MSFT Microsoft Corporation

Microsoft Corp. is courting corporate customers by forging a new collaboration with Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. as well as upgrading a key software suite for the cloud.

The software giant and HP Enterprise, the corporate-computing company formed by the recent breakup of Hewlett-Packard Co., in 2014 announced a set of joint efforts that included cloud computing services and consulting. Now they're extending their partnership to build offerings based on Microsoft's new Windows 10 operating system that target HP Enterprise's corporate customers.

HP Enterprise in October announced plans to wind down its cloud service, known as Helion Public Cloud, that provided raw computing power. But the Palo Alto, Calif., company continues to offer online access to Web-based applications; for example, the company works with Microsoft to offer the popular Office 365 productivity suite, said Chris Moyer, an HP Enterprise vice president.

The new collaboration with HP Enterprise takes advantage of Windows as a service, Microsoft's term for offerings that include automated management of updates to the operating system. The as-a-service approach will help HP Enterprise's corporate customers manage software on their computers, said Ajit Moodliar, a Microsoft director of business development.

The two companies, which have worked together on applications for the automotive and other industries, said they also are working on additional products and services targeting the retail, energy and transportation industries.

Microsoft on Thursday also is announcing a Web-based overhaul of its Dynamics suite of business programs that compete with offerings from companies that include SAP SE and Oracle Corp. Falling under the heading ERP, for enterprise resource planning, the software manages chores such as accounting, inventory, manufacturing and human resources.

Microsoft entered the ERP market by buying Great Plains Software Inc. in 2001 and Navision AS in 2002. The product line evolved with versions denoted by year of introduction, the latest of which was Dynamics AX 2012.

The latest version, simply called Dynamics AX, runs in a Web browser rather than requiring special software installed by customers. Though it isn't the first version to be available in an online format, it is the first designed specifically to run on Microsoft's Azure cloud service, Microsoft said.

Microsoft said Dynamics AX includes many features to appeal to users of different mobile devices and Microsoft Office applications, as well as new tools to help analyze data generated by businesses.

"This is from our perspective a transformational release," said Mike Ehrenberg, a Microsoft executive who holds the title of technical fellow.

Dynamics AX is the latest sign of a philosophy pushed by Satya Nadella, who was named Microsoft's chief executive in February 2014. One of his key themes, dubbed "One Microsoft," is intended to get divisions that previously developed products separately to collaborate and make their software work together. The ERP service brought together technologies involved in Office, Azure, mobile and browsers in a new way.

"There was never any synergy," said Josh Greenbaum, an analyst with Enterprise Applications Consulting, a research firm in Berkeley, Calif. "Dynamics AX is sort of a proving ground for the One Microsoft strategy."

Write to Don Clark at don.clark@wsj.com

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

November 19, 2015 09:25 ET (14:25 GMT)

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