What is the Microsoft Power Platform?

Dissecting this digital transformation catalyst

The Microsoft Power Platform is a suite of interconnected, low-code/no-code tools that empowers organizations to analyze data, act on insights, automate processes, and create effective solutions.

And yet, the Power Platform is more than just a collection of tools; it's a blend of business intelligence, app development, and app connectivity solutions that creates a unified approach to solving business challenges while unlocking the potential for digital transformation.

With Microsoft Power Platform, users can create custom applications, automate workflows, visualize data, and build intelligent chatbots.

On average, survey respondents estimated that Power Platform premium capabilities helped their organizations' teams achieve:

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The four pillars of Microsoft Power Platform

The Microsoft Power Platform is comprised of four components that all cater to different aspects of business technology. They include:

1. Power BI: With this tool, it’s never been easier to transform raw data into meaningful and shareable insights that drive intelligent decision-making.

2. Power Apps: Whether it's an app to expedite approvals, streamline inventories, or manage customer relationships, Power Apps grants anyone the power of custom app development — not just those with technical expertise.

3. Power Automate: Take the mundane and monotonous tasks that can slow your organization down and automate them, freeing your team up for more strategic, high-value activities.

4. Power Virtual Agents: Create intelligent chatbots without the need for coding. These handle anything from answering FAQs to guiding users through complex processes—all while providing a personalized and interactive customer experience.

The interconnectedness of the Power Platform

While each part of the Microsoft Power Platform suite serves a unique purpose, they are deeply interconnected. Consider the task of onboarding a new employee.

Power Apps can streamline and automate the intake process, creating custom forms, workflows, asset requests, and necessary paperwork.

Once this data is collected, Power Automate takes over tasks like initiating asset approvals, or dispatching informative emails to the new employee.

More complex actions, like multi-stage training programs, are efficiently coordinated via Power Automate as well.

Should new employees have questions during onboarding, Power Virtual Agents are at the ready. Using AI, these chatbots provide immediate responses, which minimizes the load on HR personnel.

Meanwhile, Power BI consolidates, analyzes, tracks, and presents onboarding data, linking experiences to performance and retention, thus enhancing the process and organizational outcomes.

In this way, Power Platform is an interconnected ecosystem that allows organizations to enhance overall productivity and efficiency.

The power of the Power Platform

The Microsoft Power Platform isn’t just another widget in your technology toolbox; it is the toolbox.

The proof is in the data.

According to The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Power Platform Premium Capabilities study — conducted by Forrester Consulting — a composite organization realized a 140% return on investment (ROI) over three years and a net present value of $8.32 million.

Additionally, adopting Power Platform resulted in $14.25 million in benefits due to “streamlined business and development processes, improved business outcomes, and application retirement savings,” as well as a 45% reduction in application development costs.

Here’s how the Power Platform helps you optimize operations, make informed decisions, and better serve customers:

Boosts efficiency: Automate repetitive tasks to free up time for higher-value work.
Empowers citizen developers: Democratize app development by allowing everyone to design and build custom applications without deep coding knowledge.
Facilitates data-driven decisions: Turn raw data into actionable insights with Power Platform’s visualization capabilities that make data sets digestible.
Enhances customer experience: Create AI-powered chatbots to improve customer support and engagement, allowing your support team to focus on what matters.
Integrates seamlessly: From Microsoft 365 to Dynamics 365 to Azure, the Power Platform amplifies the capabilities of your existing Microsoft ecosystem.

Discover how Power Platform can work for you