Microsoft Ignite is in the books with a lot of new announcements and of course AI and Microsoft Copilot seems to be the new sheriff in town.
But with all the announcements and fancy show cases on how Copilot can help you out in your daily work life, a question emerges: HOW and WHEN can I use all of that?!
Let's address the elephant in the room - perhaps you can't at the moment. And the information on the official website is pretty vague. But we're in the same boat, so let's see whats available today for the majority.
Bing Chat
Bing Chat is available for every user via bing.com or integrated with your Microsoft Edge Browser. Please be aware that this communication is not protected. The data contained in your prompt and your data will be used to train the LLM. It is not intended to use this tool with sensitive information from your business. But it can search the web, help to summarize textes and uses GPT-4 since now.
Personally its nice for web based research but I liked the answers given by ChatGPT (version 3.5) more on point.
Bing Chat Enterprise (now Copilot)
Bing Chat Enterprise (or already renamed to Copilot) is the cooperate version of Bing chat. Your data and the information you share will be protected within your organization. This corporate version is available by signing into your work / school account on Bing Chat and your Edge browser.
On top Microsoft provides a standalone website for the Copilot via https://copilot.microsoft.com/
Microsoft Copilot (copilot.microsoft.com):
Make sure you always spot the green Protected tag before working with commercial data. Bing Chat Enterprise / Copilot is available via Microsoft 365 E5, E5, Business Standard, Business Premium, and A3 or A5 for faculty licenses at no additional costs. F3 licenses will be supported later in December.
Both Bing Chat experiences are as well available on Windows 11.
Copilot Studio (former Power Virtual Agents)
One of the most discussed announcements at Ignite: Power Virtual Agents (PVA) is now Microsoft Copilot Studio. It now works as end-to-end conversational AI platform that empowers you to create and customize your own copilots using natural language or a graphical interface - all without pro code know how. Use specific website information, plugins, custom topics and PDF documents to feed the AI powered chat experience. At the end the Copilot Studio will be a kind of maker tool for the full AI stack in your organization.
First Steps in Copilot Studio:
Microsoft Copilot Stack Overview:
Microsoft Copilot Studio is currently in preview and you're able to start a trial via https://copilotstudio.microsoft.com. In case you have already PVA licenses in use today, you should be good to use the new Studio without starting a trial.
Copilots in Dynamics
In the Dynamics and Power Apps world we have multiple different Copilots. So lets try to differ the different available apps.
Power Apps: Copilot for Power Apps is already generally available. Its accessible for every power apps maker regardless of the license via make.powerapps.com.
It supports makers on creating responsive and accessible apps on the power platform, including guiding through the creation process, designing, answering questions or importing data tables.
Field Service: The preview for AI-powered experiences for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service is available in December. Usually previews are available at no additional cost.
Service: Copilot for Service will be available in public preview in early December. General availability is targeted for the first quarter of 2024. The pricing is stated as $50 USD per user/month, but the website claims that the "comparable agent assist capabilities" will be included for Dynamics 365 Customer Service Enterprise Users.
Project Operations: Copilot powered Risk assessments, internal and external Status Reporting and Task plan creation is already available as preview in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Project Operations. The feature needs to be enabled in the Project Parameter control at no additional cost.
Sales: The Microsoft Sales Copilot is already available for all Dynamics 365 Sales Enterprise and Premium subscriptions at no additional cost. Its possible to attach the Sales Copilot license for $40 USD per user/month for any other Dynamics 365 Sales plan. Find out more here on the website.
The Sales Copilot supports on daily tasks like email summarization, drafting new emails, setting up meetings and even taking notes on the same. AI-generated call insights, meeting preparation assistance and conversation analysis should help to improve the customer experience.
This copilot also supports Salesforce and is best to use out of Microsoft Outlook or Teams.
Maker experience with Copilot (make.powerapps.com):
Status Reporting generated by Copilot in Project Operations:
Copilot for Sales in Outlook:
Copilot for GitHub
For your inner developer, there is as well some variety of AI-powered functionality. Starting off with Copilot for GitHub supporting developers with functionality like code completions, a chat interface, code referencing and enterprise-grade security and protection of your data. This Copilot Business license is available today at $19 USD per user/month.
Recent presented features like documentation search and summaries or Pull request summaries will be available from February 2024 on as part of the Copilot Enterprise license with $39 USD per user/month.
Azure OpenAI Studio
For a more "clean" and direct AI experience you can try out Azure OpenAI. Its more designed to connect your own data, functions and more to OpenAI features and model offerings. But everything still within your Azure environment. With the Studio its possible to deploy and train your own models based on the offerings by OpenAI including DALL-E and ChatGPT (Version 4 in Preview) with a playground functionality and direct code access to trigger functionality within your processes.
The pricing is determined by your usage of tokens and can be connected to an existing Azure Subscription, which you perhaps already have available.
Completions playground with Example to generate Quiz questions:
DALL-E Playground:
Azure AI Studio
The new Studio announced at Ignite is currently in preview. It provides a single place for developers of all skill levels to build AI applications. From what I've seen so far, it includes the previously mentioned OpenAI Studio, plus for example a Language, Speech or Machine Learning Studio (and more) - so it behaves more like an overall Studio to manage and build AI in your environment.
Its also possible to integrate other models like Llama 2 by Meta or the Nvidia AI foundation models. Regarding pricing it seems to be similar as the Azure OpenAI Studio, based on consumption. Find out more on the official website.
Model Overview Azure AI Studio:
But - where is Copilot for Microsoft 365?
So and now the final boss of all questions: Where is Copilot for Microsoft 365? I want to create PowerPoints out of my Word files, let the AI organize my calendar and all that fancy stuff from the Microsoft Demos.
Let me say it in that way - the access is currently a bit exclusive. The GA (Generally Available) date is 1st of November 2023. So its available, but only for enterprise customers who meet some requirements. And here it gets complicated while I have two different information here. I decided to pick the information thats shared on the setup guide website for the Copilot:
Here it is stated:
You have a minimum of 300 Microsoft 365 E3 or E5 licenses in your organization
You have a minimum of 300 Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses in your organization
This is an AND condition, so you need to meet both criteria.
It remains to be seen how to get access if you don't work in such an environment. I also assume the minimum of 300 Copilot licenses ($30 USD per user/month) could discourage some early adopters.
What can we do till Copilot is available for me?
Because Copilot and especially Copilot for Microsoft 365 is not a turn on / turn off feature you want to prepare yourself and your organization upfront.
Most important - the data is the fuel that powers AI. You want to have healthy and high quality data including the correct governance. All the AI is useless if the new trainee as access to all global business data. Users should only see what they're supposed to.
And this is the beautiful thing about Copilot - it can only access the data you're allowed to see and use.
Setting policies, the correct permissions and structures is essential.
Microsoft is supporting your new journey with a lot of learning materials like Copilot Lab. Also you may want to explore the AI learning and community hub and consider joining the community forum.
Please be aware that a lot of the mentioned functionality is still in preview. Its not recommended to use preview features in your productive environment.
Availability of certain features can differ per region.
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