server nightly
- Enable self-service password resets via automated workflows rather than helpdesk tickets
- Simplify leave approvals by routing as review requests based on policies
- Drive process efficiency and compliance using approval workflows with built-in controls
Point-and-click configuration steps make it easy for line of business experts to build flows with pre-built templates. At the same time, enterprise scalability, streaming analytics and AI capabilities cater to complex integration needs.
Leading research advisory firm reports Power Automate results in 70% faster development of automated solutions versus writing custom code. This fuels rapid ROI along with deeper visibility and manageability.
Power Virtual Agents – Conversational Experiences
Chatbots and virtual agents are increasingly preferred by customers for quick access to information. Gartner forecasts 25% of digital workers will use virtual assistants daily by 2021.
Power Virtual Agents enables anyone to create powerful bots that can handle thousands of conversations without coding. Users can easily build engaging voice and text-based conversations leveraging 300+ pre-built connectors.
For example:
HR helpdesk bot answers employee queries on policies
IT self-service bot for password resets, how-to guides
Customer service bot provides order status, warranty, troubleshooting tips
The bot automatically improves over time using AI and recommendations engine analyzing past conversations. It can be embedded seamlessly across websites, mobile apps and messaging platforms.
Within a year of launch, Power Virtual Agents has been used by 5000+ organizations to create chatbots improving customer and employee experience.
Integrated, Intelligent and Scalable
While the individual components of Power Platform target distinct scenarios from apps to automation to analytics and conversational AI, the integrated experience across the apps unlocks further synergies.
For instance, apps can embed flows for structured business processes. Analytical dashboards can have near real-time data from apps via virtual table connections. Bots can execute automation flows to complete transactions like raising tickets, updating lists, fetching data etc.
Power Platform builds on Microsoft Cloud‘s robust data management, security and compliance capabilities leveraging:
Common Data Service – A scalable cloud database helping consolidate data across apps and experiences. It enforces consistency, validation rules and business logic through a unified data model.
Over 300 connectors – Pre-built gateways to streamline integration across on-premise and cloud data sources along with services like Automate, Azure AI, Microsoft Graph. Support for open API connectivity options like REST, SOAP and GraphQL cement extensibility.
Enterprise gateway – Provides easy connectivity to on-prem data and backup options along with built-in monitoring, load balancing capabilities.
Highest Rated Low-Code Platform
Microsoft has been recognized as a leader in Enterprise Low Code Development Platforms across research assessments by Gartner, Forrester, IDC.
Power Platform highest rated low-code development platform overall based on analyst surveys. It scored very high on measures of delivery speed, developer productivity, end user satisfaction.
Over 95% of customers surveyed confirmed Power Platform delivered the expected business benefits and ROI based on a study by TechValidate.
Global organizations across industries now leverage Power Platform realizing hard dollar cost savings and productivity gains for business and IT teams.
Let‘s look at some examples:
Manufacturing – Toyota Industries Corporation developed over 50 custom Power Apps to digitize processes saving 5000+ hours annually. Airbus built a Power App using IoT data from aircraft improving production efficiencies.
Energy – Petro Rabigh automated over 45 business processes through Power Automate reducing cost by 6 figures annually.
Professional Services – KPMG improved field workforce productivity using capacity planning and work order management Power Apps.
Healthcare – Partners HealthCare uses Power BI dashboards to track surgery turnaround improvements.
The proven ROI, enthusiastic customer testimonials and rapid mainstream adoption underline Power Platform‘s position as an indispensable enterprise solution today.
Getting Started
These practical tips can help you drive adoption:
Start small – Identify early use cases like automating employee onboarding, building helpdesk ticketing app or VPN connectivity analytics. Quick wins help showcase possibilities and value.
Empower teams – Explore citizen development model allowing business users to create solutions ensuring proper governance.
Consider integration – Audit existing apps/infrastructure like legacy systems, custom or packaged apps like SAP, Salesforce to determine integration approach.
Upskill resources – Microsoft Learn provides free hands-on training covering fundamentals to deep technical content on Power Platform. Consider getting resources certified on PL-100 exam as well.
Governance first – Plan permission policies, prevent oversharing of apps and manage dependencies proactively else it can quickly spiral out of control. Center of Excellence model works best.
There has never been a better time to leverage low code platforms like Microsoft Power Platform to drive competitive advantage. The capabilities seamlessly bring together rapid app development, automation, actionable analytics and conversational AI – ingredients that fuel transformation.
