The first question a CFO asks about an ERP project is how much?, and the first honest answer is it depends on scope. That answer is useless unless it comes with a way to estimate the number. This guide explains what drives the cost of implementing Dynamics 365 Finance & Operations (F&O) in a manufacturing company, how licenses differ from implementation services, how long each phase takes and why, how to measure return, and what to bring to a quote request.
We do not publish fixed prices here, and we would be wary of any article that does. Published price lists disagree with each other because prices change over time and differ by country, currency and agreement: Microsoft’s own pricing page shows different amounts for different countries, billed per user per month on an annual commitment.

What determines the cost of an ERP implementation?

The cost is driven by scope far more than by the software itself, and six factors explain most of the difference between one quote and another.
Number and type of users. Licensing is per user, so the count and the mix (full users versus lighter users such as shop-floor staff who only perform limited tasks) shapes the recurring cost. It also shapes training effort.
Licenses and applications. Which applications you need (Finance, Supply Chain Management, or both) and which plan tier you choose affect the subscription. We explain the structure in the next section.
Customization. Every change to standard processes adds build, testing and upgrade cost. Microsoft’s implementation guidance recommends analyzing requirements as fit-to-standard first, and treating gaps deliberately, not by default. The cheapest customization is the one you decide not to build.
Integration. Connecting the ERP to other systems (a shop-floor system, a customs or logistics platform, e-invoicing, banks, a CRM) is often the most underestimated line. Count the interfaces and ask who owns each one.
Data migration. Moving items, bills of materials, routes, customers, suppliers, open orders and opening balances is a project of its own. Dirty data multiplies the effort, because it must be cleaned before it is loaded, not after.
Training, testing and change management. Users must be trained, scenarios tested end to end, and the organization prepared for new ways of working. Cutting this line saves money before go-live and costs more after it.
Beyond these six, the number of plants and legal entities, the number of languages and currencies, and the project governance model all move the total.

What is the difference between licenses and implementation services?

Licenses are a recurring subscription paid to Microsoft, while implementation services are a project cost paid to the partner who designs, builds and deploys the solution. They are separate lines with different logic, and comparing quotes only works if you separate them.
Dynamics 365 is licensed per user and per application, billed monthly on an annual commitment, as Microsoft’s pricing page shows. In general, full-access users carry the highest price, lighter user types exist for people who need limited access, and users who need a second application can often add it at a discounted rate, so how you classify each user changes the bill. A higher tier adds agents and Copilot
Credits, which matter only if you plan to use them. Always confirm current rules in Microsoft’s licensing guide and with your partner, because these programs change.
Implementation services are priced by scope and effort: discovery and design, configuration, development, integration, data migration, testing, training, go-live support and project management. Two items sit outside both lines and belong in your budget: your own team’s time (key users must be released from daily work), and costs such as devices, specialist add-on solutions, and post-go-live support. For a comparison of how Dynamics 365 sits next to other ERP platforms, see our guide to comparing ERP systems for manufacturers.

What are the implementation phases, and how long do they take?

Microsoft’s Success by Design framework describes the Dynamics 365 implementation lifecycle in five phases: Strategize, Initiate, Implement, Prepare and Operate. Mapped to a manufacturing project, they look like this.
Strategize and Initiate is the discovery stage: The team agrees the business case, scope and priorities, studies your processes, and validates requirements against standard functionality. Its output is a solution design and a plan, and it is where most cost and risk is decided.
Implement is the build: The team configures the system, develops the agreed extensions and integrations, loads migrated data in rounds, and tests. Microsoft pairs this phase with design reviews on areas such as data model, security and integration.
Prepare covers readiness for go-live: user acceptance testing, training, final data migration, a cutover plan and a go-live readiness check.

Operate is the stabilization period after go-live, when users get support and issues are resolved. Many companies then plan further phases for other plants or modules.
Official guidance does not publish per-phase durations, and we will not invent them. What public examples show is that total duration depends mainly on scope. Some partners list fixed-scope offers of roughly ten to twelve weeks for a single company with no customization. At the other end, Ovintiv reports going live with Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management in under nine months, on time and on budget (Microsoft Customer Stories). Multi-site manufacturers roll out in phases over a longer period: Bossard went live in Sweden and Denmark in June 2022, with Singapore following in April 2023 (Microsoft Customer Stories). Ovintiv is an energy company, not a manufacturer, so treat it as an example of a single go-live, not a benchmark for your plant. Your real timeline comes out of discovery.

What makes projects succeed, and why do they fail?

Projects succeed when scope, data and ownership are controlled, and fail when they are not, rarely because of the software. The factors that most often decide the outcome are within your control.
Success usually has these ingredients:
an executive sponsor who makes decisions quickly; a fit-to-standard mindset that questions every customization request; named business owners for data (bills of materials, stock, lead times) rather than leaving data to IT; a phased plan, plant by plant or module by module, so each phase teaches the next; realistic testing with your own scenarios; and enough training before go-live.
Failure usually looks like this:
data loaded without cleaning; old spreadsheet habits recreated through heavy customization; the project treated as an IT project instead of a change in how operations and finance work; training cut to protect the schedule; and a partner chosen on the lowest quote, without references from similar plants. A cheap quote that excludes data migration, integration or training is not cheap, it is incomplete.

