Microsoft 365 Copilot: Why have it in the company?

What is Microsoft 365 Copilot

Microsoft 365 Copilot is an AI assistant embedded across Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, and the Microsoft 365 Chat interface. It combines OpenAI’s large language models with Microsoft Graph — giving it access to the user’s emails, meetings, documents, and chats — to draft content, summarise meetings, analyse data, and automate repetitive tasks directly inside the apps employees already use. Data stays within the Microsoft 365 tenant and is not used to train foundation models.

Available to enterprise and business subscribers from January 2024, Copilot requires a separate per-user licence (currently $30/user/month for enterprise) on top of a qualifying Microsoft 365 plan. Adoption rates vary widely: organisations that invest in data readiness, role-based training, and custom plugins consistently report 3–5× higher active usage than those who simply turn on the licence.

Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat

What is Microsoft Copilot used for

Copilot is the new productivity support that exploits the integration of Large Language Models with Microsoft Graph, the infrastructure behind the storage and sharing of data between Microsoft applications.

The goal is to offer an experience similar to tools such as ChatGPT, but applied to our business data, work documents, our emails, with a greater emphasis on the privacy of users’ business and personal data. Interactions with Copilot are in fact maintained within the Microsoft 365 security perimeter, ensuring compliance with the requirements of the GDPR.

Copilot is a data processing engine, designed to guide users in the use of Microsoft 365, Microsoft Viva, Microsoft Power Platform and Microsoft Azure applications. This tool therefore makes it possible to optimize the activities of users in the corporate digital workplace, helping them to:

• Analyze data in Excel
• Create documents in Word
• Manage communication through Outlook
• Create illustrated presentations in PowerPoint
• Improve collaboration with colleagues on Teams

On the other hand, the integration of Copilot with Azure makes it possible to consolidate the information coming from the services used in the company, thus improving the design, management and scalability of the IT infrastructure.

With this integration, Microsoft’s AI is able to support the management of Azure, in a conversational form, as well as advice for the use of the Microsoft cloud, such as optimizing the distribution of virtual machines or increasing the protection of storage accounts.

Other important Copilot features are present in Power Platform products, allowing users to generate with a single prompt a Power Automate automation, a Power Apps application or a Power BI report, integrating the necessary data and content from the Microsoft business environment.

Microsoft 365 Copilot: release date, pricing, and licenses

Since January 2024, Microsoft 365 Copilot has been available to all user segments — individuals, SMEs, and Public Administration — with no minimum license requirement for SMBs.

Copilot has also been made available with GPT-4 Turbo, the highest performing artificial intelligence model that Microsoft can currently offer. But it doesn’t end there.

Here’s all the news regarding accessing Microsoft 365 Copilot in the Microsoft 365 and Office 365 apps:

• Individuals who have a Microsoft 365 Personal or Microsoft 365 Family license can purchase the Copilot Pro license (currently at 22 €/user/month), thus obtaining access to Copilot in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote.‍
• Companies with a Microsoft 365 Business Premium, Microsoft 365 Business Standard, Office 365 E3, or Office 365 E5 license can purchase from 1 to 299 Copilot licenses. The previous requirement to purchase at least 300 licenses has been eliminated, making the capabilities of the new AI accessible even to small and medium-sized businesses.‍
• Companies with a Microsoft 365 E3/E5 license can purchase Copilot without limits.‍
• Copilot has been extended to teaching and administrative staff in the education sector, through Education plans.

Currently, the Microsoft 365 Copilot license costs 28.10 €/user/month for a company. The investment may seem high at first. However, an analysis of the costs associated with business productivity shows that Copilot pays for itself soon, leading to a significant economic return.

Just consider the time saved for each user with access to Copilot. According to data provided by Microsoft, it is only necessary to save 74 to 30 minutes per month per individual user to amortize the investment in Microsoft 365 Copilot: is this a feasible objective? The answer is yes.

In fact, the analyses conducted by Microsoft highlight an important impact of Copilot on organizations. 70% of users reported an increase in productivity, while 68% reported an improvement in the quality of work. In addition, 57% of the interviewees noticed an increase in creativity, while 29% were able to speed up research, writing and synthesis activities. ‍ In terms of time, the results are just as convincing: 64% of users spend less time managing emails, 75% have optimized their information search activities and 86% are able to recover lost documents in the corporate digital workplace more quickly.

