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January 2025 announcements

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This page provides the announcements for Microsoft Partner Center for January 2025.

NCE license-based change indicator and end-of-sale price list updates

The beta period for the new commerce experience (NCE) license-based change indicator and end-of-sale price lists ends on February 1, 2025.

  • Date: January 31, 2025
  • Workspace: Pricing
  • Impacted audience: Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partners (indirect providers and direct bill) in all markets, countries, and regions

On February 1, 2025, the beta period for the NCE license-based change indicator and end-of-sale price lists will be complete. Partners downloading the NCE license-based price list via the Partner Center portal will no longer see the row tagged New Commerce - Beta, and the standard current month NCE license-based price list will include the Change indicator column.

Partners downloading the current month NCE license-based price list via API will also see the Change indicator column, and the Pricing View of licensebasedbeta will be deprecated once the beta period ends.

The end-of-sale price list will be generally available. You can continue to download it through the Partner Center portal. An API download approach for this price list continues to be assessed.

Next steps

Transition from Power BI Premium to Microsoft Fabric

Customers with Power BI Premium (P-SKU) are required to transition to Microsoft Fabric (F-SKU).

  • Date: January 31, 2025
  • Workspace: General
  • Impacted audience: All partners

Per the announcement made in March 2024, as part of our ongoing efforts to enhance our service offerings and consolidate our purchase options, Microsoft is retiring the Power BI Premium per capacity SKUs (P-SKUs) on January 31, 2025. We're replacing them with Microsoft Fabric SKUs (F-SKUs). Microsoft Fabric is a unified, AI-powered, end-to-end intelligent data platform with a full suite of cloud services and tools built on the existing Power BI platform and delivered as software as a service (SaaS).

This transition affects P-SKUs for:

  • Enterprise Agreement (EA)
  • Cloud Solution Provider (CSP)
  • All customers with an upcoming renewal of Power BI Premium after January 31, 2025

We highly encourage you to plan this transition with your customers to ensure a seamless user experience. The following resources can help you build your transition and renewal plans:

  • Partner Guidance document: Get detailed information on the transition from P-SKUs to F-SKUs, including the benefits of F-SKUs, timeline for the transition, and steps required for migration.
  • Microsoft Fabric features: Learn more about Microsoft Fabric - an AI-powered analytics platform that unifies data and services, including data analytics, data science, and data lakes, to accelerate innovation and provide a comprehensive analytics solution for organizations.
  • Microsoft Fabric pricing: Find detailed information on the pricing options for Microsoft Fabric, including pay-as-you-go and reservation pricing, benefits of Fabric Capacity, and a centralized dashboard for monitoring usage and cost.
  • Migration to Microsoft Fabric capacities: Learn how to transition your Power BI Premium capacities to Microsoft Fabric with an automated migration tool, ensuring a smooth and efficient upgrade process.
  • Fabric Partner Community: Join to participate in a diverse and inclusive Teams channel created for all Microsoft partners interested in building and growing their Microsoft Fabric, Power BI, and analytics practices.

If you have any questions or need help with the transition, reach out to your Partner Development Manager. Thank you for your cooperation and continued support.

Next steps

  • Start planning for your customers' transition using the provided Migration Guide.

Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers is now generally available

We're excited to announce that at the end of January, Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers is generally available.

  • Date: January 31, 2025
  • Workspace: General
  • Impacted audience: All Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partners transacting Microsoft 365 and Dynamics 365

We're excited to announce that at the end of January, Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers is generally available. Tenants that have at least one Microsoft 365 Copilot license is able to access Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers via the Copilot button on the top right corner of the screen. Copilot experiences in the Teams and SharePoint admin centers will be introduced in the coming months as part of this product set. Admin accounts don't require a Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses to be assigned to them, and no action is required.

Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers is a set of experiences that harnesses the value of generative AI to boost Microsoft 365 admins' productivity by streamlining daily work, so admins are empowered to focus on their strategic priorities, make faster decisions, and maximize the value of their investments.

When will this happen?

Rollout begins end of January and is expected to be completed by the end of March.

How this affects your organization

Copilot in Microsoft admin centers is available to all admins, and respect role-based access controls (RBAC) within the admin center, only surfacing information and controls that the particular admin has access to. Copilot won't make any configuration changes on behalf of an admin, keeping security integrity intact.

When available, Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers can help:

  • Optimize routine tasks - Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers leverages AI to simplify and speed up routine administrative tasks, allowing IT administrators to focus on strategic initiatives. By providing real-time, contextually relevant information and seamless integration across various Microsoft admin centers, Copilot in MAC enhances productivity and decision-making, ensuring a more efficient and effective Microsoft 365 management experience.
  • Generate insights faster - Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers enables IT administrators to quickly access and analyze critical data, enhancing productivity and decision-making. This streamlined approach ensures that administrators can act swiftly and effectively, driving better outcomes for their organizations.
  • Get more out of Microsoft 365 - Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers helps IT admins and adoption specialists to understand licensed Microsoft 365 features and capabilities that can unlock new ways of working for both IT admins and users in their organization.

