New AI solutions and improvements to Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit

New AI solutions and improvements to Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit

Microsoft has announced a suite of new AI solutions and improvements to Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit. These solutions are designed to transform the nonprofit industry by helping fundraisers engage with donors, manage campaigns, and optimize operations. The company also announced a limited private preview for nonprofits to experience a new AI-powered fundraising propensity model. This model will allow participating nonprofits to test new AI tools that can predict fundraising goals and identify donors most likely to donate to a campaign or cause.

According to Justin Spelhaug, Vice President and Global Head of Tech for Social Impact at Microsoft, “AI can and will be a game-changer for nonprofits and fundraisers.” With these new AI solutions, Microsoft aims to empower nonprofits and fundraisers to achieve more and create a more positive and rewarding experience for donors.

Nonprofits often struggle to make budgets go further and do more with fewer resources. Since 2020, many fundraisers have seen a decline in the number of donors giving to causes. Data can help nonprofits identify promising prospects, predict donor behavior, and measure fundraising outcomes. However, access to data and the ability to form actionable insights based on fundraising analytics is a major roadblock for many organizations.

volunteers helping sort out donation items into a box, new Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit AI features announced

Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit new AI solutions

Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit now includes new tools such as a Fundraising dashboard built on Power BI’s data visualization platform, Dynamics 365 Marketing integration, and AI capabilities in the Fundraising and Engagement tools. These tools will help nonprofits leverage data in a powerful way to attract, retain, and grow their donor base.

In addition to these new capabilities in Microsoft Cloud for Nonprofit, Microsoft is developing an AI-based donor propensity model. This model will help nonprofits identify constituents most likely to donate or engage with a campaign or cause based on predictive donor behavior. Interested nonprofits can sign up to participate in this private preview.

These new AI solutions are built on Microsoft’s trusted cloud platform, Azure, which offers enhanced security, scalability, and reliability. They are also integrated with Microsoft’s existing solutions for nonprofits such as Microsoft 365, Power Platform, Microsoft Dynamics 365, and LinkedIn.

In 2017, Microsoft launched Microsoft Cloud for Good to help mission-driven organizations get access to technology to do more. Click to visit to learn more about these new AI solutions for nonprofits. Here is how nonprofits in Africa can benefit from the offer.

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Check out other Microsoft stories making the news across Africa and the Middle East region.

Microsoft supports 3 South African Organizations with $1M in cash and technology grants

Microsoft supports 3 South African Organizations with $1M in cash and technology grants

Microsoft Philanthropies announce $1M in cash and technology grants to three innovative non-profit South African organisations to drive greater impact through digital transformation

 
South African  

Recipients of the grants are Youth Empowerment Services (YES), Peace Parks Foundation and the Sunflower Fund. Microsoft believes this “will bolster their work to respectively create employment opportunities for youth. It’ll combat wildlife crime and support conservation work. As well as advance healthcare solutions for those with Leukaemia and other life-threatening blood diseases”.

Since 2016 Microsoft philanthropies has given over $25 million in grants out to more than 2,300 South African non profits. 

Microsoft’s Technology for Good

 
Microsoft’s Technology for Social Impact (TSI) group general manager Justin Spelhaug, shared on Microsoft’s plan. A plan to empower non-profits to achieve more through digital transformation. He said non-profits currently operate in a world of highly constrained resources. They are doing more with less and this requires changing how they work. Technology can help accelerate their missions in many ways.

Technology is a powerful tool to help solve the world’s most challenging issues.
In the same way Microsoft takes our corporate clients on the digital transformation journey, we are working with NPOs in South Africa to help them implement long-term, sustainable change in their communities.
Digital technology powered by Azure has helped NPOs make smarter decisions, be more productive and communicate with one another more effectively.
In the future, AI will enable NGOs to harness vast amounts of data and make breakthrough advances in areas like healthcare, agriculture, education and transportation. We’re already seeing how AI-bolstered computing can help doctors reduce medical mistakes, farmers improve yields, teachers customise instruction and researchers unlock solutions to protect our planet.” – Justin Spelhaug

Here is a closer look at what these South African Organizations are working on

 

Youth Empowerment Services (YES)

Microsoft and YES have partnered to bring cloud technology and access to the latest software to South African youths. Launched by President Cyril Ramaphosa on March 2018, YES is a business-led partnership with government, labour and civil society. YES aims to empower one million young South Africans by offering paid quality work experiences over the next three years.

Microsoft is investing $825,450 in a strategic software grant to equip 100 community hubs (YES centres of excellence). This comes with Office and other applications to boost employee productivity and skills development of young people. Microsoft will provide training to empower employees who will utilise Office for non-profits. They’ll also work on adapting more technologies as well as apps and service. 

