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☆ Inside Microsoft's struggles with Copilot
▼ + stars: | 2024-11-15 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +23 min

In September 2023, Microsoft's famously soft-spoken CEO, Satya Nadella, unveiled the company's flagship AI product, Copilot, with sweeping fanfare. Some of Microsoft's own employees and executives are privately concerned that Copilot won't be able to deliver on its ambitions. Copilot's struggles have created an opening for Microsoft's rivals, some of whom have seized on the opportunity to promote their own agendas. "Now, when Joe Blow logs into an account and kicks off Copilot, they can see everything," said one Microsoft employee familiar with customer complaints. As complaints and questions over Copilot mount, so does the pressure to justify Microsoft's unprecedented level of spending on AI.

Persons: Microsoft's, Satya Nadella, Gartner, Copilot, it'll, Copilot's, Marc Benioff, Benioff, Goldman Sachs, Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz, Ethan Miller, Jared Spataro, Spataro, —, Joe Blow, Joe, Nadella, Gary Marcus, Marcus, Wile, Coyote, Brontë, Judson Althoff, Jason Zander, Zander, We've, OpenAI, Tasos Katopodis, Steve Jobs Organizations: Microsoft, Venture, Getty, Goldman, BI, Fortune, Excel, Lumen Technologies, Honeywell, Gartner, Wall Street, Initiative, Department of Homeland Security, Employees, San Francisco, Software, Apple, Jobs Locations: Microsoft's, Copilot, New York City

☆ Marc Benioff says Microsoft rebranding Copilot as AI 'agents' shows they're in 'panic mode'
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-21 | by ( Kelsey Vlamis | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Benioff said Microsoft Copilot was inaccurate and compared it to "Clippy 2.0." Salesforce recently announced a pivot to Agentforce, its own product that inlcudes custom AI agents. Benioff's post comes over a month after Salesforce announced its own pivot to AI agents through Agentforce. Advertisement"This is the next big transformation," Benioff told Fortune in September, referring to AI agents. In his X post critiquing Microsoft Copilot, the Salesforce CEO said Agentforce, in contrast, was "what AI was meant to be."

Persons: Marc Benioff, Benioff, Microsoft Copilot, Salesforce, —, Copilot, Fortune, Agentforce Organizations: Microsoft, it's, Service, Monday, Business, McKinsey, Thomson Reuters

☆ Leaked messages show early challenges for Amazon's big AI product and concern about losing customers to Microsoft
▼ + stars: | 2024-09-05 | by ( Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Amazon Q, a big new AI product, faces issues such as high costs and lack of features. Neighorn told BI that Amazon had clear pricing for Amazon Q and that customers could use the AWS Pricing Calculator to calculate Amazon Q charges. "Amazon Q only launched in April, and we continue to add new features based on customer feedback," Neighorn said. "Amazon Q has a rapidly growing customer base that is using Q for a variety of use cases." AdvertisementFor now, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy may be the biggest salesperson for Amazon Q.

Persons: —, Q, It's, Slack, Q's, AWS's, Microsoft's Copilot, Patrick Neighorn, Neighorn, Matt Garman, Garman, Andy Jassy, Jassy Organizations: Amazon, Service, Web Services, Business, Microsoft, Google, ChatGPT, BI, Microsoft's Exchange, Bayer, Smartsheet, National Australia Bank, AWS, Q, LinkedIn Locations: North

☆ Salesforce tops earnings estimates, CFO Amy Weaver to step down
▼ + stars: | 2024-08-28 | by ( Jordan Novet | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

The company also said Amy Weaver, its chief financial officer, will step down. With respect to guidance, Salesforce called for adjusted fiscal third-quarter earnings of $2.42 to $2.44 per share on $9.31 billion to $9.36 billion in revenue. Analysts surveyed by LSEG had expected $2.43 in earnings per share on $9.41 billion in revenue. The LSEG consensus was $9.89 in adjusted earnings per share, with $37.84 billion in revenue. During the quarter, Salesforce said in the fall it will start testing an Einstein Copilot for Merchants that can compose product pages and promotions with a few words of human input.

Persons: Amy Weaver, Salesforce, Marc Benioff, Weaver, LSEG, Einstein, Benioff, Jared Spataro Organizations: Management, Merchants, Microsoft, CNBC

☆ Microsoft's new AI chief explains what's at the top of his to-do list
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-26 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Microsoft's AI chief, Mustafa Suleyman, has laid out his main goals for the company. In a podcast chat with Seth Rosenberg, Suleyman said he wanted to "uplevel" Copilot's quality. AdvertisementMicrosoft's newly installed AI chief, Mustafa Suleyman, is keen to ensure that the Big Tech company is not underestimated. On a recent podcast with Seth Rosenberg, Suleyman explained his new responsibilities at the company. He said he oversaw key teams, including Bing and Edge, and Copilot, Microsoft's flagship AI product.

