Deltek Vision (legacy product) vs. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central

Deltek Vision is perfect for both small and large businesses to implement. Especially when this program can be hosted in the cloud, users then can access from anywhere across the globe via the internet to print reports & track time spent on various projects.

Incentivized

It addresses well some integration and connectivity issues with other software and adapted technologies: formulation and manufacturing batching software, scanners and bar codes, inventory, financials, emailing of invoices and statement, sales and purchasing... etc. I believe it to be better suited to a medium to large company. Not as simple and seamless as we expected for migrating from another Microsoft Dynamics software product (we moved from GP to NAV). Our staff is going through a tougher time than we thought to learn some procedures. Normal growing pains?!

Incentivized

• The ability to build out your own user-defined fields, grids, and even whole Info Centers is a huge plus. We can build out what we need in-house, without needing to engage outside consultants for most needs.
• The ability to create both user-initiated and scheduled workflows allows us to add intelligence to our actions within the system. We have weekly scheduled reports going out to the various levels of our organization, as well as workflows to trigger multiple field updates, alerts, emails, etc. to keep necessary people on the path and informed.

Incentivized

• All of the Dynamics ERP systems are fully integrated with the full family of their Office products (Word, Excel, etc.) but the true power behind Dynamics-NAV is that it comes with complete access to the source code. Although most ERP packages provide some type of a development environment, it is always a third-party software package and requires an additional expense. NAV comes with full source code access and devolvement tools out-of-the-box and requires no additional purchase. The user is able to modify pages, reports and even add additional fields to the standard tables. If your company has an internal development staff you have the ability to purchase the same full development license that the VAR has, allowing you to handle all system customizations and support in-house. The sum total of this high flexibility is that you are able to make NAV conform to your business rather than you conforming to the software.
• In addition to the available source code, NAV provides the user with an unlimited ability to modify and build within the rich environment of C/AL code. In over 20 years of modifying the NAV product I have never had a client ask for a modification or custom functionality that I was not able to provide. Add to this the fact that NAV now includes many development points that allow the user to place their custom code inside of the system without impacting the base code. This makes the upgrade process quick and easy and avoids the common occurrence of being version locked.
• The user interface of Dynamics NAV has been well thought out and provides a very easy to learn and use package. Master records (Customer, Vendor, Items, etc.) have been laid out in a standard format. Once you learn where fields are located on one record you have learned them all. The forms (called Pages in NAV) have a very similar structure and, by design, are uncluttered and easily customized by the user without impacting the base code. This allows each user to configure the Page to the way they work, easing the learning process and speeding up daily work and data entry.
• The NAV environment has grown to be very feature rich in the functionality offered and provides the user with almost everything they need with the purchase of the base product. Advanced features can be added if required as can a large number of third party add-ons made exclusively for the NAV environment. Additionally, user licenses are sold as concurrent and not as named. Concurrent licenses control the number of users allowed into the system at any one time meaning that anyone can be provided with the ability to log into the system. This allows the company to setup an unlimited number of users with the ability to access the system at any given time. This allows the occasional user to share a license with other users who only need to access the system to enter a small amount of data or run a few reports. This functionality is a plus for the company with a large sales staff or outside workers who only need limited access to the system. Named licenses would require that you purchase an access license for every person who needs to access the system.

Incentivized

• Mac users have a different view from PC users and it is not as robust as what you can do on a PC.
• You can only access the platform through Internet Explorer on a PC, which is an outdated browser not a lot of employees use for anything else.
• User interface is a bit outdated, it could use a refresh.

Incentivized

• There are not a lot of "out of the box" automation processes, for Microsoft Dynamics NAV. Different versions of NAV, have had various job scheduling functionality. However, each process that is automated, must be confirmed that it will function correctly, in an automatic mode. In our installation, most of the automation processes have been custom-developed.
• Microsoft Dynamics NAV could have better documentation. Much of the documentation is original, from multiple versions ago. There is generally no step-by-step instructions, on performing various functions. Instead, most help is context-sensitive, obtained by pressing F1, on a particular field.
• Older versions of Microsoft Dynamics NAV had a built-in WYSIWYG report builder, which made designing reports fairly straight-forward. Later versions (2013 and forward) rely exclusively on Visual Studio and SQL Reporting Services, which require a greater technical level of expertise, to use.

Incentivized

Because we are looking to upgrade to the next software level of Deltek.

Incentivized

We've already decided to continue using this software. It is too expensive for us to upgrade so we made a workaround by using the virtual computer with Windows XP installed on it. We did research replacing this software, but it was a better financial decision to keep what we had instead

Incentivized

It's on the verge of being awesome. Right now it's a matter of money -- if you have the money to hire consultants round the clock, yeah this is awesome.

Incentivized

Best in terms of reporting or coming up with a great dashboard. Seamlessly collaborated with teams without depending on particular device as its web version is the buddy for people with work flexibility. Licensing price and integrations can be the areas of improvement and can simplify the interface which will be easy for a new user.

Incentivized

99% of the customer service specialists and technicians that I've encountered are quite awesome!

Incentivized

It provides one to efficiently be able to manage bookkeeping and inventory without much challenges. One can easily navigate through workflow processes while managing usages and budgets. Being able to produce reports in Word, Excel or PDF means one is able to have a working document to produce trends and graphs or produce pivot tables.

I've used QuickBooks Online and other QuickBooks products but they were not for the same purposes as my experience with Deltek. I also was not part of the team that selected Deltek as that was prior to my arrival at my firm.

Incentivized

Dynamics fits the modern world, integrating new technology to ensure a complete business process is readily accessible in a rapidly moving world of "in-office" and "remote" work. It solves the need for several departments and streamlines procurement, warehouse, and finance processes.

Incentivized

• Deltek Vision allows us to configure the standard info centers to capture the information we need to support our business model and decision making processes. We are able to create user-defined fields (date, numeric, currency, character, drop down list, pick lists, memo/rtf and relational database fields) on both standard tabs and user-defined tabs. This has made the product very valuable to using the system to support our business policies and help data management to support decisions easier.
• Deltek Vision's custom proposal module and government forms modules shaves hours off of proposal preparation. Because Deltek Vision is the "source of truth" for our employee history and project history we are able to easily and quickly pull information from Vision onto proposal templates in minutes. Pulling information from a centralized repository gives our users confidence in the data, employee updates/feedback are made one time (in Vision) rather than every time a new proposal document is put in front of the employee, and gives our marketing professionals the extra time needed to craft the proposal to meet the RFP and client requested information. We use Deltek Vision to support of Strategic Plan goal for our company growing and win more work!
• Deltek Vision has utilities that can be managed by designated system administrators. You don't have to have a SQL expert or DBA on staff to write basic workflows, queries and reports. If you have savvy staff on hand, that takes the time to learn the front end of the Vision product, you will be able to set up some automation and configuration that doesn't require an expert. Deltek Vision also allows you to design the layout of your screens using a easy Screen Designer tool.

• Better visibility of ROI throughout each period. Orders entered, shipped, and backlogs are very visible to authorized users upon login.
• Purchasing and inventory turns have been better realized. Out of stock parts reduced.
• A future customer portal will enhance the customer experience by pulling NAC data into a web-based UI. However, the portal is a separate expense.
• Time savings realized by being able to generate views or reports versus asking IT or accounting to pull a custom report.

Incentivized