Harvesting enterprise data is central to how organizations compete, and even survive, as industries transform digitally. Yet, as companies merge and technologies shift, managing data has become an extremely complex but critical task, especially handled alongside of an enterprise ERP implementation. For companies moving from an on-premise legacy ERP system to Microsoft’s cloud-based Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations (“D365”), there are some unique challenges and new tools to leverage when considering the data migration activity. Microsoft delivers the Data Management Framework (“DMF”) tool to assist customers with data migration for D365. Data migration itself consists of three distinct activities, as illustrated below: Data extraction (from legacy systems), data transformation and data import into D365. DMF will assist in the import into the new D365 application, but what is the best way to extract and transform, to “ready” the data for the import?

1. Considerations for Data Migration
D365 Finance & Operations
Written By: Gina Pabalan
Director, Data & Analytics

2. Harvesting enterprise data is central to how organizations compete, and even survive, as industries
transform digitally. Yet, as companies merge and technologies shift, managing data has become
an extremely complex and critical task, especially handled alongside of an enterprise ERP
implementation.
For companies moving from an on-premise legacy ERP system to Microsoft’s cloud-based
Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations (“D365”), there are some unique challenges and new
tools to leverage when considering the data migration activity.
Microsoft delivers the Data Management Framework (“DMF”) tool to assist customers with data
migration for D365. Data migration itself consists of three distinct activities, as illustrated below:
Data extraction (from legacy systems), data transformation and data import into D365. DMF assists
with the import of data into the new D365 application. But what is the best way to extract and
transform the data from a legacy environment to prepare it for input to the DMF tool?
Data Migration for Companies Migrating
from a Legacy ERP
2 fullscope.com
This white paper addresses approaches for extraction
and transformation of data from legacy systems, as
well as strategies for addressing seamless reporting of
transactional data (i.e., sales) combining the new D365
data with legacy data after system go-live.

3. For the purpose of this paper, we will classify data into these three categories: master data,
transactional data or opening balances.
Master data spans the dimensionality of an organization’s business functions and consists of
information about a person, entity or object. For example, in the sales, marketing and customer
service functions, master data can consist of customer numbers, contact info, service codes,
warranty information and distribution details. In the finance function, master data might include GL
accounts, cost centers, department codes and company hierarchies.
Master data can be very detailed. For example, a master vendor record contains not only general
information such as a vendor’s name and address, but also specific information, such as payment
terms and delivery instructions. Master data remains somewhat constant over time and is really the
core data about your company, which forms the basis of an enterprise-wide “system of record” for
the business.
Transactional data are all the unique business events that occur in the day-to-day operations
of a business, such as a shipped order or a movement of inventory. Transactional data will consist
of “facts” like quantities shipped, amounts invoiced and hours worked, and be associated with the
master data dimensions. The volume of transactions grows exponentially each year and can easily
add up to millions of records. Transactional data can be either closed historical transactions or open
transactions.
Opening balances are essentially a rollup of transactions to a point in time. For example,
inventory starts at zero and all the inventory transactions (+/-) sum to an ending balance, which
becomes the opening balance for a new period. If historical transactions are left behind, one will
need to import an opening balance in the new ERP system for assets and liabilities (i.e., inventory).
Master data, “open” transactional data and open balances need to find their way into D365, either
programmatically, or manually, depending on the total number of records and the need for automation.
Migrating historical transactional data into D365 is generally discouraged.
Data Defined
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4. Data living in a legacy ERP system will be structured very differently than data required for D365.
It is not a simple mapping from one system to another. Microsoft simplifies the import process by
providing the Data Management Framework (“DMF”) tool.
The migration of legacy data into D365 will primarily focus on the master data, such as customers,
vendors, items, etc. The DMF tool helps to easily import data into D365 that will then proliferate
to all the underlying D365 tables associated with that particular data set. That said, it does require
a customer provide the export, cleansing and transformation of its own legacy data into a standard
Excel-based format, provided by Microsoft, as defined by the D365 entity structure. Once in that
format, DMF picks it up and properly loads it into D365.
The process of legacy data extract and transform (the “ET” of “ETL”) typically falls to the customer,
who is more familiar with their own legacy data. This process can be painstaking and tedious,
and prone to error if not completed in a systematic and repeatable way. Customers will likely use
Microsoft SSIS to accomplish this task, or consider a SQL-based automation tool like Fullscope’s
Accelerator to streamline this legacy data extract and transform activity.
Fullscope’s Accelerator provides SQL-based ETL automation fully leveraging the Microsoft stack.
With Fullscope’s tool, this data extract and transformation process is 50-75% more efficient than
writing SSIS the traditional way, and offers additional long-term benefits (see “addressing reporting
goals” below).
Data Migration for Your D365 Implementation
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“Fullscope’s Accelerator provides ETL automation
fully leveraging the Microsoft stack.”

