Microsoft Details Onboarding Requirements for Microsoft 365 Copilot

Last month, Microsoft announced the launch of its Microsoft 365 Copilot Early Access Program. Now, the company has detailed a lengthy blog post to inform potential customers about how to prepare for Microsoft 365 Copilot.

Microsoft 365 Copilot uses large language models to help users write/edit documents, organize data, and analyze information. Users can leverage natural language commands to interact with Office apps such as Microsoft Teams, Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Viva, and more. The Copilot tool uses Microsoft Graph data to let users access files across an organization for content generation.

Licensing requirements

Microsoft explained that the AI-powered Copilot assistant would be available to organizations with Microsoft 365 E3 or Microsoft 365 E5 licenses. However, Mary Jo Foley recently confirmed that the tool will be a paid add-on for enterprise customers. Small businesses with Microsoft 365 Business or Business Premium licenses will also be eligible to access Microsoft 365 Copilot.

Microsoft added that customers will need an Azure AD account and enroll in the Current Channel or the Monthly Enterprise Channel for Microsoft 365 apps for enterprise. IT admins will also need to enable Microsoft Teams plug-ins and unblock WebSockets connections from users’ endpoints.

Microsoft 365 Copilot technical requirements

Microsoft 365 Copilot doesn’t store user data, and it respects the complaint requirements of organizations. “Copilot experiences use the organizational content in your Microsoft 365 tenant, including users’ calendars, emails, chats, documents, meetings, contacts, and more — all from within the Microsoft 365 compliance boundary. Copilot does not use customer data or user prompts to train the foundation,” Microsoft explained.

Furthermore, Microsoft 365 Copilot will not be accessible to people using the existing Outlook desktop app. Users will need to switch to the new web-based Outlook for Windows client to use Copilot. “For seamless integration of Microsoft 365 Copilot with Outlook, you are required to use the new Outlook for Windows, currently in preview,” Microsoft added.

Lastly, Microsoft warned that Copilot could inadvertently disclose sensitive information. The company urges customers to have data governance controls in place to prevent oversharing of information. Microsoft recommends that administrators can use its Microsoft Syntex service to control oversharing. Microsoft Purview Information Protection can also help to manage data classifications in enterprise environments.