Persons: Mustafa Suleyman, Seth Rosenberg, Suleyman, —, he'd Organizations: Bing, Service, Big Tech, Business

☆ The captain and copilot of an A320 fell asleep for 28 minutes during a flight to Jakarta, report says
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-09 | by ( Cameron Manley | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Read previewThe captain and copilot of a domestic flight in Indonesia carrying 153 people fell asleep for nearly 30 minutes, a report published by Indonesia's National Transportation Safety Committee (KNKT) said. Around 45 minutes later, the captain woke up and offered to let the copilot, 28, rest, but they declined, and the captain fell back asleep. AdvertisementThe first officer spent roughly the next 20 minutes communicating with air traffic controllers and flight attendants before they "inadvertently" also fell asleep, per the report. After waking them, the captain answered another pilot's call and air traffic controllers, claiming they had suffered a "radio communication problem." According to the KNKT report, the second in command had not rested sufficiently the night before the flight.

Persons: — Organizations: Service, Indonesia's National Transportation Safety, Business, Air, Indonesian Locations: Indonesia, Kendari, Indonesian, Southeast Sulawesi, Jakarta

☆ Microsoft begins blocking some terms that caused its AI tool to create violent, sexual images
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-08 | by ( Hayden Field | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

The AI tool now also blocks requests to generate images of teenagers or kids playing assassins with assault rifles — a marked change from earlier this week — stating, "I'm sorry but I cannot generate such an image. There is also a warning about multiple policy violations leading to suspension from the tool, which CNBC had not encountered before Friday. Microsoft has started to make changes to its Copilot artificial intelligence tool after a staff AI engineer wrote to the Federal Trade Commission Wednesday regarding his concerns about Copilot's image-generation AI. Shane Jones, the AI engineering lead at Microsoft who initially raised concerns about the AI, has spent months testing Copilot Designer, the AI image generator that Microsoft debuted in March 2023, powered by OpenAI's technology. All of those scenes, generated in the past three months, were recreated by CNBC this week using the Copilot tool, originally called Bing Image Creator.

Persons: Shane Jones, OpenAI's DALL, Jones, lacy, Elsa, Lina Khan Organizations: CNBC, Microsoft, Federal Trade, Disney, Palestinian, Israeli Defense Forces, Commerce, Science, Transportation, FTC Locations: Gaza

☆ Microsoft engineer warns company's AI tool creates violent, sexual images, ignores copyrights
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-06 | by ( Hayden Field | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +11 min

Jones was noodling with Copilot Designer, the AI image generator that Microsoft debuted in March 2023, powered by OpenAI's technology. "It was an eye-opening moment," Jones, who continues to test the image generator, told CNBC in an interview. watch nowMicrosoft's legal department told Jones to remove his post immediately, he said, and he complied. Jones said the risk "has been known by Microsoft and OpenAI prior to the public release of the AI model last October." "I am certainly convinced that this is not just a copyright character guardrail that's failing, but there's a more substantial guardrail that's failing," Jones told CNBC.

Persons: Jakub Porzycki, Shane Jones, Jones, OpenAI's DALL, Lina Khan, Khan, deepfakes, he's, Satya Nadella, Sam Altman, Justin Sullivan, Darth Vader, Elsa, Mickey Mouse, guardrail that's Organizations: Microsoft, Nurphoto, Copilot, CNBC, Commerce, Science, Transportation, Federal Trade, Google, Getty, pitchfork, Disney, Wars, Palestinian, Israel Defense Forces Locations: Krakow, Poland, Redmond , Washington, San Francisco, hoodies, Gaza

☆ Microsoft's pricey AI assistant Copilot is giving some early adopters buyer's remorse
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-13 | by ( Geoff Weiss | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Some early adopters of Microsoft's AI assistant, Copilot, are less than impressed, the Wall Street Journal reports. The first users balked at the hefty costs and said the AI would hallucinate wrong answers. AdvertisementMicrosoft is making a big bet on AI with its newly launched generative AI assistant Copilot, but some early adopters have been less than impressed. Others said the AI hallucinated wrong answers or calculated spreadsheets wrong, according to the outlet. And earlier this month, the techgiant rolled out Copilot internally, Business Insider's Ashley Stewart reported at the time.