5. So what about the transactional data? Migrating historical transactional data can present a major
problem when considering a move from a legacy ERP system to a more modern ERP system with
its new data structures, posting methodologies and workflows.
The reality is that all those facts, events and transactions, living in their legacy format, requires
harmonization and transformation before they can be plugged back into a new ERP system. In
addition, many transactions will require further processing (i.e., posting), and the very process of
posting transforms the data further, making it even more challenging to get the various data sets to
synchronize into a functional whole. Next, consider that many companies have millions of historical
transactions, so the chance for error is significant. It is unlikely all the errors would be identified and
corrected during the ERP data validation phase, which means that companies will continue to “pay
the price” for data anomalies long after their ERP go-live.
For this reason, most experienced ERP implementation partners advise customers to not migrate
transaction history from legacy applications to a modern ERP system. With the D365 cloud pricing
model, Microsoft further discourages this migration by charging customers for the extra storage
required, making this an even more expensive proposition.
For customers who are upgrading from Dynamics AX 2009 to D365, it should be noted that the
data schema is dramatically different. Table structures were re-architected and have ballooned in
number—from 1,800 tables to over 10,000 tables. That, along with the many functional changes
delivered by Microsoft in the Dynamics product, results in having to execute a “re-implementation”
vs an “upgrade” from AX 2009 to D365. Migrating AX 2009 historical transactional data should be
avoided.
For customers who are upgrading from Dynamics AX 2012 R3, the data schema is closely aligned,
and a data upgrade is certainly possible. A review on the overarching reporting and BI strategy
would be warranted to determine if the increased cost and effort are worth it.
Migrating historical transactional data will result in increased project complexity, cost and risk.
Most commonly, the reason for migrating the data tends to be for reporting purposes and there are
certainly better ways to address this critical business need. We will explore this further next.
Historical Transactional Data
Why You Shouldn’t Migrate It to D365
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6. Every business understandably wants to keep legacy data and preserve its integrity. After all, a
company may have spent decades compiling it, as it’s the only way to show trends and reveal
patterns to help guide the way forward. Legacy data is valuable.
For businesses moving to D365, there are a couple options--besides migrating transactional data
into D365--to achieve post implementation reporting that combines legacy and new D365 data.
Each of these options is described and illustrated on the next page:
Addressing Reporting Goals
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Migrate balance and net change activity into D365.
This approach is most commonly used to address financial reporting requirements. It involves
moving general ledger account opening balances and periodic net changes into D365. This approach
provides a valuable capability to drive year-over-year financial reporting. Since we are not migrating
volumes of historical transactional data, it is limited in that drill down to the transactions themselves
would not be possible.
Simple mashup within Power BI.
Microsoft delivers embedded Power BI with its D365 application. If the organization upgrades to
Power BI Pro, it is possible to do some limited data mashup within Power BI itself. The challenge
with this approach lies in the budget for additional Power BI Pro licenses, plus the challenge with
transforming and harmonizing data across the aggregate D365 entities and detailed legacy data.
Further, this method implies that Power BI would be the only option for reporting. So although
possible, it is not always practical or desired.
Report directly from BYOD.
The BYOD is an export of the standard data entities into anAzure SQL data store. Think of the BYOD
as an operational data store that provides full SQL access to D365 data. Although it is possible to
pull legacy data into the BYOD for reporting, the BYOD behaves more like a staging database than
a true modeled data warehouse that will allow for meaningful reporting and analytics.
BYOD as a source for a data warehouse.
In this case, the BYOD is used specifically for D365 data, in order to leverage the full power of SQL
for data transformation and harmonization. SQL SSIS ETL is used to pull data from the external data
source (i.e., legacy environment), and then transformed and harmonized into a governed data set
specifically designed to support the organization’s reporting and analytics needs. If this approach
is taken, Fullscope’s Accelerator can greatly help expedite this capability and provide a tool that
can be leveraged for long-term enterprise reporting and analytics. If the tool is used for migration of
master data, as described above, much of that work can be leveraged on the back side to ensure
harmonization of data between old and new ERP systems.
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8. Most D365 customers want to leverage the full Microsoft stack, which in the data world means,
leveraging SSIS, or SQL Server Integration Services to move data around. Microsoft’s SSIS tool
comes prepackaged with the customer’s Microsoft licenses and since it is a standard Microsoft tool,
skills are easily found in the resource market should assistance be needed. But as anyone with
SSIS proficiency understands, the ETL task of writing scripts and stored procedures can be a mind
numbing task. Further, to successfully write export scripts, one requires some inherent knowledge
of the business, and its business rules and definitions for its data. Sitting a business analyst
alongside an SSIS programmer can be akin to putting two people in a room who speak two separate
languages. And herein lies the opportunity.
Fullscope’s Accelerator delivers a pre-configured D365 Data Migration Hub that integrates with the
D365 Data Management Framework to steamline data migration for D365 implementations. The
Accelerator includes an ETL automation capability that auto-generates all the SQL code in an open
and non-proprietary environment. It also includes a drag-and-drop interface that documents and
maintains all the important metadata and mappings. This results in:
1) faster delivery of the ETL code (50-70% more efficient),
2) systematic and repeatable development process,
3) accurate documentation and lineage of all data transformations,
4) streamlined error tracking and troubleshooting capability,
5) effortless “re-write” as migration requirements evolve (and they will),
6) decoupled data migration activities from the D365 application development cycle to
facilitate more iterative testing.
Businesses that use Fullscope’s Accelerator see a quick return on their investment, saving countless
hours of time and frustration involved with cleaning up legacy data and structuring it to work with the
Dynamics 365 Data Management Framework. If you have any questions or want to consider this
solution as part of your D365 implementation, please contact us at Fullscope.com.
The New World Order
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award-winning company is one of the largest resellers of
Microsoft Dynamics 365 (formerly Dynamics AX and CRM).
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through the judicious use of technology. We continually fine-
tune our process and user-adoption programs to give you
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to stay with you throughout your Dynamics 365 journey
has earned us the highest customer retention rate in the
business.
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