Microsoft works to add non-OpenAI models into 365 Copilot products, sources say

Microsoft has been working on adding internal and third-party artificial intelligence models to power its flagship AI product Microsoft 365 Copilot, in a bid to diversify from the current underlying technology from OpenAI and reduce costs, sources familiar with the effort told Reuters. When Microsoft announced 365 Copilot in March 2023, a major selling point was that it used OpenAI's GPT-4 model. In addition to training its own smaller models including the latest Phi-4, Microsoft is also working to customize other open-weight models to make 365 Copilot faster and more efficient, the sources added. Microsoft 365 Copilot, an AI assistant built in to Microsoft's suite of enterprise software including Word and PowerPoint, is still trying to prove its return on investment to enterprises.