Migrate From NAV To Business Central

Migrate from NAV to Business Central to avail powerful features along with exceptional cloud capabilities to boost your business for rapid growth and high revenue. For growing SMBs, Microsoft Business Central has become the right choice for businesses that need a simple yet powerful ERP solution.

Modern businesses rely on facts and data to decide what’s good for the business or not. Such business owners make data-driven choices to support the growth of their businesses using existing resources.

You might agree with me when I say NAV is an amazing tool and should be implemented in all businesses to make business management easy.

With over 125,000+ clients and more than 2,000,000 users around the globe, it is one of the most popular ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) solutions.

Developed by Microsoft, it can be implemented in any business to streamline entire operations, whether simple or complex.

Being a popular ERP solution, growing businesses are still migrating to Business Central.

Don’t you think it's a little absurd?

Yes, this is a little weird, but you will grasp the explanation behind it.

Modern businesses are evolving rapidly, and so are the ways of business management. A lot of the features and capabilities of NAV, or Microsoft Navision, have become outdated, making businesses struggle with the management of entire business processes.

This has become the top reason for businesses moving from NAV to Business Central. This migration will let the business leverage the latest features and functionalities to boost growth.

Before discussing further about Business Central, let’s get an overview of Microsoft NAV.

Microsoft NAV - Outdated yet Powerful ERP Solution

Microsoft Dynamics NAV, formerly known as Navision, is an ERP solution developed by Microsoft to ease business management for small and medium-size organisations.

This is so powerful that it can streamline, control, and manage various departments altogether, like finance, accounts, supply chain, inventory, customer relationships, and more.

Being hosted on on-premises servers, Microsoft NAV works best when it comes to managing traditional business operations.

But businesses need advanced technologies to stay ahead of the competition.

This was the major drawback for NAV users, as they became restricted in their ease of data access. To resolve modern challenges, a business needs to access data 24X7 so that they can take actionable data-driven decisions whenever required.

In 2018, Microsoft upgraded Dynamics NAV to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central with new and advanced capabilities. It lets the business deal with modern-day challenges while simplifying existing business operations.

Introducing Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central: An All-in-One ERP Solution for Smooth Business Management

Dynamics 365 Business Central is a powerful ERP solution available for users to manage entire business operations in real-time. It provides a centralised platform to operate all processes while supervising the task in real-time to make data-driven decisions whenever needed.

Business Central allows users to communicate, collaborate, and share the data using a single, unified platform to make the data accessible to all, whether an executive or a higher authority.

With a cloud-based deployment, Business Central is flexible in nature, enabling users to customise the system based on changing business needs.

The flexibility to change business requirements makes this solution ideal for all industries, including service, manufacturing, and distribution.

When it comes to scalability, no one is better than Business Central for SMBs. As it allows the organisation to expand or shorten processes whenever requirements change.

Here comes cloud computing, capable of simplifying existing processes while offering global connectivity for optimal performance.

The cloud deployment of Business Central allows businesses to access and operate the data 24X7 to keep you informed about your business in real-time.

However, if you still want to host the data in-house and want to access global connectivity, you can avail yourself of the hybrid deployment option. While categorising your requirements.

The cloud options cost way less when compared with the on-premises deployment because users can access the cloud on a subscription basis. However, if you are going for on-premises deployment, you may have to invest a lot of money and effort in setting up the servers.

Why Should you Migrate from NAV to Business Central?

For all growing businesses, employing a simple yet powerful ERP solution is a must to manage and control a business. If you are looking to boost your business while gaining simplicity, you should go for NAV migration from Business Central.

Based on current market scenarios, the capabilities of NAV perform like an outdated solution. Still, some organisations are using it to deal with their business management.

If you feel the same, is your NAV compatible with your changing business needs?

You most likely answered NO. Because it lacks many core features and benefits essential for today’s market demands.

Another important reason for moving from NAV to Business Central is that Microsoft has stopped launching new updates for NAV. The situation has become troublesome for existing users.

Also, Microsoft has stopped offering customer support to resolve any security or functionality issues. Such NAV users have to rely on their NAV support partner to get the business back on track whenever they encounter any issues with the system.

If you are a current user of NAV, you might be aware of the cumbersome process of updating the system, which normally takes days with on-premises servers. Even with a lot of resources and efforts to successfully install everything, there may still be some errors.

See Also - Why To Upgrade Dynamics NAV To Business Central

If you were working with Business Central Cloud, all updates would be installed by Microsoft automatically without hampering the current system.

Generally, Microsoft releases updates in April and October every year.

Journey from Navision to Business Central Migration: A Simple yet Effective Process

The process to migrate NAV to Business Central isn’t complex. However, you will need the right NAV migration partner, like Dynamics Square, to simplify the process. A step-by-step procedure will give you an overview of the process and the resources a partner would need to migrate successfully to Business Central.

1. Understanding Requirements

The first thing a NAV support partner or migration partner should do is know and understand the business requirements.

The partner will need accurate information about the current integrations and customizations and how they benefit the organisation.

Even the partner would ask about the future possibilities of customizations to ease the processes of growing the business.

2. Analyzing the Current NAV

After understanding the requirements, the business central implementation partner will analyse the current NAV system. Your partner will check various factors, like:

• Checking the version of NAV
• Evaluating the existing integrations
• Auditing the customizations
• Calculating the volume of data
• Measuring the amount of data to carry forward in the new system.

3. Migration to Business Central

When the NAV migration partner is ready with the data for a successful migration to Business Central, the core process of moving old data to the new system will start.

In this process, the unusable data will be removed, and the essential data will be moved to the new system based on your server deployment choice.

Also, the partner will install Business Central on new servers and later migrate the NAV configurations to them.

4. New ERP System Training

After the successful migration to Business Central, the partner will train the users with the new interface, features, and functionalities of Business Central.

Although it has a simple user interface, users still need an overview of the whole application.

Also, the NAV to Business Central migration partner will guide the users through the usage of integrations, customizations, and other advanced features.

How can Dynamics Square help you with the Seamless Migration Process?

Dynamics Square has been one of the leading Microsoft Support Partners in the UK, providing seamless services to migrate NAV to Business Central for years.

We have a team of 150+ Microsoft Certified Professionals serving 500+ clients around the globe to help them achieve their financial as well as growth goals.

For the last 12 years, we have been working for the organisation to provide flawless support and help them grow in high competition. Our team of professionals has immense knowledge of resolving errors in business management.

Being a Microsoft Solutions Partner, Dynamics Square understands the requirements of small and medium-sized businesses. Once we understand your entire business as well as its workings, we offer a personalised solution to aid your business's growth.

Most asked FAQs

How do I migrate from NAV 2016 to Business Central?

The migration process for all NAV versions to Business Central is the same. You can book a call with Dynamics Square to help you get started with the process.

What is the cost of NAV to Business Central Migration?

The cost of migration differs from one organisation to another. Also, the cost depends on the requirements, customisations, and integrations. For an exact quotation, you can contact Dynamics Square.

How much time will the migration take?

Time depends on the data you want to move from your old system to the new system and the kind of customisations you need with Business Central. However, an executive of Dynamics Square can help you with the exact time and quotations. 

See Also -

• Why Microsoft Dynamics NAV used for?
• Top Reasons For Migrating From Dynamics GP To D365 Business Central
• How Successful Is Your Dynamics NAV Implementation?