Axapta

Microsoft Dynamics AX is one of Microsoft's enterprise resource planning software products. It is part of the Microsoft Dynamics family.

Microsoft Dynamics AX was originally developed as a collaboration between IBM and Danish Damgaard Data as IBM Axapta. Axapta was initially released in March 1998 in the Danish and U.S. markets. IBM returned all rights in the product to Damgaard Data shortly after the release of Version 1.5. Damgaard Data merged with Navision Software A/S in 2000 to form NavisionDamgaard, later named Navision A/S. Microsoft acquired the combined company in July 2002.

In September 2011, Microsoft released version AX 2012. It was made available and supported in more than 30 countries and 25 languages.

The newest version, released in February 2016, dropped the nomenclature of year and version and was simply called AX, although was widely known as AX7. This update was a major revision with a completely new UI delivered through a browser-based HTML5 client, and initially only available as a cloud-hosted application. This version lasted only a few months, though, as Dynamics AX was rebranded Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Operations in October 2016, and once more as Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations in July 2017. An additional version is available focusing on Retail branded as Dynamics 365 for Retail. This has a slightly different licensing price than Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations.

MDCC or Microsoft Development Center Copenhagen was once the primary development center for Dynamics AX. MDCC is now located in Kongens Lyngby and also houses Microsoft Dynamics NAV and several other Microsoft Dynamics family products. Microsoft Denmark is also found in the same building. Microsoft employs about 900 people of around 40 different nationalities in Denmark. In addition to MDCC, Microsoft carries out AX development in Bellevue, Washington, Fargo, North Dakota, USA; Moscow, Russia; Shanghai, China; and Pakistan.