Microsoft has now enhanced its AI assistant – Copilot with a new feature called ‘Actions,’ which enables it to perform various online tasks on users’ behalf. With the help of simple chat prompts, users can assign tasks like booking restaurant reservations, purchasing event tickets, arranging travel plans, or sending gifts.
In fact, by partnering with platforms like Booking.com, Expedia, Kayak, Tripadvisor, Skyscanner, Vrbo, Priceline, OpenTable, and 1-800-Flowers.com, Copilot AI can seamlessly execute these tasks in the background, enabling users to focus on other priorities.
Also, Copilot’s Actions feature can transform web content into audible podcasts, allowing users to listen to articles and other online materials. This is very similar to the functionality offered by Google’s Notebook LM. Clearly, it aims to provide an alternative way to consume information, catering to users who prefer auditory learning or need to multitask.
Speaking of other benefits, the upgrade also allows the AI assistant to monitor online deals on users’ behalf. It can help in finding the best deals on products and services online. This feature aims to streamline the shopping experience by automating deal tracking and notifications. Interestingly, the functionality resembles features found in other AI-powered platforms, like Perplexity AI, which has integrated shopping tools (called ‘Buy with Pro’) that offer tailored product recommendations and facilitate in-app purchasing.
In addition to task automation and shopping tools, Copilot AI now features personalization capabilities, including memory functions that allow it to remember user-specific details to offer tailored support, such as reminders and recommendations. Even, Copilot has been equipped with visual recognition abilities as well, enabling it to analyze real-world scenes through user cameras, thereby expanding its functionality to provide assistance based on visual inputs.
Notably, these enhancements come at a time when Microsoft is facing strong competition from other AI players, particularly in terms of AI agents (the new trend in the AI domain). Actually, several major tech firms are also developing advanced AI agents that can interact with web browsers and perform tasks without human intervention. These AI agents go beyond just answering questions and automate complex online tasks like navigating websites, searching for information, making purchases, and even interacting with web pages by clicking on elements and filling out forms.
For example, Amazon’s Nova Act – launched in March – is a browser-based AI agent that can search the web, shop online, and analyze what’s on the screen. In fact, Microsoft-backed OpenAI’s Operator is also a kind of AI agent that can fill out forms, book flights, plan grocery orders, and even complete user purchases. Another one is Anthropic’s Claude 3.5 Sonnet ‘computer use’ feature which allows Claude AI to control a browser, click around, and complete tasks online.
Meanwhile, in terms of numbers, Copilot (including Copilot for Microsoft 365) has seen significant adoption. Early estimates suggest that around 70% of the Fortune 500 are now using Microsoft 365 Copilot. Additionally, Copilot (launched in February 2023) had around 25-30 million active users last year (2024).
