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Microsoft to begin integrating AI-based “Microsoft 365 Copilot” into programs to assist with text creation

It’s the next generation of Clippy, with Artificial Intelligence built in.

Microsoft has announced that the company will be bringing more AI into its products by releasing Microsoft 365 Copilot for Word, Excel, and other apps to write text and manage emails.

Following up on the AI that’s already been integrated into its Bing search engine as well as its Edge web browser, the company on Thursday announced that Microsoft 365 Copilot will use business data to leverage intelligent productivity solutions across apps like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams.

The changes are as follows:

  • Copilot in Word writes, edits, summarizes, and creates right alongside people as they work.
  • Copilot in Excel helps unlock insights, identify trends, or create professional-looking data visualizations.
  • Copilot in Outlook can help synthesize and manage the inbox to allow more time to be spent on communicating.
  • Copilot in Teams makes meetings more productive with real-time summaries and action items directly in the context of the conversation
  • Copilot will also appear in Microsoft Viva to help enterprise leaders with conversation starters based on sentiments and trending topics, and suggestions as they draft posts with options to add images and adjust the tone.

The company also announced a new feature called “Business Chat,” which will allow users to enter natural language prompts like, “tell my team how we updated the product strategy,” and use calendars, emails, chats, documents, meetings, and contacts to generate status updates.

The company says that Copilot’s language models weren’t trained on user content or individual prompts, but it’s unclear if Microsoft is using GPT models from OpenAI or its own technology. However, Microsoft expressed support for OpenAI in Office apps in January.

The company is currently testing Microsoft 365 Copilot with 20 customers, including eight in Fortune 500 businesses. It will expand the technology to more customers and announce pricing and further details in the coming months.

Additionally, IT admins will receive new controls to help them enable Copilot across their organizations.

Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.

Via AppleInsider and Microsoft