Which General AI Assistant?

Hi All,

We are in the middle of our AI journey, and we are still deciding which tool we want to allow for general use for our users

This is what our options are:

Tool	Access Model	Strengths / Use Cases	Restrictions	Cost / Notes
Copilot (Free)	Available to everyone	- Help with writing - Basic Non confidential assistant	Never enter client or personal details	Included in current Microsoft package / Free
ChatGPT (Free)	Available to everyone	- Help with writing - Basic Non confidential assistant	Never enter client or personal details	Free
Enterprise ChatGPT	Given on a 1-1 needs basis (e.g. working with client data, Sales, specialist research)	- Good for research- Trusted with XYZ (but remain sceptical with XYZ) - Has access to emails, onedrive, desktop, sharepoint files - Connectors	Same data discipline applies	~£15K for 50 licences Can choose data residency
Enterprise CoPilot	Given on a 1-1 needs basis (e.g. working with client data, Sales, specialist research) Where ChatGPT doesn’t meet the need	- Has direct access to emails, onedrive, desktop, sharepoint files	Older GPT model than ChatGPT	£263papu – 17 licences currently data residency is UK
All other AI Assistants not listed	Available to everyone – for Free assistants	- Help with writing - Basic Non confidential assistant	Never enter client or personal details	Free

My main ask is is, which is better ChatGPT or CoPilot?

I am just thinking back to when COVID struck, and Zoom was huge for meetings.. but then MS offered Teams for free.. and now we barely use Zoom.

Or we can pivot later from ChatGPT to CoPilot.. or just have a mix of the 2, the cost is basically the same.

Thanks,

Tim

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Comments

Chris_OBrien

Hi @timjeens - great question, and something that lots of our clients are wrestling with and ask us for help on. Perhaps I could headline a couple of considerations here and link you to a deeper dive that may help with the next step of your research and thinking. Link to another resource is at the end of this post, but some top of mind thoughts first:

Our guidance is that OpenAI offerings (ChatGPT standard/team/enterprise) still aren't suitable for organisational use despite how they are positioned - in some SKUs, your data may not be used to train models but can be passed to 3rd parties, and OpenAI's integration with M365/SharePoint is very low-fidelity (essentially a search hand-off and basic keyword matching, rather than AI actually understanding your documents semantically)
Free Microsoft Copilot chat is useful, but basic - most organisations now are looking for AI which understands their company (clients/projects/employees/policies/initiatives etc.), and Microsoft Copilot chat doesn't do this. Certainly, a user can upload (or point to) an individual document and work with that, but that's very limited compared to AI which understands your organisation through 100,000+ documents. Employees find a lot of value in AI which goes beyond basic LLM usage - being able to ask questions about their work and company and go straight to the answer (rather than search) can be a huge productivity gain, even if difficult to measure. That said, if all you want is "pure LLM only" it's a good option
Microsoft 365 Copilot is an amazing tool if the value case stacks up - Microsoft continue to improve full Copilot (e.g. Researcher and Analyst, model updates etc.) but ~£24pupm can be challenging for some orgs. We have some clients who license x% of employees with Copilot and then supplement with other lower cost AI tools and approaches, but we're big advocates of the tool itself. Worth remembering that the appropriate steps to properly drive adoption are important too though
Advania Private ChatGPT may be worth considering - this is our AI platform accelerator built in Azure OpenAI, deployed to 20-25 Advania clients so far. It gets deployed to your cloud environment, integrates with your documents in M365 (and potentially other data sources too), and because everything runs within your trusted cloud boundary, employees can safely work with company sensitive data without the risk of anything leaking out. We think it's a good option for many organisations due to these benefits, but also because it's not priced per user - just one-off project costs with us and then your Azure consumption. This is typically much lower than other AI options so it can be very cost effective (e.g. our run costs at Advania UK are ~7k per year for 1500+ users), while providing a solid AI platform which can be extended with extra data sources and customisations etc. However, it's not (and never will be) full Microsoft 365 Copilot, so it's important to understand it's strengths and what's on our roadmap vs. what simply can't be.

This post and linked "matrix" provides some further thoughts:

https://community.advania.co.uk/kb/articles/19-navigating-microsoft-copilot-and-ai-options

Certainly happy to get a call arranged with me or another Advania AI specialist if helpful @timjeens, just let us know.

HeidiW

Definitely a great question, and want to support what Chris has said.
Copilot has become even better, with GPT-5 being available - has definitely supercharged my reporting and analyses, with a lot of "bonus" insights that I may not even have thought to ask about.

timjeens

That's all brilliant information, thanks for that.

The private ChatGPT has given me something to think about!

Thanks,

Tim

timjeens

We decided to stick with just Copilot.. MS basically gave it for free with our MS 365 Business Premium licences, and with the recent new licence "MS Copilot Business" I can upgrade some people even cheaper now.