A few days ago, our team returned from Directions EMEA 2025 — the premier conference for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central partners in Europe. This year’s event took place in Poznań, Poland, and honestly, we had an amazing experience. Just imagine: over 3,000 attendees from 650 companies across 60 countries, three days of intensive networking, knowledge sharing, and discussions about the future of technology. Plus, over 300 sessions where the words “AI,” “agents,” and “vibe coding” were mentioned so often we lost count. This year featured an incredible number of parallel sessions — sometimes over 15 different options to choose from. There were also many new names in the expo area, making it a real challenge to experience everything in just 3 days.
But let’s walk through the most interesting things we saw and heard.
Business Central Continues Its Growth
Let’s start with the good news: Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central has officially reached the milestone of 50,000 cloud customers. This is significant growth compared to the 40,000 announced at last year’s Directions EMEA. The numbers speak for themselves — the platform isn’t just alive, it’s actively thriving, and demand remains consistently high. Businesses are actively migrating to the cloud or choosing SaaS solutions from the start because it’s modern, scalable, and secure.
Business Central also got a new logo. Designers will be pleased — rounded corners and gradients are back in style. Our marketing team is already stressed out, as now we’ll need to update all our materials. But what won’t you do for progress? The major release is scheduled for the first quarter of 2026. However, we already have the new Business Central logo, so feel free to reach out.
AI and Agents — More Than Just Hype
The main question hanging in the air at the conference was: how much of this whole AI story is a real revolution, and how much is just marketing noise? Microsoft made it clear they believe the hype phase is long over. In their view, we’re standing on the brink of a genuine business transformation. The company shared quite ambitious plans according to which AI agents will become an integral part of the Business Central platform.
What exactly can we expect? Two agents will become generally available this November. The first is the Sales Order Agent, which will handle intelligent order fulfillment. The second is the Payables Agent, designed for automated invoice processing. Just recently, we were picking similar add-ons from AppSource, and now this has become a built-in BC feature. What’s most interesting is that partners will soon be able to create their own AI agents directly within Business Central. An MCP server will be available for this purpose, along with the ability to create agents in plain language using AI and vibe coding. The future is here.
Vibe coding is a new approach to software development based on conversing with AI through chat. You simply describe in plain language what your application should do, and the artificial intelligence generates the code for you. Then you can give it additional examples, clarify details, guide it — and it improves the result. Essentially, it’s coding without needing to know how to code.
Sounds like science fiction, doesn’t it? The goal is to make software development accessible to a broader range of people and significantly speed up the process. The technology is still in its early stages, but it has gained considerable popularity in recent months. Microsoft claims this approach is already changing how applications are built for Business Central.
Coding Agents — The Next Step
If you’re a developer, you might want to sit down before reading further. Microsoft believes that in the near future, coding agents will take over a significant portion of programmers’ work.
Dmytro Chadayev, Program Manager at Microsoft and, by the way, a well-known figure in the BC community who actually from Ukraine (we’re very proud), explained that new AI models are getting better and better at writing code. And we’re not just talking about suggesting individual lines of code. These agents will be able to plan and execute entire coding tasks autonomously, in a loop, based on a given goal. They’ll have access to compilers, tests, online documentation, version control systems, and MCP (Model Context Protocol) servers. The logical question arises: does this mean developers will soon become unnecessary?
Microsoft gives a pretty clear answer: “AI won’t replace your people. The right people with AI skills will.” So if you’re a developer, now is your best time to start mastering new skills. Technology is evolving quickly, and with the advent of AI, the pace is only accelerating. What looks like a demonstration of possibilities today will become everyday reality tomorrow.
What Conclusions Can We Draw?
Yes, there’s still a lot of noise and inflated expectations around artificial intelligence. But after Directions EMEA, it became clear: the foundation for real transformation has already been laid. Business Central is growing, AI agents are transitioning from experiments to working tools, and development approaches are changing before our eyes. We see enormous opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses in working with agents and automation — time can be freed up for analytics, forecasting, and planning. Business Central is a system that keeps our team on their toes, as major update releases come out twice a year, and every year a general roadmap for the system’s development and improvement is presented. We’re catching the latest trends in business software because this is the flagship international ERP that sets the pace for the entire industry and competitors.
We returned from the conference with a wealth of impressions, new ideas, and an understanding that the coming year will be very exciting. A lot will change before the next Directions EMEA — that’s for sure. And we’ll definitely tell you about all the new features and functionalities of our beloved Business Central system.
