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How AI can help doctors hear what matters

Doctor visits often feel rushed, with attention split between patient and screen, leaving many unheard. The problem is especially acute for women, whose symptoms are more likely to be dismissed or misdiagnosed. A new perspective from Kearney and Microsoft, part of their [w]Health initiative, suggests better care starts with listening — and that AI tools like Dragon Copilot can help give clinicians the time and space to shift more toward human connection.

Clinician reviews tablet with patient in exam room.

Copilot Cowork is now available to take on complex tasks

Microsoft’s Copilot Cowork is now generally available worldwide, bringing AI that can take on complex, multi-step tasks from start to finish. In one example, an engineering team used Cowork to edit batch‑job spreadsheets and generate dependency flow charts after every change, automating work that had required careful manual effort. Read more on how organizations can put Copilot Cowork to work.

Copilot Cowork interface in a browser, showing task options and AI model menu.

New Surface devices boost speed and battery life

Microsoft rolled out its latest Surface devices Tuesday, powered by Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon X2 chips. The new Surface Pro and Surface Laptop deliver more than 50% faster graphics performance than the previous generation and longer battery life to keep up with everything from creative work to running local AI models. The devices are available starting today.

Copilot said: Two Microsoft Surface laptops in green and copper, opened and angled toward each other against a gray background.

AI success hinges on intelligence and trust

Success with AI comes down to two things: intelligence and trust, writes Judson Althoff, CEO of Microsoft Commercial Business. Companies want AI to strengthen their expertise, not extract it, and for it to be secure and worth the cost. Microsoft’s approach focuses on using multiple models, turning company data into useful context, and giving organizations control over performance, spend and outcomes to deliver real results.

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New book shows how leaders can build trust when everything is changing

A few years into her time as a technology leader, Julie Averill started asking herself a question she couldn’t shake: What is this actually for? As CIO at lululemon and REI, the work was clear on paper, but her real impact showed up somewhere else.
In her new book, “Chief Impact Officer,” she unpacks that shift — and what it takes to build trust with your team when technology is changing fast.

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How an AI-infused app delivers data-driven results to Turkish farmers

Her neighbors thought she was a bit eccentric when she started planting blueberries in pots in rural western Türkiye, but Pinar Ünsal persisted, using her training as an engineer to focus on data-driven farming.  Today, her thriving harvest is powered by an AI-enriched app built on Microsoft Azure — delivering crop insights from real-time satellite imagery, hyperlocal weather reports and real-time data that help her grow smarter, save time and manage risk.

Close-up of a hand holding a blueberry branch with small white blossoms.

Microsoft shares new data on email security performance

What happens after a malicious email lands might matter more than expected. A year of production data and real-world benchmarking from Microsoft suggests email security doesn’t stop at the inbox. The report finds that post-delivery detection and cleanup are playing a growing role, even in layered setups designed to block threats before they arrive. Read on about a shift in how protection works in practice.

Team meeting in conference room with laptops and security dashboard on screen.

Satya Nadella: A frontier without an ecosystem is not stable

Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella shares thoughts on the future of the firm in an AI-driven economy, and why every company will need to compound the loop between their human capital and token capital. Read his post.

What the AI-driven skills shift means for educators

Hiring managers have changed what they’re looking for. It’s not just about using more tools; they want people with a deeper set of uniquely human capabilities.  New Microsoft research shows how fast that shift is happening: about 70% of the skills used in most jobs are expected to change by 2030, AI literacy now appears in job listings around six times more often than a year ago, and 66% of leaders say they wouldn’t hire someone without AI skills. All of this points to an opportunity for educators to help shape the future. Read on for five new fundamentals reshaping the future of the workforce. 

Teacher helping a student with a laptop in a classroom while others work in the background.

A new playbook for investigating AI incidents

AI systems are now part of everyday work, and when something goes wrong, investigators need a clearer way to understand what happened. Security teams are already digging into incidents that involve Microsoft 365 Copilot and Azure AI services, but without structure, it can be hard to piece together a coherent account. To help, Microsoft is releasing a new investigator playbook designed to help reconstruct AI-related activity using signals that are already available across the company’s security products.

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How AI is reshaping, not replacing, creativity

Across marketing organizations, a familiar tension is emerging around AI: if everyone is using the same tools, will everything begin to sound the same? In a new blog post, Tracie Westby, who leads integrated marketing for Commercial Cloud and AI at Microsoft, says the answer has less to do with the technology itself and more to do with how it’s applied.

