Microsoft is adding a new wrinkle to Microsoft 365 Copilot, its AI service for businesses, with a free chat experience that includes the ability to create and use AI agents on a pay-as-you-go basis inside organizations.

Microsoft is relaunching its free Copilot for businesses as Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat today, complete with the ability to use AI agents. Copilot Chat is Microsoft’s latest attempt to get people used to using AI at work and relying on it enough to tempt them into paying $30 per month to get the full Microsoft 365 Copilot.

M365 Copilot Chat is a chat interface powered by OpenAI’s GPT4o that serves up responses based on web data (rather than information held in the Microsoft Graph, as per the paid M365 Copilot subscription). It also includes features such as Copilot Pages and image generation, as well as data protection and IT admin controls at no cost to users.

Microsoft has created a new engineering org aimed at accelerating AI infrastructure and software development within the company.

Microsoft Corp. is forming a new engineering group that will be led by Jay Parikh, a former Meta Platforms Inc. executive who joined the company last year. Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella announced the move today in a note to employees.

Platforms and Tools unit will be led by Jay Parikh, the former Meta Platforms Inc. engineering executive who joined Microsoft in an unspecified role in November. The division will bring together some existing teams like Dev Div,