Microsoft introduced AI-powered Copilot for Microsoft 365 apps and services.
Discover a new way of working with Microsoft 365 Copilot—next-generation AI capabilities embedded in the Microsoft 365 apps you use every day. Learn more: https://t.co/fqTtN1tRVQ pic.twitter.com/gNjCQfGkdz
— Microsoft 365 (@Microsoft365) March 16, 2023
The tool is based on the large multi-modal GPT-4 model from OpenAI. It is designed to help people create documents, emails, presentations, and spreadsheets.
Copilot will sit next to Microsoft 365 Apps in the sidebar as a chatbot.
“It works with you, built into the apps that millions of people use every day: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams and more,” said Jared Spataro, head of Microsoft 365.
The developers gave several examples of using Copilot in Microsoft 365:
- Word – compiling documents based on other files. The AI-generated text can then be freely edited and adapted;
- PowerPoint – creating a presentation of 10 slides based on a Word document;
- excel — processing tabular data using natural language prompts. Also, the tool can create a SWOT analysis based on the document;
- Outlook – sorting and deleting letters, summing up branches of correspondence, as well as compiling draft answers with a given tone and length of text;
- Teams – deciphering and summarizing the results of the meetings.
However, Spataro noticed that the chatbot will not always be right.
“Sometimes Copilot does it right, and sometimes it does it wrong, but in a useful way, giving you an imperfect idea that still gives you a head start,” he said.
Spataro says Copilot is more than just an integration of ChatGPT into Microsoft 365. It combines office applications with Microsoft Graph and GPT-4 data and analytics.
Copilot uses “grounding” to improve the quality of hints. If the user asks Word to create a document from the data, the chatbot will query Microsoft Graph for context and data before calling GPT-4. The response is then sent back for additional security and compliance checks. As a result, the final result will return to the original application.
The tech giant is also planning to launch a business chat feature that works with all data and office applications. It uses Microsoft Graph to combine documents, presentations, emails, notes, and contacts into a single chat experience in Teams.
The company said it is testing Copilot with 20 customers. In the near future, the developers plan to expand the number of users.
“We will share more pricing and details in the coming months,” the press release says.
Recall that in August 2021, Microsoft introduced GitHub Copilot to help write code.
In February 2023, the tech giant integrated the GPT language model into the Bing search service.
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