Microsoft is preparing to unveil its new autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) agents next month, giving businesses the ability to develop their own customized AI tools. This marks a significant step in Microsoft’s ongoing competition with Salesforce, which introduced its own AI agent tools in September.
At its “AI Tour” event in London, Microsoft announced that businesses will soon be able to create their own autonomous agents using Copilot Studio, the platform that enables users to build and customize “copilot” AI assistants. While these AI agents have been in private preview since May, they will enter public preview next month, expanding access to more organizations.
These AI agents act as virtual workers, capable of executing tasks autonomously without human supervision. Microsoft views them as a major advancement over traditional AI chat interfaces, allowing for more seamless integration of AI into business operations.
In addition to allowing businesses to create custom agents, Microsoft will introduce 10 new autonomous agents for its Dynamics 365 suite, which covers sales, service, finance, and supply chain management.
During the event, Jared Spataro, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of modern work and business applications, showcased an AI agent developed by consulting firm McKinsey. This agent could autonomously read and understand an email, identify key information, find the right person to handle it, and even write and summarize responses—without requiring complex programming knowledge. According to Spataro, McKinsey’s use of the AI agent reduced lead times by as much as 90%.
Fierce Competition in AI Space
Microsoft’s push comes as competition in the AI space intensifies, particularly with Salesforce, which launched its Agentforce platform last month. Agentforce allows enterprises to create their own AI agents tailored to specific needs, a model that Salesforce argues is better suited to handling large-scale enterprise operations.
Salesforce’s U.K. and Ireland CEO, Zahra Bahrololoumi, has been vocal in her criticism of Microsoft’s “copilot” model, arguing that it doesn’t connect well with enterprise data. Bahrololoumi noted that for AI to represent companies accurately and responsibly, it needs to be deeply integrated with customer data, something she says the copilot model fails to achieve.
While Microsoft has declined to respond to these remarks, the rivalry between the two tech giants is longstanding. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff has previously called for European regulators to scrutinize Microsoft’s acquisition of LinkedIn, arguing it posed competition concerns.
AI Deal with U.K. Government
Separately, Microsoft announced a five-year deal with the U.K. government, allowing public sector organizations to access its suite of AI tools. Under this agreement, the Crown Commercial Service, the U.K. government’s procurement agency, will provide public sector organizations access to Microsoft 365, Azure, and Microsoft 365 Copilot, which embeds AI into productivity apps.