Microsoft Corp. has decided to merge its consumer and work versions of the Copilot AI assistant into a single product aimed at enterprise clients. In doing so, the company is stepping back from the crowded market of personal chatbots dominated by players such as OpenAI, Google from Alphabet Inc., and Meta Platforms Inc.
At an event in Seattle this week, Microsoft executives introduced the new Copilot to business and technology leaders. This product, the result of six months of engineering effort, integrated a separate version for home use, adopting some of its stylish design elements, and abandoned the marketing strategy that positioned the company as the creator of personal AI.
Jacob Andrew, who leads the development of the unified Copilot product, told the audience of corporate clients on Wednesday that users have high expectations for enterprise software based on their experience using smartphone applications. He noted that integrating some user experience features from the consumer application has 'significantly improved Copilot in recent months.'
Andrew added that individual Microsoft users are typically interested in the capabilities of PowerPoint and Excel and are more interested in 'the full power we offer enterprise users' rather than a simplified chat application.
The updated software, announced on Friday, allows users to edit Word or Excel documents directly within the Copilot application or in a browser tab. This addresses a common complaint about the limited access the Microsoft assistant has to its own productivity software. Additionally, a coding assistant tab has been introduced, allowing regular users to create dashboards or automate tasks. The Microsoft Scout assistant, which is always active and can be called by colleagues, also joins the Copilot package under the new name Autopilot.
The new Copilot, set to roll out in the coming weeks, concludes one of Microsoft's biggest bets in the AI era. Two years ago, management formed separate teams to create two assistants—one for work and one for home. After Microsoft helped OpenAI bring ChatGPT to a global level, the company bet on its own consumer assistant that could attract a new group of customers and hired industry veteran Mustafa Suleyman to lead the project.
The situation quickly became complex when ChatGPT reached a billion users, and Google launched its personal assistant Gemini within the extensive Android ecosystem. Compared to this, very few people utilized Microsoft's offering for a personal chatbot. In March, Suleyman handed over his responsibilities for Copilot product development to Andrew, a former leader at Snap Inc.
Microsoft's retreat coincides with the emergence of Meta's Muse, a personal assistant that can act on behalf of users and has ranked highly in app download charts. In interviews this week, Andrew and Charles Lamanna, the head overseeing Microsoft's teams working on core Copilot for work functions, stated that Muse's success proved people's receptiveness to AI automation. They noted that Microsoft's strength lies in transferring similar functions to office workers.
Lamanna emphasized: 'We are not going to create a Copilot that looks like your personal companion.' He added: 'That is simply not what people want from Microsoft. We help you get work done.'
Andrew reported that many features of the personal Copilot, including specialized tools for health, education, or news and information searching, have been incorporated into the rebuilt product. 'In this unified Copilot, you still have all those amazing consumer verticals and all those unique experiences.'
Some other features that were part of the personal Copilot, such as custom podcasts and an animated avatar bubble that appeared during conversations, have been discontinued. Anthropomorphic elements remain in the new Autopilot bots, which appear as smiling figures when summoned in chat or in Teams email.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella compared the shift in office work driven by automated AI services to the replacement of interdepartmental memos and faxes by personal computers. 'It wasn't just about our new digital tools,' he said at the event this week. 'It was a completely new way of conceptualizing the trajectory of business processes. That is what is happening around Copilot.'
As of the end of June, the company had paid for over 30 million Copilot subscriptions. While private users can use a limited version of the Copilot chat for free, the most powerful tools are reserved for subscribers of the company's M365 application package, which has about 90 million paying users.
David McLaren, Head of Data and AI at GHD, a Canadian engineering and professional consulting firm participating in Microsoft's early adopter program for AI tools, stated that employees use Copilot to summarize conference calls and assist with email management, as well as preparing presentations and analytics for clients. He noted: 'It helps you get rid of a blank slate.'
GHD began using Copilot in late 2023 as part of a three-hundred-person trial and has since implemented the tool for all 12,000 of its employees. McLaren expressed surprise at the use cases: 'They are everywhere.'
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