This is what you can use the Microsoft Power Platform for

What is the Microsoft Power Platform?

Microsoft wants computers to become like cars. Millions of people can drive a car, even though they have no idea how the engine works. In a sense, the idea behind Microsoft' Power Platform is similar. It gives people the possibility to build apps, analyse data and automate processes even though they might not have a lot of technical knowledge.

The Microsoft Power Platform consists of roughly three parts: PowerApps, Power BI and Power Automate (previously known as Microsoft Flow). In the next paragraphs we’ll explain what you can do with these applications.

PowerApps

PowerApps is an application you can use to develop basic applications. Applications in PowerApps are low-code. This means that you don’t have to code as much to develop an application. PowerApps is user-friendly – everyone can learn how to work with it.

With PowerApps you can develop applications to achieve the goals of your organization. PCMag praises how user-friendly the application is. PowerApps is affordable, the design is excellent and PCMag has singled it out as Editors' Choice Platform for power users and IT-professionals.

Power BI

Microsoft Power BI combines extensive analytics with a user friendly interface, PCMag writes. With Power BI you can analyse and visualize the data of your organization. Power BI is a powerful application: it’s user-friendly and has amazing visualization capacities. Power BI works well with other Microsoft Office applications.

Power Automate (previously known as Microsoft Flow)

Power Automate is Microsofts’ answer to automation software like If This Then That (IFTTT) and other workflow applications. The idea behind Power Automate is that you can automate your tasks, even when you’re not a developer.

In Power Automate legacy-applications can be automated and combined with modern applications. This can be of much help if you want to put multiple systems together. Microsoft uses Power Automate to answer customers demand for optimizing their processes for a faster delivery with high results and a low cost.

During Microsoft Ignite, Microsoft announced that they will use Robotic Process Automation in their Power Platform. It’s used to automate tasks that are repeated often.

What is the advantage to the Microsoft Power Platform?

You don’t have to be a skilled IT-professional to work with the Microsoft Power Platform, but you can use to do tasks for which you’d normally need IT-professionals. Think about automation, business analytics and developing apps.

The Microsoft Power Platform is the perfect extension for the Microsoft Azure Platform. The Power Platform applications use the data from the Common Data Service (CDS) of Microsoft. CDS is a cloudbased tool on Azure, in which you can safe and administer your organizations data in a secure way.

You can decide to integrate your Power Platform applications in your already existing Microsoft applications. For example: you could use these applications in Microsoft Teams. Teams will evolve from being just a chat, meeting and voice applications to a much bigger platform. That’s exactly what Microsoft was thinking of.

How much does it cost?

If you want to start working with the Microsoft Power Platform, there are multiple possibilities.

Microsoft offers a PowerApps per app plan and an Power Automate per business plan. You can also use Power BI via this model. With these subscriptions you can use applications for a specific scenario and Power Automate can support certain processes. But you won’t have to subscribe to all the products of the Power Platform, like you’d have to in the past. You pay only for what you use. Want to know more about the pricing? Microsoft explains it all on this web page.

To use products from the Power Platform you’ll no longer need the permission of an administrator. Microsoft announced that Power Platform is becoming a self-service platform during Ignite. 

I want to know more about the Microsoft Power Platform!

Global Knowledge offers training courses for PowerApps, Power BI and Power Automate. We offer a Microsoft Power Platform Fundamentals training course. Following the Microsoft Power Platform Fundamentals course, there are several courses to choose from: 

• Microsoft Power Platform App Maker (M-PL100)
• Microsoft Power Platform Functional Consultant (M-PL200)
• Microsoft Power Platform Developer (M-PL400)