Microsoft unlocks Copilot AI in Office apps for all businesses

Microsoft is opening the door for all businesses to use its AI-powered Office features. Microsoft’s Copilot for Microsoft 365 launched in November, and enterprise customers must commit to at least 300 users and pick up a phone to get on the list. For businesses, that means an additional minimum cost of $9,000, but now Microsoft’s AI assistant is generally available to all businesses, large and small, with no minimum number of users.

“Given the demand and interest we are hearing from SMBs, we are removing the 300-seat minimum requirement,” Divya Kumar, Microsoft’s global marketing director for search and artificial intelligence, said in a one-on-one conversation with SMBs. edge. “So now businesses of all sizes can get a $30 option and enable Copilot in Microsoft 365.”

Removing the 300-seat purchase requirement is a significant change, but Microsoft has also removed the need for the Microsoft 365 plan, opening up Copilot within Office applications to Office 365 E3 and E5 customers. Microsoft 365 Business Standard or Business Premium subscribers can also purchase Copilot for Microsoft 365 for $30 per user per month.

Copilot for Microsoft 365 still commands a higher entry price for now, but this feels like the type of launch we originally expected. The November launch is more of a pre-order event, as most enterprises won’t be able to get it the right way, and only the largest enterprise users will get access to Copilot.

Microsoft promises that Copilot in Office applications will change the way documents are created and edited. Powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4, Copilot will sit alongside Microsoft 365 apps like an assistant, appearing as a chatbot in the sidebar. It can also be called inline, allowing users to generate text in files, create PowerPoint presentations based on Word files, and even help use features such as pivot tables in Excel.

Copilot is also available in Teams, which is ideal if you want to summarize a meeting you never attended or a meeting you were late to. Email threads in Outlook can also be summarized, and Copilot can create draft email replies with various tones or lengths.

Microsoft now has three different versions of Copilot. Regular Copilot is free for both consumers and businesses, and is essentially a chatbot, much like ChatGPT. Then, today a new Copilot Pro option is rolling out to consumers, which costs $20 per month and provides AI-powered Copilot functionality in Office apps and elsewhere. Microsoft now offers the same premium subscription with more features to businesses as Copilot for Microsoft 365, priced at $30 per user per month. You can read more about the new Copilot Pro product here.