Microsoft AI CoPilot: 'We want it to be everywhere you need it,' VP says

Microsoft (MSFT) unveiled a lineup of new Surface laptops alongside its AI-driven Copilot. Copilot is designed to serve as a personal assistant, appearing when users require its assistance. With continued usage, Copilot will adapt to individual needs.

"We want it to be everywhere you need it," Microsoft's Corporate Vice President of Modern Life, Search and Devices, Yusuf Mehdi tells Yahoo Finance. The hope is that users shift away from reliance on apps and "overtime you're gonna end up going just to your Copilot."

Yahoo Finance Tech Editor Dan Howley interviews Yusuf, delving into the capabilities of Copilot, how it's meant to work, and the security features designed to safeguard users.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live.

Video transcript

JOSH LIPTON: Microsoft says Copilot is designed to help users better organize and interact with all of their data. Yahoo Finance's Dan Howley had a chance to speak with, Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft's Corporate VP. Take a listen.

YUSUF MEHDI: Today, it's really about kind of two things. One is in this age of AI and Copilots like you talked about, reimagining everything that we do, Windows, M365, Bing, Edge, and our Surface devices, and having those all really be AI first. And the second thing was the announcement of copilot, which is the one single AI companion that you can use every day to ask questions, to create, and to take action.

DAN HOWLEY: So I guess, what are you-- where is Copilot going to live? I know it's in Windows 11. It's in Bing. It's in Edge, you know, Outlook. Where-- where is it going to live for the average person? When are you going to interact with it?

YUSUF MEHDI: Yeah. So a way to think about it is we want it to be everywhere that you need it, right? So your everyday Copilot, it can be like one click and it's up as an assistant. But it's also going to be smart, so it'll pop up when you need it. So for example, if you go to highlight some text or you have a photo, Copilot will pop up and say, hey, do you need me to do something with this? Do you want me to copy it in? Do you want to summarize it? And so-- and will get smarter as the thing goes, so we'll know what actions to take on something that you select.

DAN HOWLEY: So I guess, is it-- you know, there was a discussion of this new age of computing, I think, Satya had said that, you know, we had gone from the PC to the CP for Copilot. How does this change then computing for consumers and the enterprise?

YUSUF MEHDI: Yeah. The way-- the way this changes is very profound is in the past, you might say, oh, I got to boot up my operating system or do some things in my operating system, then I do some things in my apps, and then maybe I go in the browser. Now, over time, you're going to end up going just to your Copilot. We think more and more that will be the primary way that you will interface with all of these things. And it will be smart enough to know, hey, do I need something from this app? Do I need something from the internet? Do I need something from the operating system?

DAN HOWLEY: I guess, when you look at this, you know, you have Windows, you have the Copilot in there. You have Microsoft 365, you have the Copilot in there. When it comes to privacy and security, what can users expect?

YUSUF MEHDI: Yeah. So we, obviously, put privacy and security at the highest order of importance for us. So a couple of things people can expect. One is that we will protect your user identity and your privacy. We don't associate any of that data with you when it comes to doing AI. We will provide new capabilities like we demonstrated today, like the notion of personalized answers that are based on your chat history.

And then you can get more tailored answers. So for example, if you are like me and you like golden retrievers and the seahawks, and you say, what's going on this weekend? We can give you better answers in your search results. But if you don't want that, you can turn it off. And then lastly, if you work at a company and you have, you know, confidential information, you can use a feature that we call Bing Chat Enterprise or Microsoft 365 Copilot. And then we will keep all that data private to your company. It doesn't ever go to the AI models. It doesn't train the AI models to know human looks at it.