Microsoft Partners Begin Testing for Dynamics CRM 'Titan'

Published: January 17, 2007

by Alex Woodie

Microsoft is previewing the next major release of its Dynamics CRM product, codenamed "Titan," the company announced last week. Titan is being designed with a "multi-tenant" architecture, which means a single implementation will support multiple clients using the software as a service (SaaS) delivery model. At the same time, the Titan code can be installed using traditional "on premise" deployments.

Titan is will be the first new version of Microsoft's CRM software since Dynamics CRM 3.0, which shipped in December 2005. That release turned Microsoft Outlook into the de facto interface for Dynamics CRM, and enabled users to perform various tasks, such as looking up customer information, setting up appointments, and capturing customer discussions, all from within Outlook.

While the Office-ization of Microsoft's ERP and CRM products--not to mention SAP's enterprise software--is currently in full swing, Microsoft is a little late to the SaaS party, and is playing catch-up to industry leaders like Salesforce.com, which has a fully hosted CRM model.

The key deliverable in Microsoft's CRM SaaS playbook is Microsoft Dynamics Live CRM, which it unveiled last July at its annual partner conference. Dynamics Live CRM, when it becomes available later this year, will basically be the SaaS version of Dynamics CRM. It will use the same Titan code, and hook into Outlook, much like the on-premise version of Titan.

The biggest difference will be that customers won't actually install and run Dynamics Live CRM. Instead, it will be installed in a data center owned by Microsoft or one of Microsoft's business partners. This is why the "multi-tenancy" of Titan will be so important. New integration points in Titan will also make it easier for partners to deliver highly customized implementations of Dynamics CRM, which can then grow (and potentially move back in-house) as the customer's business needs dictate.

Titan is currently available only to a select group of 300 Microsoft partners through its Technology Adoption Program (TAP). During the second quarter, the Titan TAP will be expanded to 1,000 partners. The Titan release of Microsoft CRM--along with its Microsoft Dynamics Live CRM service --will be available around the middle of the year, Microsoft says.

Initially, Microsoft Dynamics Live CRM will only be available in North America. Microsoft says it will announce plans for international expansion of the service at a later time.

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