Although it is difficult to precisely quantify the time saved by each user, we can estimate an average of about 30 minutes a day. This savings is attributable to the advanced features that allow Copilot to facilitate the management of internal communication and collaboration. Let’s see some of these features below.

Copilot’s time-saving features in Microsoft 365

Microsoft 365 Copilot offers a wide range of advanced features, operating through the use of natural language, to improve daily productivity.

We have already seen how the recovery of the investment in Copilot requires only the saving of 74-30 minutes per user per month. Below, we present some of the features of Microsoft’s new artificial intelligence that make it easier to achieve this goal.

Collaboration and communication between colleagues

Microsoft 365 Copilot offers new opportunities for collaboration and communication between colleagues, facilitating the exchange of information, the coordination of activities and the creation of content.

Microsoft 365 Copilot in Teams

Summary of meetings in Microsoft Teams

Copilot allows you to obtain a quick summary of the meetings in Teams, reworking the information shared during the meetings and reported in the transcript. Users can thus access in a few seconds the highlights of their meetings, the decisions taken by colleagues and the agreed activities, with an indication of who should carry them out and by what date. The estimated time savings are around 15 minutes per user per day.

Microsoft 365 Copilot in Teams meetings

Summary of emails in Outlook

Copilot allows you to summarize the information of the emails exchanged with specific users or on related topics, even if they do not belong to the same thread. It also highlights senders’ requests and suggests how to respond, as well as indicating which activities to schedule to satisfy those requests.

The time savings depend on the number of emails a user receives daily: a member of the sales department, who manages customer relationships, could save between 15 and 30 minutes a day thanks to the use of Microsoft 365 Copilot in his inbox.

Recap of Outlook emails with Microsoft 365 Copilot

Drafting of contents

Copilot is able to process the data stored in the Microsoft 365 corporate environment and create with a single prompt the drafts of:

1. Word documents
2. Microsoft 365 Copilot: release date, pricing and licenses
3. PowerPoint presentations
4. emails to send through Outlook
5. Post to be published on Viva Engage
6. SharePoint intranet communications Each content is accompanied by attachments, tables, graphics and illustrations relevant to the target audience, the communication medium and the author’s objectives. This feature saves at least 30 minutes per user per day.

Creating a Power Point presentation with Microsoft 365 Copilot

For a complete overview, read our guide on Microsoft 365. Explore our Microsoft 365 Services.

FAQ on Microsoft 365 Copilot

What is Microsoft 365 Copilot?Microsoft 365 Copilot integrates OpenAI’s large language models with Microsoft apps like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Teams, helping users boost productivity by automating tasks and providing real-time assistance in document creation, data analysis, and communication management.

How does Microsoft 365 Copilot improve productivity?Microsoft 365 Copilot enhances daily tasks by automating document drafting, summarizing meetings and emails, and offering advanced collaboration tools, saving users significant time each day.

What applications are supported by Microsoft 365 Copilot?Microsoft 365 Copilot works within Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, and integrates with other services like Microsoft Graph and Power Platform for seamless business operations.

Is Microsoft 365 Copilot secure for business data?Yes, Microsoft 365 Copilot ensures compliance with data privacy regulations, including GDPR, by keeping interactions within the secure Microsoft 365 environment.

What are the pricing and licensing options for Microsoft 365 Copilot?Microsoft 365 Copilot costs approximately €28.10/user/month for businesses, with different license options for personal users, SMEs, and public sectors. Licensing has no minimum requirement for SMEs, making it accessible to smaller companies.

How does Microsoft 365 Copilot help with email management?Microsoft 365 Copilot summarizes email threads, highlights key points, suggests responses, and schedules tasks based on email content, potentially saving 15-30 minutes daily per user.

What is the benefit of Microsoft 365 Copilot for collaboration in Teams?Copilot in Microsoft Teams summarizes meetings, decisions, and tasks, improving team collaboration by helping users quickly review outcomes and responsibilities, saving an estimated 15 minutes per day.

How does Microsoft 365 Copilot assist with document creation?Microsoft 365 Copilot can draft Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, and emails, automatically incorporating data and visuals relevant to the user’s needs, saving approximately 30 minutes per day.

How can businesses adopt Microsoft 365 Copilot?Dev4Side Software offers tailored services for adopting Microsoft 365 Copilot, including data migration, user training, and custom extension development to ensure seamless integration into the digital workplace.

Related case studies

Read the case study: Copilot Circle Hub for the adoption of AI in the company

Read the case study: Copilot plugins: how to integrate AI with business databases