At 2025’s Biz Apps Partner Executive Summit, held July 23-24 in Bellevue near Microsoft’s Washington headquarters, industry leaders told us that AI adoption for Microsoft Partners is essential. As Partners, we must internalize AI adoption to thrive in FY26 and beyond.
As organizer Giuseppe Ianni of Dynamic Communities put it, the summit provided a “24-hour immersion into… FY26 priorities that [are] defining Partner success in the AI era.”
It also helped us dissect those priorities, explore Microsoft’s shifting Partner strategy, and outline actionable blueprints for navigating AI transformations.
Watch PartnerTalks’ full interview with Giuseppi Ianni below.
From Business Solution Partners to AI Solution Partners
Microsoft has tied Partner success in fiscal 2026 directly to AI integration.
On the summit’s stages, Microsoft’s executives emphasized the importance of Partners using AI internally before expanding upon it and selling it externally. Famously (though not at the summit), Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella often refers to the concept as “technical intensity.”
It seems that many organizations are already listening:
IDC forecasts that global spending on AI will reach US$423 billion by 2027, growing at a compound annual rate of 26.9 per cent.
Gartner reports that by 2026, 80 per cent of enterprises will have deployed generative AI APIs or applications in production environments, compared with less than 5 per cent in 2023.
To remain competitive, we must clearly jump on the trend.
That’s why Ianni said the core message from Bellevue was that Partners are no longer only Business Application implementers. Instead, Microsoft expects us to evolve into AI Solution Partners.
“That’s also why we’ve changed the name to AI Business Solutions Partner Executive Summit,” Ianni said. “It shows our alignment back to Microsoft in the field community to say, ‘Hey, this is where things are going’”.
Looking Ahead: Summit 2025 and Beyond
Dynamic Communities is scaling future events from a 24-hour to a 36-hour immersion due to demand. Ianni projects that the Community Summit in Florida this October will draw nearly 6,000 attendees, which could make it the largest gathering in the business applications ecosystem.
This scale, he says, reflects the urgency and interest surrounding AI adoption across ISVs, SIs, customers, and end-users.
AI Adoption for Microsoft Partners: Strategic Takeaways
Adopt AI Internally
The summit encouraged Partners to “prepare, understand and act on the AI opportunity.” This means piloting AI inside their own organizations first. By deploying tools like Microsoft Copilot, Dynamics 365 pre-built agents, and AI-driven analytics, we can improve efficiency.
Leverage Networking and Collaboration
The Summit’s attendees saw six global SIs take to the stage alongside hundreds of senior leaders. Executive-level collaboration is key to accelerating Partner-to-Partner co-selling and joint ventures in AI.
Track Microsoft’s Structural Shifts
Microsoft is actively reorganizing Partner programs, particularly around ISV incentives and cloud alignment. “A lot of changes are coming in,” Ianni said. “Even from the MAICPP programs coming directly from Microsoft for ISVs.”
“We need to change and evolve the way we’re selling in the overall community,” he continued. “It’s for the best and we all need to get behind it.”
