Amgen, a US-based biopharmaceutical company, has transitioned its enterprise AI tool from Microsoft’s Copilot to OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

This change follows the firm’s announcement 13 months ago to implement Copilot for its 20,000 employees.

The shift to ChatGPT was expanded earlier this year, with Amgen citing improvements in the technology and positive employee feedback on tasks like research and document summarization.

While Copilot continues to be used with Microsoft products such as Outlook and Teams, Amgen’s Senior Vice President Sean Bruich noted ChatGPT’s usability as a key factor in the decision.

This transition underscores the increasing competition between OpenAI and Microsoft in the enterprise AI market.

The rivalry has strained the partnership between the two firms, as Microsoft continues to develop its own AI technologies while OpenAI expands its offerings.

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🔗 Source: Bloomberg

🧠 Food for thought

1️⃣ The consumerization of enterprise AI adoption continues a historical pattern

The Microsoft-OpenAI competition demonstrates how consumer familiarity drives enterprise technology adoption, a pattern that has reshaped enterprise software for decades.

Enterprise AI adoption grew 270% over a four-year period ending in 2019, with 37% of organizations implementing AI solutions according to Gartner’s survey of 3,000 CIOs across 89 countries 1.

ChatGPT’s advantage stems from its consumer-first approach, similar to how products like Slack and Zoom initially gained enterprise foothold through individual employee adoption rather than top-down IT decisions.

This mirrors what happened with smartphones and cloud storage services, where employee preferences for consumer technologies (iPhones, Dropbox) influenced IT departments to accommodate these tools rather than mandating corporate standards.

The shift in enterprise software adoption reflects how employees increasingly expect workplace tools to match the quality and user experience of their personal technology, making user satisfaction a critical factor in enterprise purchasing decisions.

2️⃣ Integration vs. standalone capability: the classic enterprise software dilemma

The competition between Copilot and ChatGPT highlights the perpetual tension in enterprise software between deeply integrated ecosystems and best-in-class standalone tools.

Microsoft’s strategy of embedding Copilot within its existing applications represents the integrated approach, with seamless connectivity to Microsoft 365 applications like Word, Excel, and Teams being its primary selling point 2.

ChatGPT, meanwhile, excels in versatility and can connect to over 7,000 applications through integration platforms like Zapier, offering greater flexibility for organizations with diverse technology environments 2.

This competitive dynamic has historical precedents: Microsoft Office dominated through integration despite standalone alternatives like WordPerfect offering superior features, while Salesforce succeeded by offering a best-in-class CRM that outperformed integrated alternatives.

The article reveals this tension persists in the AI era, with organizations like Bain using both tools for different purposes—ChatGPT for general use by 16,000 employees and Copilot primarily for Microsoft-specific tasks for just 2,000 employees.

Recent Microsoft developments

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