Persons: —, Copilot, Copilot —, It's, wasn't, Jared Spataro, Spataro, Insider's Ashley Stewart, Satya Nadella Organizations: Wall Street, Microsoft, Service, Excel, Chemicals, Dow, Lenovo, Super Locations: Copilot, OpenAI

☆ Microsoft's Super Bowl ad is a sign of the company's shifting AI priorities
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-07 | by ( Aaron Mok | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Read previewMicrosoft's appears to be focusing its artificial intelligence efforts more on its AI companion Copilot over its revamped Bing search engine — and the tech giant's latest Super Bowl ad may be a sign of the company's changing priorities. On Wednesday, Microsoft revealed its Super Bowl ad for Copilot's standalone smartphone app that can answer user queries akin to OpenAI's ChatGPT. But viewers who've been following Microsoft's AI efforts may be wondering: what about Bing chat, the AI-powered search engine that the company launched months before Copilot? Bing, which added AI capabilities to its search engine last February, had around only 3% of the search market within that same time frame. Microsoft's shift from Bing to Copilot comes as the tech company seeks to integrate Copilot across its product lines.

Persons: —, Bing, Yusuf Mehdi, . Bing, doesn't, We've, Mehdi, Microsoft didn't, Copilot, chatbot Organizations: Service, Microsoft, Business, Google, Excel Locations: .

☆ Microsoft gets a price target hike after posting a great quarter driven by AI
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-30 | by ( Jeff Marks | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +8 min

Microsoft reported strong fiscal second-quarter results Tuesday, boosted by the strength of AI. Cloud unit Azure was better than expected thanks to organizations running AI applications on its cloud. That's double from last quarter as Azure AI customers grew to 53,000 from more than 18,000 last quarter. What's fascinating about Azure AI is that over one-third of its customers are completely new to Azure, according to Microsoft, highlighting the importance every organization has in understanding its AI strategy. Microsoft guided Productivity and Business Processes revenues to $19.3 billion to $19.6 billion, ahead of the consensus of $19.45 billion.

Persons: Satya Nadella, Jim Cramer's, Jim Cramer, Jim, David Paul Morris Organizations: Microsoft, Revenue, LSEG, Nvidia, AMD, Productivity, LinkedIn, Activision Blizzard, Windows, Activision, CNBC, CES, Bloomberg, Getty Locations: Las Vegas

☆ Microsoft's everyday AI companion Copilot is here to help – if you're willing to pay
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-16 | by ( Hasan Chowdhury | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Read previewMicrosoft is ready to offer you a personal AI buddy — if you're willing to pay. The Redmond tech giant is rolling out its "everyday AI companion," called Copilot, to both individuals and small and medium-sized businesses through paid subscription services. On one level, Copilot is a generative AI tool integrated into Microsoft's suite of apps: think Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams. Divya Kumar, Microsoft's search and AI marketing chief, told Business Insider there's a simple reason to pay: to get priority access to the best AI models. In a demo, Kumar used Outlook to show how Copilot could help save time on emails.

Persons: —, Bill Gates, Bennett Raglin, Gates, ChatGPT, Satya Nadella, Stephen Brashear, Divya Kumar, OpenAI, Kumar, It's Organizations: Service, Redmond, Business, Microsoft, Getty

☆ Microsoft brings Copilot AI assistant to small businesses and launches a premium tier for individuals
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-15 | by ( Jordan Novet | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Microsoft said on Tuesday that small businesses can now subscribe to its Copilot virtual assistant in the company's productivity apps. And consumers who pay for the Microsoft 365 software can sign up for a new paid version of Copilot. But those who pay for Microsoft 365 Personal and Family subscriptions haven't been able to use it in Word, Excel, Outlook and other apps. Those with Copilot Pro receive "priority access to the very latest models — starting today with OpenAI's GPT-4 Turbo," Mehdi wrote. "Whether you need advanced help with writing, coding, designing, researching or learning, Copilot Pro brings greater performance, productivity and creativity," Mehdi wrote.

Persons: chatbot, Satya Nadella, Nadella, Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft's, haven't, OpenAI's, Mehdi, Melius, Ben Reitzes Organizations: Microsoft, Investors, Google, Apple, Microsoft's Ignite, Windows, Bing, Copilot Locations: Seattle, copilot.microsoft.com

☆ Microsoft announces more Copilot AI features in Outlook, PowerPoint and Teams
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-15 | by ( Jordan Novet | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Microsoft on Wednesday announced a slew of new capabilities coming to the Copilot artificial intelligence add-on for its Microsoft 365 productivity applications. There are concerns about whether Copilot for Microsoft 365 is worth $30 per person per month. Copilot will be able to create Teams chat messages and come up with tone changes. During Teams meetings, the Whiteboard tool can automatically create visualizations of ideas that people discuss. In PowerPoint, Copilot will be able to create slides that include AI-generated images based on brand assets, with the help of the Microsoft Designer app.

