Microsoft
has announced new moves to expand the reach of its Copilot artificial intelligence software to more users—in particular consumers and small businesses.
The company launched Copilot for Microsoft 365 enterprise customers in early November, priced at $30 per user per month. Now the company is taking steps to broaden the software’s reach.
Microsoft is unveiling Copilot Pro, a subscription service targeted at individuals, for $20 a month.
The company also is making Copilot for Microsoft 365 available to small businesses with under 300 employees at the same $30 per user monthly price point it set for larger customers.
In a blog post introducing Copilot Pro, Microsoft executive VP and consumer chief marketing officer Yusuf Mehdi wrote “there are a set of Copilot power users like creators, researchers, programmers and others who want more rapid access to the very latest we have to offer.”
The Copilot Pro subscription service will include access on any device, running on top of applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote on PCs, Macs, and iPads.
It has priority access to the latest large language models, starting with OpenAI’s GPT-4 Turbo, which can handle complex prompts with up to 300 pages of text.
The subscription also includes enhanced AI image creation with Designer, the new name for what used to be called Bing Image Creator. Subscribers will be able to build their own Copilot GPTs—Copilot software tailored for specific topics—using a forthcoming tool called Copilot GPT Builder.
The company is also expanding Copilot’s availability to more enterprise users—Microsoft had previously required a license for Microsoft 365, but now will allow access to customers with the slightly more limited set of applications under its Office 365 E3 and E5 subscription plans.
In addition, Microsoft is expanding the features included in its free Copilot service, which used to be called Bing Chat.
Starting Tuesday, the site will offer targeted Copilot versions for topics such as fitness, cooking, and travel.
The company also debuted a Copilot mobile app for both
Apple
and Android devices, which includes the same capabilities as the Web version, including access to the GPT-4 large language model from Open AI as well as Dall-E 3 for image creation.
Microsoft is also adding Copilot to the Microsoft 365 mobile app for both Apple and Android devices for people with a Microsoft account.
Write to Eric J. Savitz at [email protected]
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