AI & automation

On November 25, 2024, Anthropic introduced the Model Context Protocol, or MCP, as an open standard for connecting AI assistants to external information and tools. The official announcement marked an important step toward assistants that can work with business context instead of relying only on information copied into a conversation. Start with a useful business workflow Consider an internal support assistant that helps employees find an approved procedure and prepare a...

OpenAI introduced Structured Outputs on August 6, 2024. The capability gave developers a more dependable way to request information in a predefined structure, using a JSON schema that specifies expected fields and permitted values. For businesses considering AI integration, this was a useful step toward connecting language models to existing software. From a conversation to information a system can use A conversational answer may be helpful to a person while remaining...

Microsoft’s January 15, 2024 announcement expanded access to Copilot for Microsoft 365 for small and medium-sized businesses. This official milestone brought AI assistance within familiar productivity applications into reach for more organizations. For a business considering adoption, the central question is how that assistance fits its people, information and daily work. Choose work that benefits from assistance A useful starting point is a recurring task with a clear...