Thursday, 08 April 2021 01:32
Microsoft Power Automate makes it possible to grow your business productivity by automating repetitive, time-consuming tasks. Power Automate provides a better way to get things done across your organisation through digital and robotic process automation (RPA).

 

There are many areas that are being invested in for Power Automate as a part of 2021 release wave 1. First, Microsoft Teams, with more than 100 Million daily active users, is central to Microsoft's remote work strategy, and Power Automate is key to the Microsoft Teams extensibility strategy by providing automation for your collaboration scenarios. We will build more and easier entry points across the Microsoft Teams experience, such as in meetings/calendars and other types of conversations. It will also be possible for administrators to push solutions that contain flows across the teams in their organisation. 

For a full update list, please view HERE

Cloud Flow

In 2021 release wave 1, there are a number of different new capabilities for users of cloud flows (the flows that you build in the Power Automate portal which connect to 400+ services through connectors). This is our Digital Process Automation offering and covers:
  • • Flow creation
  • • Acquisition and retention
  • • Administration
  • • Lifecycle
  • •Integrations (Microsoft Dataverse, Dynamics 365, Azure, Microsoft 365, Microsoft Teams)

Unified Platform

Improved app selection and navigation in mobile apps allows users to quickly access and pin their apps enhancing their productivity whilst on the go. Additional capability is enabled for users, app makers and admins across model driven apps and canvas apps. One of the top ones has to be the new in app notifications feature, which allows notifications to be pushed direct to specific users through external systems, Power Automate or from within the system in the notifications centre. Other capabilities include the merging of records, enhanced UX improvements for Subgrids and improved app discovery and navigation. 

Deep Integration with Teams

From within the Solutions area in Power Automate, you'll now have the opportunity to bring an entire solution to Microsoft Teams so that you can package up flows, apps, and more within a single Microsoft Teams app. You can then bring the app to your tenant's app catalogue so that other parts of your environment can install and use the solution in just a few clicks.

 

Microsoft will be trying to bring its workplace collaboration tool, Microsoft Teams more in line with its Power Platform. You will see that Power Platform dashboards, apps & automations are available within Teams – adaptive cards and bots can be accessed through conversations.

Power Automate goes RPA (Robotic Process Automation)

One of the features revealed by Microsoft is the new RPA capability in Power Automate which is to be referred to as UI flows. UI flows for Power Automate is now available in public preview. Despite the fact that creating a UI flow Is largely a point and click experience, you will still need to have some understanding of how coding works.

 

The RPA feature removes the manual processes involved through automated workflows that record and playback human-drive interaction in conjunction with software systems that aren’t able to support API automation. It is important to note that Power Automate already has prebuilt connectors for more than 275 apps that are able to support API automation but claims that it now has an end-to-end automation platform that can reinvent business processes for workloads across a variety of different industries/sectors.

 

Microsoft include robotic process automation (RPA) capabilities with Dynamics 365 applications, including the following:
  • • Dynamics 365 Customer Service
  • • Dynamics 365 Field Service
  • • Dynamics 365 Finance
  • • Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management

Automation with Power Automate

One of the top features in this release has to be the Process Advisor which comes into public preview now and general availability in May 2021. With this toolset businesses can map and record repetitive manual processes and view them in a process map with an associated set of analytics, to be able to streamline the process and reduce its steps and variants and automate repetitive tasks.

Power Automate Release Plan Wave 1 2021
The Wave 1 2021 update contains new features and capabilities that will roll out across Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform from April until September 2021. Certain features are available now in either Early Access or Public Preview before they are made Generally Available. There are over 300 plus new capabilities across 443 pages of rich content, if you want to know what this means for you and how you can navigate these updates.

What’s next on 2021 Release Wave 2 Overview

Power Automate will update the offering to combine the best of WinAutomation with the cloud-based AI Builder and connector-based capabilities in automated flows. This new version will offer customers a way to automate everything from Office apps to legacy terminal applications that haven't been updated in decades. In addition, there are further enhancements coming to automated flows running in the cloud, including richer automation and approval experiences.

 

If you are looking to transform your business through the use of Microsoft’s Power Platform (Power BI, PowerApps and Flow) then please get in touch with our team of Power Platform experts to discuss your specific business needs.

 

Want to hear more from us? Then make sure that you sign up to our mailing list to receive the latest updates straight into your inbox.