Microsoft is incorporating AI tools into its office suite, which includes Word, Excel, and Outlook emails.
Copilot, the new tool announced by the firm on Thursday, is a processing engine that will enable users to perform tasks like summarizing lengthy emails, creating stories in Word, and animating PowerPoint slides.
Only 20 commercial customers currently have access to the new functionalities, according to Microsoft 365 General Manager Colette Stallbaumer. In the upcoming months, it will be made available to more commercial customers.
Microsoft promotes the function as a tool that will help employees be more productive by freeing up time they would typically spend on their email or by facilitating easier trend analysis in Excel.
The Redmond, Washington-based technology behemoth will also include a ChatGPT-like Business Chat messaging feature. Using user data, it accepts commands and does activities, such as summarizing an email to coworkers about a specific project.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella stated in a statement, “Today marks the next significant step in the evolution of how we engage with computing, which will profoundly change the way we work and unlock a new wave of productivity growth.
Moreover, businesses like Mattel, Instacart, and others have started incorporating generative AI technologies like ChatGPT and the image generator Dall-E to generate concepts for new toy cars and respond to customers’ food-related queries.
Google, a competitor of Microsoft, announced this week that it is incorporating generative AI techniques into its own Workspace programs, including Google Docs, Gmail, and Slides. According to Google, the functionalities will be made available to its “trusted testers on a rolling basis throughout the year.”
Microsoft made its disclosure two days after OpenAI, the company that drives the generative AI technology Microsoft is depending on, released GPT-4, its most recent AI model.
