Understanding Microsoft Agent Technology: Start Here

• Customers must understand what agents are, their benefits, costs, risks, development options, and other aspects.
• Microsoft has introduced a myriad of agent platforms, tools, and services that confuse and overlap, but some unification is arriving via Agent 365.
• Consumption-based pricing, as opposed to per user pricing, is expanding.

What Is an Agent?

An agent is an AI-based process that can respond to user prompts in natural language and perform tasks. Agents can run interactively, responding to a human user, or in the background without an exposed UI. Such background agents can perform prescribed routines, similar to traditional workflows, or they can act autonomously with AI-driven reasoning whereby they make decisions on how and when to perform tasks.