Your Microsoft apps are getting an AI revamp. Here's what we know
Just days after Google announced the generative AI makeover of Google Workspace, Microsoft made a similar announcement. Your favorite Microsoft Office apps including Word, Powerpoint, Excel, Outlook and Teams are getting their own AI facelift.
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On Thursday, the tech giant announced Microsoft 365 Copilot, which integrates large language models (LLM), including Open AI's GPT-4, into the Microsoft 365 apps.
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
Microsoft says Copilot will be integrated into the apps in two different ways to assist both behind-the-scenes as you do your work, and also actively when requested.
Microsoft 365 apps will be embedded with Copilot which will optimize the apps to work alongside you and assist you in accomplishing tasks as you go through your workflow, according to Microsoft.
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Microsoft Business Chat, on the other hand, will be an active assistant that can generate responses to any question you have based on your Office apps and data including your calendars, emails, chats, documents, meetings and contacts.
The example Microsoft provided was asking Business Chat to, "Tell my team how we updated the product strategy," to which the bot would be able to produce a status update based on your morning meetings, emails and chats.
GPT's text generating capabilities will shine in Word where Copilot can produce an entire first draft for you to jumpstart your writing process, according to the blog post.
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Microsoft says Copilot will also be able to help with visual projects such as creating a presentation from a single prompt in PowerPoint and creating data visualizations in seconds in Excel.
Lastly, Microsoft shares that Copilot will also help optimize your interactions with others. In Outlook, it will help you clear your inbox in seconds so you can get to answering the emails that matter quicker. In Team meetings, it can help summarize key discussion posts as well as propose action items.
All of these features are similar to the ones found in the revamped Google Workspace which include text-generation for Google Docs and emails, AI generated presentations in Slides and AI-text summarization.
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Like Google, Microsoft has yet to make these AI features available to the public. Microsoft said that it will bring Copilot to all of its productivity apps in the months ahead. Currently, Microsoft is testing Copilot with a small group of customers to improve the model based on user feedback.