Peace Parks Foundation

Microsoft Philanthropies is providing the anti-poaching solutions organization a grant for its move to the cloud. Microsoft AI for Earth is also providing three grants to support various aspects of the Peace park Foundation work. These include a grant to further their Smart Parks system, using Microsoft’s Platform as a Service (PaaS) functionality to enable the transformation and integration of anti-poaching interventions. Microsoft’s artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities have been deployed to analyse images from a network of connected camera traps to enable autonomous poacher detection. There are two additional grants. One to support new work on conservation-minded agriculture, to deliver best practices via an app for farmers. That has the potential to improve yields with minimal habitat impact, speaking closely to the Foundation’s community development work. The third grant has been secured for the Tracker Academy affiliated to the SA College of Tourism. A project that aims to pair AI with indigenous knowledge of animal tracking and behaviour to train the next generation of trackers.  

Sunflower Fund

The Sunflower Fund plays a critical role in recruiting blood stem cell donors to fight Leukaemia and other life-threatening blood diseases. They are leveraging the power of Microsoft’s intelligent cloud (Azure), a mobile app and AI to better engage with donors and recipients.

Justin Spelhaug says in just 18 months we reached our goal. By helping more than 90,000 nonprofit organizations digitally scale their impact and serve the public good. Our goal over the next 3 years is to reach over 300,000 nonprofits by the year 2020.

Microsoft’s cloud for public good and philanthropy grants are available to help any non profit achieve more. Read more about Microsoft’s Technology for Social Impact group and how you can benefit from the value they bring to the non-profit community.

Nonprofits can use Microsoft’s Cloud for Global Good to deliver more effective services, Learn How to.

Nonprofits can use Microsoft’s Cloud for Global Good to deliver more effective services, Learn How to.

Microsoft is bringing the power of technology to help nonprofits achieve their missions. I’ll share on its history and how to go about benefitting from this offer.

nonprofits

Microsoft is on a mission to empower every organization and person on the planet to achieve more. This has led Microsoft in its endeavor to launch a series of initiatives. These include the Insiders4Good initiative, the Cloud for Global Good, Affordable Access and many more. The Insiders4Good has seen 25 entrepreneurial ideas turned to businesses in Nigeria and 20 in East Africa. The Affordable Access grant initiative has seen 11 African enterprises receive grant funds to grow their businesses in underserved communities.

Microsoft is hoping to donate 1 billion dollars in cloud computing resources to nonprofits and researchers over 3 years. Microsoft believes about 70,000 organizations around the world can benefit from this initiative. They’ll receive Microsoft Cloud Services; Azure, Office 365, Power BI, CRM Online, the Enterprise Mobility Suite and Windows 10.

“Microsoft is empowering mission-driven organizations around the planet with a donation of cloud computing services. Now more than 70,000 organizations will have access to technology that will help them solve our greatest societal challenges and ultimately improve the human condition and drive new growth equally” – Satya Nadella, Microsoft CEO

How do nonprofits benefit from the Microsoft Cloud for Global Good offering? 

In every region of the world, Microsoft has partner organizations that administer this offer. So, you’ll need to check with the Microsoft office in your region on this. I’ll focus on the Africa region in this post, but if you read on you’ll get to know what you’ll need to qualify.
TechSoup is a partner organization in Africa. This means if you have a local TechSoup office in your country, they’ll be your go-to guys. If not, they also have other partners in your country. For example, in West Africa, West Africa Civil Society Institute, WACSI.(*Partner details below) 

You must first apply to the partner organization in charge of your country. Select the offers suitable to your organization and which service type you’ll benefit from.

Here are some helpful details for nonprofits 

  • Requirements for Nonprofits to qualify for the offer.
  1. Legally registered as a nonprofit organization;
  2. In most cases, you’ll be required to provide a valid registration certificate.
    (*for some you’ll need to provide a revenue authority identification number. For others, you must have operated for at least 2 years)
  • The registration Process.

You can contact the partner organization in your region or register online. To register, go to www.techsoup.global, select your country, click on Join now to request donations, and fill out the registration form. If you initiate your donation request from  Microsoft you will be redirected to the partner platform to be validated as a Nonprofit before you can process to check out the selected product. 

  • Coverage area/region of implementing Partner Organizations Africa.  

Current Africa Regional Partners: 

SANGONet 
West Africa Civil Society Institute, WACSI, WACSITech (For more information organizations can contact us at wacsitech@wacsi.org)
Kenya Community Development Foundation, KCDF 
Professional Development Foundation, PDF

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 If you visit www.techsoup.global and select your country, you will be redirected to the partner website. 

  • What are the benefits? What do you get when you apply? Is there a duration of the package, does it become a paid service after a period or when it exceeds a limit?

All software and cloud solutions offered by Microsoft is donated. But there is a small administrative fee you’ll be made to pay.The program is a Technology donation program for non-profits. This program aims to help nonprofit organization access technology products and services at discounted price (up to 95% less than the market value). This is an administration fee that nonprofit organizations contribute to get access to the products and service.
Once an organization is registered for the program, it can benefit from the products of its choice available on the catalog at any moment. 

Specifically, for Office 365, nonprofit organizations have discounted rates of subscription, different from the standard user fee/month. 

Kindly note that Microsoft doesn’t validate nonprofits, so you’ll need to register with the partners.

Have you benefited from this offering? Share your thoughts with us.