Microsoft Ignite 2021: 6 Places to Pay Attention

Microsoft Ignite 2021’s spring event is a 48-hour livestreaming event, and although viewing from home offices means no travel or weird hotel set-ups, attendees would still do well to pay attention to the key areas Microsoft will zero in on during this event.

According to Microsoft communications VP Frank X. Shaw, there are six subject areas to pay attention to during Microsoft Ignite 2021. Since Ignite is historically Microsoft’s way of alerting its userbase where the company’s priorities are headed, these six key subject areas are the ones to try and check out over today and tomorrow.

Number One: Continued Cloud Innovation and Control

Microsoft Azure provides an entire range of companies, from startups to enterprises, with the cloud services they need to run their companies. Shaw says this includes cloud services and developer tools at the scale and security necessary to support their work at any stage of working within the cloud.

The following products and services are being announced at Ignite 2021 to support these types of customers:

Number Two: Security Is Everyone’s Priority

“As recent attacks have proven, security is more critical than ever,” Shaw said. He says the company’s one-two punch of an integrated end-to-end approach and AI and automation lets it offer solutions that combine security, compliance, identity and management “as an interdependent whole so that everything can be protected.”

Shaw said, “with these we tackle security from all angles, at scale, so you can protect everything across the platforms you use.”

For Microsoft, this approach incorporates security, compliance, identity, and management to protect everything in one package within Microsoft and to other systems outside of the company.

At Microsoft Ignite 2021, key announcements around security include:

Number Three: Solutions for the Hybrid Working World

As companies and organizations begin planning to transition their workforces to a post-pandemic working environment, hybrid work solutions will become more critical to successful business processes.

“We make think of 2020 as the year work moved home, but in reality, it’s the year work moved to the cloud,” Shaw said, paraphrasing Microsoft 365 vice president Jared Spataro. Microsoft Teams is the signature product demonstrating this.

During Microsoft Ignite 2021, Teams innovation will include announcements around these areas:

Number Four: Help Businesses Adapt and Innovate for a Great Customer Experience

Dynamics 365, Microsoft’s business processes product, will be integrated into Teams to bring together these two services for collaboration across business processes right inside of Teams.

This new relationship between the two platforms will enable the use of Teams-specific features such as webinars and all their related data to be accessed by sales, marketing, customer service to build and maintain customer relationships.

According to Shaw, these new integrations will improve workflows across an organization and allow employees to stay focused within their workflow whether inside of Dynamics 365 or Teams.

Number Five: Connecting Low-Code Experiences Across the Business

During Microsoft Ignite 2021, two new Power Platform updates will be announced to continue the development of this platform for professional and citizen developers:

“We’ve seen amazing adoption among citizen developers creating low-code apps and automations without having to wring any code,” Shaw said. “In addition, there’s growing interest from professional developers who use low-code alongside professional developer tools to get straightforward projects done quickly so they can focus on more demanding projects.”

Note: We have covered the low-code-no-code platforms currently provided by Google, Amazon, and Microsoft over the last several months.

Number Six: Three New Industry Clouds

Last week, Microsoft announced three new industry clouds for organizations in manufacturing, financial services, and for nonprofits. These now join existing industry clouds provided by Microsoft for healthcare and retail.

The idea, according to Shaw, is that each of these unique industry focused cloud solutions provide a seamless environment to conduct their specific cross-industry workflows.

Shaw described them as clouds that can speak an industry’s language.

“Microsoft industry clouds bring together the breadth of our offerings across Microsoft 365 and teams, Azure, Power Platform, Dynamics 365, and Microsoft Security and are underpinned by a common data model, new capabilities, customizations, and standards unique to each industry.” he added.

Ultimately, the goal with these new industry-related clouds is to help organizations in these areas more efficiently adopt the cloud to improve overall business and productivity inside and outside of their company.