Microsoft Power Virtual Agents, now part of Microsoft Copilot Studio

When we announced the general availability of Microsoft Power Virtual Agents in December 2019, a little under 4 years ago, we did not imagine the tremendous shifts that have happened in the conversational AI and chatbot market.  The advancements within the sphere of large language models that can perform a variety of tasks using AI; including text recognition, generation, translation and more, are not just radically changing what is traditionally known as a chatbot or bot, but fundamentally changing how humans work and interact.

Over the last year alone, Generative AI has changed chatbots in many ways, but one of the most significant is that it has enabled them to produce natural and engaging responses that go beyond simple pre-defined rules or templates. By using advanced natural language models, chatbots can generate context-aware and personalized answers that match the tone, style and intent of the user. Generative AI also allows chatbots to learn from data and feedback, improving their performance over time and adapting to changing user needs and preferences.  Generative answers in Power Virtual Agents is a great example of how generative AI has saved makers significant time, and also made the chatbot more useful and intuitive for users.

Microsoft Copilot, combining the power of large language models with your organizations data is already one of the most powerful productivity tools on the planet – and it’s just getting started.  And, to respond to our customers’ needs as they adopt Copilot within their organization to ensure they do this successfully, we are excited to share that Power Virtual Agents will now play an even more important role in Conversational AI.

Today, we are announcing Microsoft Copilot Studio, a low-code comprehensive conversational AI solution that unlocks new Copilot capabilities: connect copilot to your data using pre-built or custom plugins and GPTs, create and orchestrate workflows and manage your copilots in one central place and ultimately build standalone copilots for your organization. Copilot for Microsoft 365 customers will be able to use Copilot Studio for customization to provide tailored responses and workflows for unique scenarios. Power Virtual Agents has provided the foundations for and will become part of Copilot Studio, together with Microsoft’s leading conversational AI technologies.

You can read more about the announcement here.

We want to personally thank every Power Platform community member, customer and partner who has used Power Virtual Agents over the years, creating innovative solutions, transforming both employee and customer experiences for the better and enabling us to get to this point today.

For existing Power Virtual Agents customers, there will be no interruption to your experiences or solutions. You will be able to use the same capabilities now found within Microsoft Copilot Studio – and all your existing bots will light up within Copilot Studio, just as they did in PVA.

We’ve been inspired by so many of the innovative solutions that customers have built using Power Virtual Agents.

The Miami Dolphins, well known in the world of American Football, uses Power Virtual Agents on its web properties to streamline the thousands of requests it gets from fans for information on events and facilities. By resolving 97% of conversations with the bot, service agents can focus on providing exceptional customer service and increasing ticket sales.

When the world changed at the beginning of COVID-19, Kobe, a city in Japan started receiving a massive amount in calls from concerned citizens that they couldn’t handle.  Using Power Virtual Agents, in two weeks, they built a solution that reduced the number of calls by 90% and ensured that citizens received the critical information and support that they needed.

And, Rabobank, a multinational banking institution in the Netherlands, made the innovative concept of conversational banking real, enabling connected customer engagement and continuous conversations across all channels, blending human and artificial interactions, with up to 80000 calls per month handled entirely through automation.

As Power Virtual Agents enters the era of Copilot, I am incredibly excited to see what amazing copilots you will build next, with Microsoft Copilot Studio.

Thank you again, the Power Virtual Agents team.