Microsoft Copilots: The year in review and the year(s) ahead

Mary Jo Foley is the Editor in Chief at Directions on Microsoft. Before joining Directions, Mary Jo has worked as... more

Microsoft spent most of 2023 announcing — and sometimes delivering — its rapidly expanding family of Copilot AI assistants. If you thought there were a lot of Microsoft Copilots, just wait: There will be many more announcements in 2024 and beyond.

GitHub Copilot, Microsoft’s AI assistant for developers, kicked off the Microsoft Copilot frenzy back in 2021. Throughout 2023, Microsoft unveiled plans for AI assistants across Bing Chat, Windows 10 and 11, Dynamics 365, Power Platform, Power BI, Microsoft 365, the Fabric data-analytics platform, Microsoft’s security platform, and more.

Microsoft officials have touted that they used the same orchestration and same design language/”Copilot Stack” across its varied Copilots. However, as we’ve said consistently at Directions on Microsoft, “Copilot” primarily is a Microsoft branding term. Different product groups at the company have implemented Copilots differently in terms of user interface, data set used for training and licensing and pricing.

In some cases, Microsoft has rebranded existing AI-centric features as “Copilots,” especially in the Dynamics 365 space. In others, it has applied the Copilot brush to already shipping products, such as Power Virtual Agents, which it christened in November 2023 as “Copilot Studio.” Microsoft also has created some brand-new AI assistants, such as the Copilots across its Microsoft 365 suite, and is slowly beginning to make them available to customers.

What’s next for Microsoft Copilots

Microsoft has been embedding AI functionality in various products for years. Before the debut of its partner OpenAI’s ChatGPT, however, Microsoft had a different focus with AI, as acknowledged by Executive VP of Experiences and Devices Rajesh Jha.

“Prior to generative AI, it was as if the human beings did all the work and the AI was the editor. It would show up in auto-complete, grammar check, spell check. But now it’s flipped. AI is doing the work. They’re doing the first draft, they’re doing the summarization, and the human beings are now editors. So it’s gone from AI being editors to now where it should be, which is the human beings are the editors and the AI is the assistant,” Jha said during a December appearance at the Barclays Global TMT conference in December.

In the near term, Microsoft is planning to add more OpenAI goodies to its Microsoft Copilot search tools formerly known as Bing Chat and Bing Chat Enterprise. On the near-term list for these two Copilots: Built-in integration with Open AI’s GPT-4 Turbo and DALL-E 3 imaging model; a new Code Interpreter capability for performing complex tasks such as more accurate calculation, coding, data analysis, visualization, and math.

Microsoft also is doing more to blur the lines between the shell, search and browser, Microsoft’s Jha acknowledged in his Barclays conference remarks. This integration could manifest as soon as 2024, starting with the rumored Windows vNext/”Windows 12″ release, some Microsoft watchers are speculating. Jha said the deep integration of natural language in the OS is key to “a new paradigm for user experiences.”

Microsoft also will be rolling out previews of its promised Copilot in SharePoint and Copilot in OneDrive in the first part of 2024, officials told me when I asked for an update on their whereabouts. A spokesperson described these as “additional application experiences” for Copilot for Microsoft 365. (No word yet on whether there will be extra charges or how these will be licensed.)

At some point in 2024, Microsoft is expected to make good on its previous promise to allow Microsoft 365 Business Standard and Business Premium customers to buy Copilot for Microsoft 365. Starting in January 2024, Microsoft will make Microsoft 365 Copilot available to faculty for purchase if they have Microsoft 365 A3/A5 subscriptions. Microsoft officials also have said Copilot for Microsoft 365 will be available to consumers, not just businesses, in 2024.

It’s not guaranteed smooth sailing for Microsoft’s Copilot family, however. Besides generative AI hallucinations and AI ethics and safety concerns, there are other factors which potentially could impact how Microsoft rolls out its Copilots in the coming months and years.

There are signs that Microsoft’s cozy relationship with OpenAI is triggering scrutiny by not just the UK Competition and Markets Authority but also U.S.-based regulators with the Federal Trade Commision, according to published reports. Microsoft has invested an estimated $13 billion in OpenAI and OpenAI runs its models exclusively on Azure. OpenAI’s decision to give Microsoft a non-voting, observer board position following the unexpected firing/rehiring of OpenAI chief Sam Altman seems to have increased regulatory concerns.

Copyright issues also loom large for OpenAI and Microsoft. In late December, The New York Times became the latest to sue for copyright infringement, claiming OpenAI copied millions of The Times’ articles to train the large-language models powering ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot.

Everything you need to know about Microsoft Copilots

Our Directions on Microsoft members and customers have told us they’ve had challenges keeping up with all the Microsoft Copilots. They’ve had trouble determining which Copilots are still just previews (or even demo-ware) and which are generally available. They’ve been stymied when trying to figure out which Copilots Microsoft is bundling into products and often turning on by default, and which are only free to those with particular licenses.

The Directions on Microsoft analysts have been collecting information about the burgeoning Microsoft Copilot family, with the intent to bring some method to the AI madness. We’ve come up with a handy chart that lists the key Copilots the company has announced, descriptions of each, and as much pricing and licensing information as we can find. We will be updating and refreshing this chart on a regular basis, since Microsoft keeps adding new ones, changing branding and release dates, and adding new pricing and licensing wrinkles.

To download a free copy of the Directions on Microsoft Copilot infographic, go here.