Optimizing for the flow of your work

Copilot agents are specialized AI assistants designed to enhance the capabilities of Microsoft 365 Copilot by connecting to your organization’s knowledge and data sources. Alongside Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers, we're also rolling out a prebuilt admin agent. Rollout of the agent begins later than Copilot in Microsoft 365 admin centers, but is expected to be completed by the end of March.

This Copilot agent allows admins to access IT administration capabilities directly within various Microsoft 365 workflows from Business Chat without needing to be in an admin center.

The Microsoft 365 admin agent respects RBACs within the admin center and only surfaces information that the account has access to. When rolled out, if a user has an admin role assigned to them and they have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license assigned, the admin agent is preinstalled.

Next steps

New Partner Center AI assistant (preview) Anywhere scenarios in the Earnings workspace

Partner Center AI assistant (preview) Anywhere scenarios are now enabled in the Partner Center Earnings workspace. The AI assistant scenarios enhance user productivity and make reconciliation easier.

  • Date: January 29, 2025
  • Workspace: Earnings
  • Impacted audience: Incentive Admin and Incentive users

Important

Partner Center AI assistant is currently only available in preview and to partners using the English version of Partner Center.

Payments summary section

Here are the AI assistant Anywhere capabilities in the Payments summary section.

By paid
  • Select a payment and choose AI assistant - View earning details.

A screenshot that shows the AI assistant window with earning details on a specific sent payment.

Earnings summary section

Here are the AI assistant Anywhere capabilities in the Earnings summary section.

By program

Select a row and choose AI assistant to view the following trends for program, engagement, or lever.

  • View earning trend
  • View earning trend by program
  • View earning trend by engagement (hidden for non-Microsoft commerce incentives programs)
  • View customer details (hidden for campaigns)

A screenshot that shows the AI assistant window with earning trends on a specific program.

By customer

Select or search for a customer, then select and choose AI assistant to view the following trends for the customer.

  • View earning trend
  • Details by program and lever
  • Details by solution area, engagement, and lever
  • Details by product and workload

A screenshot that shows the AI assistant window with earning summary for a specific customer.

Next steps

New subscription renewals dashboard

In November 2024, we enabled a Renewals widget through the Insights workspace to make it easier for partners to manage their upcoming renewals across customers.

  • Date: January 24, 2025
  • Workspace: Insights
  • Impacted audience: Cloud Solution Provider partners (indirect providers, indirect resellers, and direct bill) in all markets/countries/regions.

Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partners can now view approaching renewals for legacy and new commerce license-based subscriptions seven, 30, and 90 days in advance. This feature helps partners take actions like turning off autorenewal or scheduling changes before renewal. Partners can select a subscription ID to take renewal actions directly.

The widget shows subscriptions that have autorenew activated only, but you can export your full list of subscriptions, including the ones with autorenew deactivated, by using the Downloads hub. To export the full list, you need Report Viewer permission.

Next steps

D-U-N-S retirement and Moody's introduction for customer lookup in the Partner Center Referrals workspace

Here's what's new for co-sell and partner-led deals in the Referrals workspace.

  • Date: January 21, 2025
  • Workspace: Referrals
  • Impacted audience: Partners engaged in co-sell or partner-led deals

Starting February 10, 2025, we're replacing D-U-N-S suggestions with Moody's for customer account lookup during the deal-creation process in the UI and bulk upload.

What's coming

  • Deal-creation process: Instead of D-U-N-S IDs, after February 10, 2025, partners see Moody’s customer data for account matching in the deal creation process.
  • Impact on partners: Partners continue to see customer account suggestions on the Other tab and two Moody's suggestion in bulk upload.
  • Account matching: Deals created using D-U-N-S IDs continue to be routed to the Deal Management System (DMS) team for manual account matching. However, we stop suggesting D-U-N-S ID accounts in bulk uploads and replace them with Moody’s API suggestions.

Note

Via bulk upload, partners can continue to create deals with D-U-N-S suggestions if they have store D-U-N-S IDs in their ecosystem.

Monthly update: Important actions partners need to take to secure the partner ecosystem

Important capabilities and updates to improve your security posture and protect your customers' tenants are now available.

  • Date: January 15, 2025
  • Workspace: General
  • Impacted audience: Direct-bill partners, indirect providers, and indirect resellers transacting through the Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program and with advisors
Available now

Microsoft Security Copilot is available for Admin On Behalf Of (AOBO) on the Service Management page of the Customers workspace in Partner Center. Learn about granting access to external users.

