Microsoft Update for Microsoft Partners

Welcome to our news! 

Have you ever wondered what it is Microsoft has been doing lately? If so, you're in the right place. We've carefully selected Microsoft's most significant updates over the last month, making sure you're always up to date. 

As Microsoft eventually makes changes that directly impact your business, understanding the latest releases can give you a competitive edge. 

Ready to start? 

Top Microsoft Partner Center Announcements  

Important Updates to Public Sector Launch in New Commerce 

Date: December 22, 2023 

Impacted Audience: Cloud Solution Provider partners (indirect providers and direct bill) globally. 

Update Overview: 

• Microsoft has revised the timeline for CSP legacy Public Sector offers (Government Community Cloud, education, and nonprofit) in new commerce. This will be launched across four waves starting March 1, 2024.
  • First wave: 
    • Wave 1: Price list preview on February 1, 2024; Available in new commerce on March 1, 2024 

Securing the Partner Ecosystem 

Date: December 18, 2023 

Impacted Audience: CSP direct bill partners, indirect providers, and indirect resellers. 

Microsoft emphasizes the importance of multifactor authentication (MFA) in enhancing security. Starting March 2024, security defaults will be enabled on all CSP partner tenants not already using them, conditional access, or a third-party MFA solution. 

Prepare for device management changes requiring GDAP relationships starting January 31, 2024. 

Partner Pulse 

Celebrating the first year of Copilot with significant new innovations 

On December 5, 2023, Microsoft celebrated the first year of Copilot with significant new innovations. The company announced testing of new features like GPT-4 Turbo and the new DALL-E 3 model.  

Microsoft Teams announced 49 new features and enhancements.  

These updates aimed to help users collaborate more effectively, streamline their workflow, and stay connected with their team. 

Our personal favourites are custom channel announcement backgrounds, improved search and domain-specific search, and calling shortcuts for Teams Phone. Custom channel backgrounds allow you to generate unique images for your channels using AI removing the need to use external applications to create new images.

Microsoft and AFL-CIO Partnership 

On December 11, 2023, Microsoft and the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) announced a new partnership.The partnership aims to create an open dialogue on how AI must anticipate the needs of workers and include their voices in its development and implementation.