Microsoft apparently envisions Copilot, the umbrella brand for its portfolio of AI-based content production technologies, becoming a major future revenue line item. And that might not be far off base. According to the company, more than 40% of the Fortune 100 participated in the Copilot early access program.
But given his huge The cost of running GenAI models in the cloud, transforming Copilot from spending to reliable monetization will require ongoing — and large-scale, ideally — development.
Certainly aware of this, Microsoft is today launching a consumer-focused paid Copilot program and relaxing the eligibility requirements for enterprise-level Copilot offerings. The goal, it seems, is to broaden Copilot’s potential paid customer base while also making Microsoft’s existing services — namely Word, Excel and the other apps in the tech giant’s Microsoft 365 family — more attractive through AI features. .
Copilot Pro — the new consumer plan, priced at $20 per user per month — gives customers access to Copilot GenAI features in Word, Excel (in preview, English only for now), PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote on a desktop , Mac and iPad — if they have a Microsoft 365 personal or family plan, that is. Copilot Pro does not come with a Microsoft 365 subscription. As with the Copilot business offering (Copilot for Microsoft 365), it is a premium add-on — bringing the total cost of the lowest Microsoft 365 subscription to $27 per month ($6.99 per month for Microsoft 365 Personal plus $20 for Copilot Pro) .
Microsoft 365 features with Copilot Pro are the same that enterprise customers have had for a long time.
In Word and OneNote, Copilot writes, edits, summarizes and creates text. Copilot in Excel and PowerPoint turns natural language commands into designed presentations and data visualizations. And in Outlook, Copilot helps draft email replies with tweaks to adjust length or tone.
In addition to Microsoft 365 upgrades, Copilot Pro subscribers get 100 “boosts” a day in Designer (formerly Bing Image Creator), Microsoft’s AI-powered image creation tool, to speed up the image creation process — plus improved quality production and landscaping options. And they get priority access to the newest GenAI models that support Copilot, including OpenAI’s GPT-4 Turbo, for what Microsoft claims is better performance during peak periods.
In the future, Copilot Pro subscribers will be able to change models to their liking and, if they need even more customization, tap Microsoft’s upcoming Copilot GPT Builder to create topic-specific “Copilots” from sets of messages.
Copilot GPT Builder looks suspiciously like OpenAI’s recently released GPT Builder for building custom chatbots powered by OpenAI GenAI models. But one assumes that Copilot GPT Builder will come with integrations for specific Microsoft services and applications.
Copilot for business
As Microsoft launches a premium Copilot for consumers, it’s also expanding the service’s business availability.
Starting today, Copilot is generally available for organizations subscribed to Microsoft 365 Business Premium, Microsoft 365 Business Standard, Microsoft 365 E3 and E5, or Office 365 E3 and Office E5. Previously, Copilot for Microsoft 365 had a minimum purchase of 300 users and required a Microsoft 365 license, but both of these requirements have been removed.
There are a few differences to note between Copilot for Microsoft 365 and Copilot Pro, the main one being Copilot in Teams. Enterprise Copilot customers — not consumers — get a “Copilot” in Teams that provides real-time summaries and action items, handling tasks like identifying people to follow and creating meeting agendas.
The different Copilot plans, compared.
In addition, Copilot for Microsoft 365 comes with what Microsoft describes as “enterprise-grade data protection” and Semantic Index, a back-end system that creates a map of data and content in an organization to enable Copilot to provides seemingly more personal and relevant answers.
Copilot for Microsoft 365 customers can too access expanded customization options through Copilot Studio, an enhanced version of Copilot GPT Builder. It was revealed In November, Copilot Studio lets users build their own chatbots and plugins and enhance their first-party company’s data.
New free features
Microsoft’s attention may be turning to paid Copilot plans, but the company isn’t completely neglecting free users.
Today marks the release of Copilot GPTs, which like OpenAI’s GPTs are tailored to topics of particular interest. A handful of Copilot GPTs went live this morning on the web client for Copilot, tailored to answer questions about topics like fitness, travel and cooking.
A free mobile app for Copilot — with access to GPT-4, DALL-E 3 for image generation and the ability to use images on a phone while chatting with Copilot, as well as chat history sync between mobile, PC and web — is now live for Android and iOS. And Microsoft says it’s adding Copilot to the Microsoft 365 mobile app for Android and iOS for users with a Microsoft account. Microsoft 365’s Copilot mobile app integration, due out next month, will allow users to export content created with Copilot to a Word or PDF document.
Finally, Microsoft says it’s expanding the number of languages Copilot supports. In the first half of 2024, Copilot will expand to Arabic, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Hebrew, Hungarian, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Swedish, Thai, Turkish and Ukrainian.