What return should you expect, and how do you measure it?

Expect a return that you can measure against a baseline you set before the project, and distrust any promise of a specific percentage. Returns depend on your data, processes and adoption, and vendors’ case studies are self-reported.
Start by recording today’s numbers for the three groups of metrics that matter to your audience.
For finance: days to close the month, how often product costs are corrected after the fact, and stock-related write-offs.
For operations and the general manager: on-time delivery, unplanned stoppages caused by material shortages, and inventory turnover.
For IT: the number of systems and interfaces retired, support and maintenance cost, and time spent on updates. After go-live, review the same numbers at fixed intervals, for example every quarter for the first year.
Then compare total cost over about five years (subscription, services, internal time, support) with the measured benefits. Treat the first calculation as a hypothesis and refine it after discovery. The strongest business cases combine hard savings, such as support costs, with avoided losses, such as stoppages and costing errors, and state their assumptions openly.

What have others achieved? A global manufacturing example

Fresh Mark, a US meat producer with more than 2,500 employees, replaced a heavily customized Dynamics AX 2012 environment and a separate warehouse and transportation system with Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management, going live in January 2023 with an implementation partner. The company reports that it consolidated and shut down legacy systems, cut IT spending by 20% by the end of the first year, and reduced system updates from several hours of downtime to 30 to 60 minutes. Nearly 400 employees now use the system (Microsoft Customer Stories, July 22, 2024).
One reservation: this is a customer story published by Microsoft, so the results are self-reported and vendor-curated, and the headline figure concerns IT spending, not margin, yield or delivery performance. It is evidence about what replacing aging, fragmented systems can do for the cost and effort of running IT, and it is not a forecast for your plant.

Your next step: a discovery workshop

The most reliable way to turn “it depends” into a budget is a discovery workshop before you commit to a project. A good workshop reviews your core processes (planning, purchasing, production, inventory, costing, finance), your data and its quality, the systems you need to integrate, the number and type of users, and the sites and entities involved. It should end with a defined scope, a phased plan, a list of assumptions and risks, and a cost range you can take to your board.

What to bring: a list of your main processes and pain points, the systems you use today, rough user counts per department, your sites and legal entities, and the deadlines you cannot move. The more specific you are, the tighter the estimate.

Frequently asked questions

How much does it cost to implement Dynamics 365 F&O?
It depends on users, scope, customization, integrations, data migration and training, so a number without those inputs is not reliable. A discovery workshop produces an estimate with its assumptions written down.
How long does an ERP implementation take?
From a few months for a narrow single-company scope to a year or more for multi-site rollouts in phases. Your timeline is set in discovery, not in advance.
Is the Dynamics 365 subscription the only cost?
No. The subscription is the recurring license cost. Implementation services, internal staff time, add-on solutions and post-go-live support are separate and belong in the budget.
Does a phased rollout reduce cost?
It reduces risk and spreads spending, and it lets each phase learn from the last, though it can extend the total duration. Many manufacturers start with one plant or core modules.
What should a good quote include?
A defined scope and deliverables, assumptions, what is excluded, the number and type of users, how change requests are priced, the timeline by phase, and the team that will deliver the work. Be cautious of quotes that exclude data migration, integration or training.

Request a quote

A quote is only as good as the scope behind it. Contact us to request a quote or book a discovery workshop, and we will define your scope, assumptions and phased plan so you can compare proposals on equal terms. You can also book a consultation or a demo first. Reach us at info@mazayasolutions.com ,or at mazayasolutions.com.

About Mazaya Integrated Solutions

Mazaya Integrated Solutions is a Microsoft Solutions Partner with more than 20 years in the technology market and a growing footprint across the Gulf. Founded in 2005 as a software development company, Mazaya moved its headquarters to Kuwait in 2014 to expand regionally, and in 2023 relocated it to Riyadh as part of a company-wide restructuring. Its end-to-end implementation and consulting services center on Microsoft Dynamics 365, including Finance & Operations for financial and supply chain management, Business Central, CRM and Contact Center, alongside AI and robotic process automation, cybersecurity, risk and compliance, and cloud and infrastructure solutions.
Mazaya works with Saudi ministries and government authorities as well as companies in the food, financial, real estate, healthcare and education sectors across Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and holds ISO 9001, 27001, 45001, 14001, 20000-1, 22301 and 42001 certifications. With offices in Riyadh and Kuwait, the team helps decision-makers choose the systems that fit their operations and turn them into measurable results. To discuss your plant, email info@mazayasolutions.com or visit www.mazayasolutions.com.