The program launched with the naming of three North American Master VARs in October 2010 is still on track, Doug Kennedy, VP of enterprise partners and sales for the Dynamics program, said this week. (There is one large caveat at the end of this item.) Kennedy is no longer responsible for the program he launched, but "I am sort of pinch hitting," he noted at Microsoft Convergence this week. Kennedy, who handles primarily enterprise partners for AX, is pinch hitting in the GP, NAV space because Rich Wickham, who took the partner sales VP job a year ago, transferred to the Window group after about seven months "with a big bump up," one VAR said.

Microsoft is conducting a test of subscription pricing for the desktop version of Dynamics GP and NAV. "We have a limited number of partners participating," Gordon Macdonald, director of ERP product marketing, said during this week's Convergence conference in Atlanta. There are subscription plans in the current array of licensing programs, but this one is different. However, compare-and-contrast kinds of details were not immediately available from Microsoft.

IBM is distributing a Dynamics AX-based distribution package that has been marketed by I.B.I.S., an Atlanta-area based Microsoft reseller. IBM is the product on the road as Accelerated Distributor. I.B.I.S. owner Andy Vabulas pointed to the agreement as fitting Microsoft's goal of partnering to fill vertical market holes served by the financial software. In July 2013, Vabulas' company was named a global independent software vendor of Advanced Distribution Software. The VAR's development work included additions in revenue management, order management, inventory and procurement.

Microsoft executive Jon Roskill became the CEO of cloud vendor Acumatica this week in what is clearly a surprising move. Roskill, who spent 20 years at Microsoft, was most recently corporate VP of the worldwide partner group, a position he took in June 2009. The surprise is that Roskill replaces Yury Larichev who became CEO in January 2013. The company says Larichev will decide upon his plans in two weeks or so, but will remain during the transition.