Report says Microsoft coached sales staff to criticize rival AI tools

In short: Microsoft is reportedly training its sales team to sell Microsoft’s own AI tools by criticizing OpenAI and Anthropic.

What's going on

Microsoft executives told sales staff in an internal meeting that they should more directly compare Microsoft’s AI products with rivals like OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic, according to a Bloomberg report cited by TechCrunch.

The message was that Microsoft’s in-house AI models, meaning AI systems it built and runs itself, are more efficient and cheaper for customers to use. Think of it like a car maker telling dealerships to highlight that its own engines cost less to run than a competitor’s.

Bloomberg also reported that Microsoft executive Jacob Andreou showed slides comparing Microsoft Copilot with Anthropic’s chatbot Claude. Copilot is Microsoft’s AI assistant inside products like Word and Excel. Andreou reportedly said Claude was slower, less accurate, and did not connect as well to Microsoft’s security and other built-in controls when used inside Microsoft’s office apps.

This is notable because Microsoft has relied heavily on outside AI models, especially from OpenAI, to power some of its AI features. TechCrunch also points to a separate recent report saying Microsoft has started swapping some OpenAI and Anthropic models out of major apps in favor of Microsoft’s own models to cut costs.

What to watch

If Microsoft keeps pushing its own models, more companies may see different AI options inside familiar Microsoft products, and pricing could shift as Microsoft competes more directly with firms it once depended on.

Source: TechCrunch AI