Removal of unused Azure subscriptions: As of December 2024, Microsoft blocks unused Azure subscriptions. The blocked Azure subscriptions are then deleted after 90 days. A subscription is considered unused when there's no activity or consumption for over 12 months. Account owners and service admins of the unused Azure subscription are notified by email 30 days before the block is applied. The subscription is deleted 90 days after the block.

Multifactor authentication (MFA) for Microsoft Entra portal: Microsoft is enforcing MFA for all users signing into Azure portal. Review the latest information and timeline.

Security requirements API is available in Beta version and gives partners direct access to essential security compliance data.

Entra roles for GDAP in Partner Center UI: Continuing reduction of gap between Microsoft Entra roles available in Partner Center API versus the UI. The remaining 17 roles are now available in the Partner Center UI.

Coming soon

MFA for Microsoft 365 admin center: On February 3, 2025, Microsoft begins enforcing MFA for all users who sign into the Microsoft 365 admin center portal. Review the latest information and timeline.

Deprecation of graph.windows.net audience tokens: To enhance our security measures, we're deprecating graph.windows.net audience tokens. So, we're updating the way you interact with Partner Center APIs. Take the necessary steps to prepare for this transition.

Security Training: Certification Week for Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program: Security & GitHub

Next steps

Monthly Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program update

Here's what's new for Solutions Partner designations, specializations, and other Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program offerings and benefits.

  • Date: January 15, 2025
  • Workspace: Membership
  • Impacted audience: Partners enrolled in the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program

We're introducing important capabilities, offers, and updates to improve the way partners can further differentiate their deep technical expertise across a set of priority scenarios with high customer demand. We added benefits for eligible Solutions Partner with certified software designations.

Available now

Updates to the AI Platform on Microsoft Azure specialization and Build AI Apps with Microsoft Azure specialization: Changes are now live for the previously named "AI and Machine Learning" and "Build and Modernize AI Apps" specializations. To learn more about the details of the requirements, see Apply for specializations.

AI assistant for prepurchase: As of December 18, 2024, a new AI assistant plugin became available to answer prepurchase questions related to queries. Partners can open the AI assistant from the Membership offer page or global entry point (sparkle icon in top right corner) in Partner Center and ask questions. This feature helps partners know all the details before purchasing or renewing any available program in the Membership workspace. AI assitant can answer queries instantly. For example, partners can ask:

  • Why is the buy now button disabled for solution partner designation?
  • Why is the renew now button disabled for solution partner designation?

What's coming

SMB path for Data & AI (Azure), Digital & App Innovation (Azure), Infrastructure (Azure) will be available: In February 2025, the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program is introducing SMB paths for Solutions Partner designations in Data & AI (Azure), Digital & App Innovation (Azure), and Infrastructure (Azure). With the SMB paths launching next month, now is the perfect time to start your preparations to qualify. For more information on Azure solution areas qualifications, see the SMB paths for Azure designations deck.

Updates to Business Applications specializations will be available: In early February 2025, four business applications specializations, Sales, Service, Finance, and Supply Chain, are getting an update to their performance and skilling requirements. And we're adding a new skilling certificate for Sales. We're changing the performance requirements by lowering the threshold for new large deployments from five to three and lowering the MCV growth rate requirement from >= 30% to > 0%. For skilling, we're reducing role-based certifications from 15 to five, with no minimum per role, and advanced certification requirements from five to two. We want to encourage more partners to enroll in these specializations. These changes are available in the first week of February 2025. The partners who are qualified as per the new requirements are automatically enrolled.

Reminders

  • Apply today to attain one of seven Solutions Partner with certified software designations and qualify for top-tier benefits, along with Azure Migrate and Modernize and Azure Innovate incentives. If you missed our announcement last month, Microsoft is offering subsidies on a first-come, first-serve basis for assessments conducted by the third-party auditor for qualification for the designations. To learn more, read this blog post.
  • Announcement of new benefits: On January 22, 2025, Microsoft is planning to introduce more than 20 in-demand product licenses, including Microsoft 365 Copilot products, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, and GitHub Enterprise. These new benefits are designed to help streamline tasks, enhance creativity, and drive efficiency across businesses. Partners can access these benefits when they go live, by purchasing partner benefits packages, Solutions Partner designations, or specializations. The new packages offer comprehensive support and advisory benefits, helping partners accelerate business growth, scale their operations, and stay updated with the latest offerings.

Next steps

Provide company account information by February 17, 2025 to maintain your Apps & Games products in the European Union Markets

Apps & Games partners with company accounts in Partner Center must provide company account information by February 17, 2025 to maintain their Apps & Games products in the European Union Markets.

