Microsoft Copilot: The AI Revolution That’s Lost in Branding Chaos

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I have followed Microsoft for nearly twenty years over several leadership changes, technology innovations, and market-defining events. From early uncertainty about Office 365 to the current challenges with Windows 11 adoption, I have seen the firm negotiate difficult product introductions. It only seems that yesterday, when Office 365 was called Microsoft Online Services, it was later renamed MS BPOS (Microsoft Business Productivity Online Standard Suite). Then, there was the entire episode where Microsoft skipped Windows 9 and launched Windows 10 but decided not to call it that, intending to avoid confusion with the older Windows 9x. What a time to be alive!

If one thing has stayed constant throughout the years, it’s Microsoft’s inclination to allow the complexity of branding to dampen the spirit and chatter about the brilliant additions to the products’ technological capabilities. And now, with Copilot, history is repeating itself.

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The Branding Conundrum: Confusion Over Clarity

Here’s what we at Greyhound Research believe – originally a united, market-defining brand, Microsoft’s moment of artificial intelligence clarity is now causing division and uncertainty. Rather than supporting Microsoft’s AI goal, “Copilot” has become an overcrowded term with conflicting meanings for different audiences. This is a strategic weakness, not only a marketing concern. Microsoft’s uneven branding threatens corporate adoption, generating market friction and allowing rivals to portray their AI products as simpler, more coherent, and better defined at a time when AI difference is critical.

This intricacy is especially challenging for technology decision-makers who have already battled Microsoft’s famously complicated licensing policies. Adding another degree of uncertainty—this time in artificial intelligence—only fuels their annoyance. Copilot’s branding ambiguity makes it more difficult for companies to know where Microsoft’s AI fits into their ecosystem and, more significantly, whether it’s worth the investment rather than simplifying AI adoption.

Microsoft’s Copilot branding conundrum is not only theoretical; it is a textbook illustration of branding complexity that runs the danger of hindering AI adoption when clarity is crucial.

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Why should this topic be of concern for Microsoft and its leadership? Microsoft and Satya Nadella’s leadership must understand that this is a fundamental challenge that could affect the company’s AI supremacy in the next years and is not a minor branding issue. Given billions invested in artificial intelligence and a rare first-mover advantage, Microsoft cannot afford to let brand uncertainty underwrite its leadership. Should clarity not be restored immediately, the business runs the danger of confusing consumers and passing its valuable AI momentum to rivals ready for this mistake.

Microsoft’s Copilot Strategy Paradox

The core of Microsoft’s Copilot branding approach is a basic paradox. The existence of tools like Copilot Studio, which allows users to create their AI-powered assistants, implicitly acknowledges that the built-in Copilot capabilities may not be adequate for complex enterprise needs, even though the company markets Copilot as a cohesive, ready-made AI solution. For end-users, this raises the following questions: Why is bespoke development necessary if Copilot is intended to function as a comprehensive solution right out of the box? Should they rely on Copilot’s built-in capabilities or make an investment to support bespoke development?

In a similar vein, the launch of Copilot+ PCs calls into question how software and hardware relate to Microsoft’s AI agenda. Do these gadgets merely provide speedier AI capabilities, or are they essentially distinct from traditional Windows PCs? Will the current differentiation become transient when all Windows PCs in the future become Copilot+ PCs?

Prior to publishing this research note, we sent it for a courtesy review to Microsoft, and this is what they had to say –

“We believe that every employee will have a M365 Copilot. Copilot works as your personal assistant integrated with work content like email, meetings, and documents. Copilot is aligned to individuals. We also foresee that AI agents will transform business processes by automating tasks for people, teams, or organizations. Agents can range from simple to advanced, and Copilot Studio assists both M365 Copilot and Copilot chat users in creating them. Customers can pay for these agents through studio messaging packs or PAYG models for Copilot chat, while most M365 Copilot use cases will incur no cost.”

“Copilot+ PCs are a different class of Windows 11 PCs that are powered by a turbocharged neural processing unit (NPU) that can perform more than 40 trillion operations per second (TOPS). There are Copilot+ PC experiences, which include Recall, Cocreator, Windows Studio Effects, Live Captions, and automatic super-resolution.”

While Microsoft’s point of view does carry merit, we at Greyhound Research believe the fact that technology decision-makers are left to go through these issues alone without Microsoft’s clear messaging further complicates an already perplexing AI strategy. And the fact that there is such a deep level of confusion on the topic, despite months of messaging, that itself is a matter of grave concern. Furthermore, in the commercial market, where trust difficulties and implementation challenges already hamper the adoption of AI technologies, this lack of transparency is especially troublesome.