Persons: OpenAI, Jared Spataro, Dana Organizations: Microsoft, Wednesday, Adobe, Google, CNBC Locations: Seattle

☆ Why Microsoft's AI assistant gives the tech giant a new edge in AI race
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-01 | by ( Morgan Chittum | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Microsoft 's (MSFT) new AI assistant tool should help the software giant solidify its lead among its Big Tech peers in the race to dominate artificial intelligence. We'll see how fast adoption takes place, but you could certainly see a snowball effect," said Zev Fima, a portfolio analyst at the Investing Club. MSFT YTD mountain Microsoft (MSFT) year-to-date performance Copilot is Microsoft's latest in a series of moves over the last year to integrate AI into its offerings. Analysts at the firm forecasted that the AI tool could generate more than $10 billion in annualized revenue for the company by 2026. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER .

Persons: It's, Zev Fima, OpenAI's, Satya Nadella, Nadella, Piper Sandler, Jim Cramer's, Jim Cramer, Jim Organizations: Microsoft, Big Tech, Investing, OpenAI's ChatGPT, Fortune, Sunday, CNBC, X, Media, Getty Locations: Cologne, Germany

The company's revenue rose 13% to $56.5 billion in the quarter ended Sept. 30, compared with analysts' consensus estimate of $54.52 billion, according to LSEG data. Revenue from Microsoft's Intelligent Cloud unit, which houses the Azure cloud-computing platform, grew to $24.3 billion, compared with analysts' estimate of $23.49 billion, LSEG data showed. Microsoft said on Tuesday that its fiscal first-quarter profit was $2.99 per share, above analyst estimates of $2.65 per share, according to LSEG data. Sales of its Windows operating system and other products in the segment grew to $13.7 billion, compared with analysts' consensus estimate of $12.82 billion, according to data from LSEG. The segment containing the LinkedIn social network and its office productivity software grew to $18.6 billion, compared with analysts' consensus estimate of $18.20 billion, according to LSEG data.

Persons: Dado Ruvic, Jesse Cohen, Jeremy Goldman, Anna Tong, Stephen Nellis, Yuvraj Malik, Devika Syamnath, Peter Henderson, Matthew Lewis Organizations: Microsoft, REUTERS, Investing.com, Alpha, Intelligence, Thomson Locations: Investing.com ., Redmond, Washington, San Francisco, Bengaluru

☆ The Street weighed in on 5 tech stocks ahead of earnings — here's our take on each
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-19 | by ( Paulina Likos | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

Wall Street analysts this week weighed in on five our of mega-cap tech stocks ahead of their quarterly earnings reports in the coming weeks. Street take: Piper Sandler named Microsoft (MSFT) its "highest conviction large cap stock" to own going into the end of 2023. Meta Platforms META YTD mountain META stock performance YTD. Street take: Bank of America said Meta Platforms (META) is "best positioned for revenue acceleration" as the outlook for digital advertising revenue growth remains solid. Ahead of the tech firm's fiscal third-quarter earnings on Oct. 24, the analysts estimate 10% year-over-year revenue growth in Search and 9% revenue growth in YouTube ads.

Persons: Here's, Morgan Stanley, Piper Sandler, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Marks, Jim Cramer's, Jim Cramer, Jim, New York Stock Exchange Michael Nagle Organizations: Nvidia, Citi, Microsoft, Apple, Counterpoint Research, Bank of America, JPMorgan, Meta, CNBC, New York Stock Exchange, Bloomberg, Getty Locations: United States, China

☆ Microsoft's Yusuf Mehdi discusses the tech giant's AI ambitions with Copilot
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-21 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Share Share Article via Facebook Share Article via Twitter Share Article via LinkedIn Share Article via EmailMicrosoft's Yusuf Mehdi discusses the tech giant's AI ambitions with CopilotYusuf Mehdi, chief of Windows and surface business, along with CNBC's Steve Kovach, joins 'The Exchange' to discuss Microsoft CoPilot's AI ambitions, and meeting the demand to offer AI for enterprises.

Persons: Microsoft's Yusuf Mehdi, Copilot Yusuf Mehdi, Steve Kovach Organizations: Windows, Microsoft

☆ It's the hardest time in recent history to get a car loan
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-02 | by ( Alexa St. John | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

It's harder than it has been in a long time to get a car loan. It comes amid increasing car loan payments and growing delinquency rates. Car buyers are facing some of the highest interest rates and monthly car payments in history — at a time that the rate of auto loan rejections is soaring. That's lower than the overall loan rejection rate of nearly 22%, but it's still up from 9% just four months earlier, and it marks the highest likelihood of auto loan rejection in recent history. Meanwhile, consumers keep getting hammered by high interest rates and even higher monthly car payments.