Westby sees AI less as a disruptor and more as a mirror that reflects the clarity — or ambiguity — behind the work, and the leadership guiding it. More immediately, she says, AI is removing friction from creative tasks, giving teams more space to focus on ideas.

Read more here on why she says creativity isn’t being replaced but rather reshaped and even strengthened in the era of AI.

Group of people in a meeting, one speaking while others listen and smile.

AI, jobs and the next generation

Graduating university students booing AI during commencement addresses should be a “wake-up call for the tech sector,” Brad Smith, Microsoft vice chair and president, writes in a new post.

Smith returned to his alma mater, Princeton University, over Memorial Day weekend, where he saw firsthand how students are thinking about AI. They recognize the technology’s benefits but “want to keep AI in its proper place,” he writes.

“They want the future to be determined by humans deciding the role of machines, not by machines deciding the role of humans,” he writes.

Read on for more on why Smith believes AI will be shaped by people, especially the next generation entering the workforce.

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8 unexpected things disability can teach us about leadership

What can disability teach us about leadership? Microsoft design leader Dave Dame shares lessons from his life with cerebral palsy—from learning to embrace imperfection to building trust and better teams along the way.

Dave Dame presenting to an audience with his name and title displayed on a large screen behind.

Why don’t cancer medicines work the same for everyone?

Cancer treatment has gotten more precise over time, as doctors first classified the disease by where it began in the body and, more recently, by the mutations found inside cancer cells to help find the right drugs to treat it.

But why can two people with seemingly similar cancers respond so differently to the same medication? Microsoft researcher Lorin Crawford thinks the answer lies in how tumors actually behave, not just how they’re categorized.

Scientist using a pipette on lab samples in a research setting

Scammers are using popular AI tools as bait, Microsoft warns

Scammers are using increasing interest in AI to trick people online. Microsoft Security reports that in recent months, cyber attackers have been impersonating popular AI tools to lure people in via phishing, fake ads and search engine optimization-driven attacks that ultimately defraud users or infect their systems with malware. For a look at four of the biggest scams Microsoft’s uncovered and what the company is doing to stop them, read more here.

Person using a laptop at a desk, with AI warning icon graphics in the background.

XBOX marks its 25th anniversary with new hardware and games

XBOX’s 2026 Games Showcase highlighted a mix of new titles, hardware and ideas, while also giving a nod to its past. Marking 25 years, the company introduced a limited-edition Series X25 console and controller inspired by the original XBOX. It also confirmed Gears of War: E-Day and Clockwork Revolution as console exclusives and shared updates across major franchises and characters. Read on for all the news and announcements from the showcase here.

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5 lessons from the front lines of workplace AI

The world of AI is moving too fast for any organization to figure it out alone. That’s why Microsoft recently convened 250 customers at the leading edge of AI transformation for a summit. The goal was to shorten the distance between the teams building Copilot and the people actually using it. As Jared Spataro, Microsoft’s chief marketing officer of AI at Work, writes in a new post, they learned the reality is that AI results depend more on leaders’ choices than the tools they buy. Read on for the five major takeaways from the summit about AI adaption in the workplace.

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As AI meets biology, both promise and potential peril grow

The convergence of AI and biology has both enormous promise and consequential risks. As AI systems become more capable and widely accessible, they can lower barriers – both for beneficial scientific discovery, but also for misuse. In a new post, Eric Horvitz, Microsoft’s chief scientific officer, writes that the challenge isn’t just one model or tool: it’s the growing mix of capabilities — like general AI models, design tools, lab automation, and systems that coordinate them — and how they work together and build on each other. To really understand both the benefits and the risks, Horvitz says, one must look at the whole system.

Close-up of pipette adding liquid to sample wells with DNA patterns in a lab.

Microsoft launches 7 new AI models at Build conference

Microsoft is rolling out a new family of seven AI models developed in-house that will form a multimodal ecosystem that is designed to work across all kinds of tasks in the real world – from image to voice, coding and reasoning. The new models and a superintelligence lab were announced at Microsoft Build, the company’s annual developer conference in San Francisco earlier this week. Read more about how it will all work here.

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Catch up on Microsoft Build 2026

Get all the news from Build, Microsoft’s annual developer conference in San Francisco this week. You’ll find details from the keynote, photos, video and more on our Build 2026 news site, with more updates throughout the day.

Satya Nadella speaking onstage with Microsoft logo behind, audience silhouettes in foreground.