Current Rebranding Initiatives and Their Results

Microsoft has implemented several rebranding initiatives in 2024 and early 2025 to solve some of these branding concerns. To better match its AI products with its flagship productivity suite, the corporation started rebranding “Microsoft Copilot” to “Microsoft 365 Copilot” for its business users in August 2024. Several Copilot capabilities were impacted by this modification, such as “Copilot in Word,” which was renamed “Microsoft 365 Copilot in Word” and expanded to include versions specifically designed for sales, service, and finance.

Microsoft extended this renaming initiative by January 2025 to incorporate Microsoft 365 Office, which is currently referred to as Microsoft 365 Copilot. We at Greyhound Research are of the firm belief that the already complicated branding environment has become even more confusing as a result of this most recent development.

These rebranding initiatives seem to be a component of a larger plan to highlight how AI is incorporated into Microsoft’s subscription-based services. This Copilot branding spree has led to a sort of wild branding sprawl, evident in Windows 11, which has a lot of Copilot-branded items but does not do well in elucidating the company’s AI offerings.

The Real-World Impact: Voices from the Trenches

Ahead of publishing this note, we at Greyhound Research reached out to two dozen large, global end-user clients and spoke with them at length about this. All confirmed that they are unsure of what Copilot is and how the various versions differ from one another. Many decision-makers are unable to differentiate between various Copilot implementations, and this lack of clarity has become a common topic of discussion even on sites like Reddit and other industry forums. Here are some select quotes from our conversations with these technology decision-makers:

• The Chief Information Officer (CIO) of a Global Bank observed difficulties in his staff separating Copilot in Word from Microsoft 365 Copilot and Copilot Studio.

• A Manufacturing Enterprise IT Leader finds that while business teams hold back on funding “Copilot for Microsoft 365” due to uncertain value propositions, developers value “Copilot for GitHub.”

• A Fortune 500 CIO emphasised Microsoft’s several rebranding initiatives, noting, “The rebranding from Microsoft Office to Microsoft 365 was a huge change. Now that another rebranding for Microsoft Copilot 365 is announced, IT teams and end users face a fresh round of confusion.”

Strategic Remedies for the Branding Crisis at Microsoft

We at Greyhound Research believe Microsoft must act swiftly to restructure and make clear its AI product lineup to resolve its Copilot branding dilemma. While there is no ideal strategy, we believe creating distinct sub-brands for Copilot that identify their various use cases and target markets is a strategy that may land better outcomes. Microsoft could group all AI-powered products into discrete, well-defined categories instead of using the general Copilot name:

• Copilot Office – AI-powered productivity solutions across Microsoft 365 services could be the focus of Copilot Office, offering a clear connection to email management, document generation, and other office productivity duties.

• Copilot Code – might be used to highlight GitHub and Visual Studio’s AI-powered coding features, highlighting the platform’s function as a developer-focused tool rather than a general-purpose AI helper.

• Copilot Enterprise – Custom AI agent development and AI automation for business-specific applications may be covered by Copilot Enterprise, which may be accessed through Copilot Studio.

• Copilot Windows+AI – Microsoft might switch the ambiguous “Copilot+ PC” moniker for its hardware products to “Windows AI,” making it obvious that AI-powered Windows hardware differs from software-driven Copilot tools.

We believe this strategy can help reduce confusion, clarify product differentiation, and help enterprise customers match their AI investments with suitable solutions thanks to this classification. In addition to rebranding, Microsoft must update its marketing messaging to guarantee that each Copilot product is positioned correctly. The business should clearly define what each version of Copilot does in its specific setting rather than depending on ambiguous AI jargon. Developers, business users, and IT leaders are among the user groups that need different communication tracks that highlight their particular use cases and the special value each Copilot deployment offers.

In Conclusion

We at Greyhound Research believe that Microsoft’s standing as a pioneer in enterprise AI will be significantly impacted by its inability to resolve its Copilot branding issue. Microsoft could lose ground to rivals like Google, Apple, and even OpenAI itself if it doesn’t effectively convey the benefits and goals of its AI products, even after spending billions on AI research and forming early alliances with firms like OpenAI.

The difficulty is especially severe because Windows 10’s end-of-support date is quickly approaching. A clear and convincing AI approach might be a potent motivator for updating as Microsoft aims to move millions of users to Windows 11 by October 2025. However, this potential advantage can be lost if the company’s AI services remain poorly differentiated and confusingly branded.

We at Greyhound Research reiterate that Microsoft must implement a thorough rebranding plan to distinguish the multiple Copilot products and align them with their target markets and use cases to overcome this obstacle. This entails changing the names and visual identities of the various Copilot products and updating marketing collateral to convey their distinct value propositions effectively.