Persons: it's, Pat Ryan, CoPilot's Ryan, Ryan, Gary Guthridge, Guthridge Organizations: Federal Reserve, Buyers Locations: Edmunds, delinquencies

☆ Microsoft's latest A.I. subscription is boosting Wall Street's confidence in the software giant
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-19 | by ( Samantha Subin | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Analysts are turning more bullish on Microsoft and its artificial intelligence capabilities after the software giant revealed pricing for its A.I. Shares closed at a record Tuesday after Microsoft revealed a $30 fee for its monthly Copilot offering, which adds AI capabilities to Microsoft 365. The announcements led to a handful of Wall Street price target adjustments, as the company solidifies its dominance in the latest technology revolution consuming the investing community. The analyst has an overweight rating on the stock and raised his price target to $385 per share from $350. The analyst hiked his price target to $400 from $330.

Persons: chatbot, Microsoft's, Amy Hood, Mark Murphy, James, Brad Sills, Sills, Brad Zelnick, — CNBC's Michael Bloom Organizations: Microsoft, Meta, Bank of America Locations: ChatGPT

☆ Microsoft stock pops after it announces $30 per month A.I. subscription for Microsoft 365
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-18 | by ( Hayden Field | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Microsoft shares rose as much as 5.8% Tuesday after the company announced a new artificial intelligence subscription service for Microsoft 365. The company will charge users an additional $30 per month for the use of generative AI with tools such as Teams, Excel and Word. Adding on the subscription to Copilot, a generative AI assistant that works across Microsoft 365 programs, could increase monthly prices for enterprise customers as much as 83%. The updates come as the race to offer consumer-driven generative AI tools heats up among tech giants such as Microsoft, Google, IBM and more. The company also announced a significant update to Bing Chat, its AI chatbot, on Tuesday: visual search.

Persons: It's, Bing Organizations: Microsoft, Google, IBM, Goodyear, General Motors

☆ Microsoft adds OpenAI technology to Word and Excel
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Photographer: Charles Pertwee/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesMicrosoft is bringing generative artificial intelligence technologies like the popular ChatGPT chatting app to its Microsoft 365 suite of business software. features, dubbed Copilot, will be available in some of the company's most popular business apps like Word, PowerPoint and Excel. The Copilot technology is built upon a type of artificial intelligence software known as a large language model, or LLM. Microsoft executives demonstrated some of the capabilities of its Copilot tool on Thursday during an online presentation. In February, Microsoft debuted a new version of its Bing search engine that included a chatbot powered by OpenAI's GPT-4 language technology.

☆ Microsoft tries to justify AI's tendency to give wrong answers by saying they're 'usefully wrong'
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

On Tuesday, Google announced it was bringing AI-powered chat technology to Gmail and Google Docs, letting it help composing emails or documents. On Thursday, Microsoft said that its popular business apps like Word and Excel would soon come bundled with ChatGPT-like technology dubbed Copilot. But this time, Microsoft is pitching the technology as being "usefully wrong." Microsoft chief scientist and technical fellow Jaime Teevan said that when Copilot "gets things wrong or has biases or is misused," Microsoft has "mitigations in place." "I studied AI for decades and I feel this huge sense of responsibility with this powerful new tool," Teevan said.

☆ Developers are turning to GitHub Copilot, a ChatGPT-like tool that helps them write code. One startup VP says it helped him save 10% of the time he'd spend coding.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-06 | by ( Thomas Maxwell | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

GitHub Copilot, launched in 2021, uses generative AI to help programmers write code. Codex is the basis for GitHub Copilot, a tool that functions as a sort of autocomplete for software engineers. At a recent event in San Francisco, he compared using Copilot to a lottery experience. In other words, if developers don't already understand what they're looking for, they'll quickly get stuck using Copilot. "Sure, you could create a basic iOS app with Copilot," Ghazanfar said.

☆ Even with used-car prices falling, buyers are still paying more than $7,100 above 'normal,' report finds
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-19 | by ( Sarah O'Brien | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

There's still a ways to go before used car prices come back down to earth. Last month, the average price for a used car was $30,899, according to CoPilot. However, the price is headed in the right direction for consumers: Six months ago, the app estimated, car buyers were paying about $10,000 above "normal." Demand in the used car market skyrocketed during the pandemic as supply chain issues hampered automakers' ability to produce new vehicles. The average price of a new car is $46,382, according to an estimate from J.D.

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