  • Date: January 13, 2025
  • Workspace: Account settings
  • Impacted audience: All Apps & Games partners with a business account

To comply with the European Union's Digital Services Act, developers with company accounts must provide business verification and customer support contact information by February 17, 2025. Failure to provide the required information results in Apps & Games products being removed from European Union markets.

Check whether you have a company or individual account in Partner Center by navigating to Account Settings > Legal Info > Developer. If you have an individual account, no action is needed. 

Use these steps to submit your business verification and your customer contact information.

  1. Sign in to your Partner Center account. In Account settings, go to the Legal information page. 

  2. Under the Developer tab, expand and edit the Contact info section.

  3. Select Update. Be sure to use an email account that you can reach so you can verify your account and perform any further actions. The email you provide must be an individual at a company-owned domain, as the following screenshot shows. Group alias and public email domains aren't supported.

    A screenshot that shows an individual's email address at a company's domain.

  4. Expand the Additional information for verification and Contact information for customers sections in the side panel.

  5. Enter your D-U-N-S® Number. Or you can upload a business verification document in the Additional information for verification section. All documents you submit must be issued within the previous 12 months or have an expiration date that's at least two months in the future.

  6. In the Contact information for customers section, provide your contact information, including contact address, email, phone number, and website address.

  7. Select the Use legal company address checkbox to use your company’s legal address. The address fields then populate. If you need to provide a new address, enter it and then select Validate address to be able to save your changes.

  8. Fill in all the required fields, and when done, select Save.

Next steps

Update to the January edition of the Global Promo Readiness Guide

We updated the January edition of the Global Promo Readiness Guide to include new promotions.

  • Date: January 13, 2025
  • Workspace: Pricing
  • Impacted audience: All Cloud Solution Program (CSP) partners transacting Microsoft 365

On January 10, 2025, the January edition of the Global Promo Readiness Guide was republished with the following key updates:

  • Microsoft 365 Copilot 15%-off global promotion for customers purchasing subscriptions with between 10 and 300 licenses: Extended to March 31, 2025
  • Microsoft 365 E5 15% CSP Accelerate one-year global promotion (launched on January 1, 2025): Available through June 30, 2025, for new-to-Microsoft 365 E5 customers
  • Microsoft 365 Business Premium 15% one-year promotion in the United States and Canada (launched on January 6, 2025): Available through April 1, 2025, for new-to-Microsoft 365 Business Premium customers

Next steps

January Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) monthly updates and community reminder

Monthly views are now published, including the updated partner launch calendars, the CSP Bimonthly Update newsletter, and other CSP community resources that provide you with essential program updates.

  • Date: January 8, 2025
  • Workspace: General
  • Impacted audience: CSP direct-bill partners and indirect providers

Always available - Launch content on demand

For a consolidated view of all recent and active launches in a single place, visit the partner launch calendars collection. You'll find a timeline for each launch and links to published materials to help you learn more about that launch.

The downloadable CSP Bimonthly Update newsletter, which aggregates recent CSP announcements, updates, events, and reminders in an easy-to-read document.

Partner Journey Maps provide detailed navigation along the journey of Microsoft’s highest priority transformations.

Need licensing readiness? The monthly CSP spotlight webinars cover the latest CSP licensing information available for all partners.

CSP Community Q&A reminder

The monthly CSP community Q&A session provides you with an opportunity to learn more and ask questions about changes affecting the program.

Register here to join upcoming calls.

Next steps

  • Review the Partner Launch Calendar, read the monthly newsletter, and register for upcoming Community Q&A calls.

Questions?

The monthly CSP community Q&A call is the best place to bring questions about operational change in the CSP program. You can submit a question up to 48 hours before the call.

Questions on any other CSP topic? Visit the Partner Center support page.

Let's do great work together.

Expanded global marketplace opportunities for ISVs in China

Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) in China can now monetize their solutions globally through the Microsoft commercial marketplace.

  • Date: January 8, 2025
  • Workspace: Marketplace offers
  • Impacted audience: ISVs in China

As of January 6, 2025, ISVs based in China can now publish and sell their software solutions worldwide through the Microsoft commercial marketplace. This expansion gives ISVs in China access to millions of enterprise customers and the extensive Microsoft partner ecosystem. ISVs in China can now:

  • Generate more revenue by reaching customers across more than 140 geographies
  • Simplify sales by leaning on the marketplace to streamline billing, payouts, and more
  • Benefit from co-sell opportunities with the Microsoft sales teams

Note

Although ISVs in China can now sell globally, customers located within China continue to access free and bring-your-own-license (BYOL) offers only.

Next steps