Microsoft announced a set of Copilots for sales, service and finance in a move that brings role-based assistants to Microsoft 365 Copilot.
The role-based Copilots will be available in preview for Microsoft 365 Copilot customers in October via the Copilot Agent Store.
Microsoft's offering is the latest in a trend of copilots and AI agents aimed at specific roles and processes.
With the Copilots for Sales, sellers can leverage AI within their usual productivity tools. Ditto for service pros and finance teams. Directions on Microsoft analyst Mary Jo Foley noted that the role-based Copilots are part of a rebrand.
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In a blog post, Microsoft pitched "Frontier Firms" that put AI at the center of customers experience, productivity and processes.
Constellation Research CEO R “Ray” Wang argued in a research report that enterprises need to rethink old models in enable AI and shed tech debt. Wang also recently examined AI exponentials and their potential.
For these role-based Copilots to work, Microsoft is connecting them to outside systems. For sales, Copilot connects to Microsoft's Dynamics 365 as well as Salesforce and other CRM systems. Finance connects to Dynamics 365 as well as SAP and other ERP systems.
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Constellation Research analyst Holger Mueller said:
"For the first wave of agents to keep a role focus needs to be on a valid True North. And efficiency gains from agents will benefit any role. The prize for enterprises though is not in efficiency - but effectiveness: Doing the right thing is the key design challenge in the agentic era. Agents are not bound to human roles and unleashing the next level of enterprise effectiveness is really the game enterprises must play and win. Role based agents can only be the start. Otherwise role-based agents can further cement up the 'efficiency trap' (which is missing the effectiveness exit)."