Meet Majorana 2

Microsoft unveils Majorana 2, its newest quantum chip built with the help of agentic AI specifically designed for research and development. Its qubits are 1,000x more reliable than the first generation, with a mean qubit lifetime of 20 seconds and instances lasting as long as one minute. These improvements have shortened Microsoft’s original timeline to produce a commercially valuable quantum computer by half, to 2029. With the Microsoft Discovery platform generally available today, other scientists and engineers can now tap into the same agentic AI expertise to speed their own breakthroughs.

Close-up of a Microsoft “Majorana 2” device with a visible chip inside, set against a yellow lab background.

Mining giant uses AI to rethink how copper is extracted

Copper is critical to energy and digital infrastructure but accessing it is harder than ever, so BHP is using Microsoft Discovery to hunt for new solutions and transform the way it innovates.

Worker in safety gear with a respirator walking past large industrial processing equipment in a factory.

Microsoft Build Live: Your source for the news as it happens

Microsoft Build is the company’s annual developer conference, featuring the latest announcements that impact the people who build and create. This year’s event takes place June 2-3 in San Francisco.

To keep track of all the news, Microsoft Build Live will provide real-time coverage as new products and critical updates are announced. Join writers Christina Warren and Nick Brady beginning at 9:30 a.m. PT Tuesday as they explore what’s new, what’s been updated and why it matters for developers and customers.

PowerShell terminal showing a “build\_live.log” script with status “LIVE” and incoming updates, on a dark screen with colorful pixel blocks.

Copilot Health preview: Bringing your info together in a way that makes sense

Since Microsoft announced Copilot Health back in March, thousands of people have been using it to link their health records, understand lab results and go into appointments with greater clarity and confidence. Now, after thorough safety testing and evaluation, Copilot Health moves into preview. Starting today, Copilot users in the U.S. aged 18+ with a Microsoft 365 Personal, Family or Premium subscription can try Copilot Health in preview. Find out what you’ll find if you try it and how to sign up.

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AI adoption grows in US, with cities leading the way

More than 30% of the United States working-age population is using AI, an increase of three percentage points from the end of 2025. In a new Microsoft report that offers an in-depth look at AI adoption across the U.S., researchers found there’s an uneven pattern of AI adoption across the country. Urban areas use AI at about double the rate than that of rural America. Read more details including a state and county-level review of AI adoption.

Abstract blue waves on plain background.

XBOX announces new Call of Duty coming in October

Microsoft has announced the latest installment of the ever-popular Call of Duty game franchise will drop this fall. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 will launch on Oct. 23, 2026, and will be available on XBOX Series X|S, PlayStation 5, PC and Nintendo Switch 2. For more details on the storyline and what cities the game will feature, check out the XBOX Wire.

Learn what’s next for AI and tech at Microsoft Build 2026

It’s almost time for Microsoft Build, the company’s big annual developer’s conference taking place this year in San Francisco. Join us virtually at 9:30 a.m. PT on Tues., June 2, to follow our live blog and learn more about Microsoft’s latest updates in AI‑powered tools and platforms for developers and beyond. Then stay tuned for more news, photos, videos and other updates throughout the day.

It’s almost time for Microsoft Build, the company’s big annual developer’s conference taking place this year in San Francisco. Join us virtually at 9:30 a.m. PT on Tues., June 2, to follow our live blog and learn more about Microsoft’s latest updates in AI‑powered tools and platforms for developers and beyond. Then stay tuned for more news, photos, videos and other updates throughout the day.

Using Copilot to ensure a human-centric approach to work

At Slovenian insurance giant Triglav, dozens of digital mentors empower employees to find ways to use Copilot and Copilot agents to make their work lives more rewarding; Copilot takes on the mundane tasks, leaving the global company’s thousands of employees to focus on human-centric work. As Klemen Ramoveš, chief digital officer, puts it, “We still believe that people are the key,” he says. “It’s ‘Copilot’— it’s not a pilot, so we need to have a lot of pilots on board.”

Portrait of a person with arms crossed in front of a blue background with colorful geometric shapes.

The Prompt: A just for fun handwriting analysis

It’s nothing scientific, but you can turn your handwriting into a fun little window to your personality. With just a Copilot prompt and writing sample, get basically a horoscope for the way you write your grocery list.

Collage of colorful geometric shapes with a torn-paper label reading ‘The prompt.’

Microsoft adds new measures to curb image-based abuse

As new U.S. protections take effect, Microsoft is expanding its response to non-consensual intimate imagery, including AI-generated content. The company is rolling out simplified reporting tools, broadened detection through image “fingerprints,” and extended enforcement across services. Microsoft is also working with global partners to advocate for stronger laws to help curb the spread of AI-made fake intimate images spread without consent and to respond more quickly to people impacted. 

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