Microsoft reportedly sharpens AI sales pitch against OpenAI and Anthropic
Bloomberg says Microsoft is training sales staff to compare rival AI tools unfavorably with its own as it pushes in-house models.
By Theo Nakamura · Staff Writer
· 3 min read
Microsoft is reportedly telling its sales force to make a harder case for its own artificial intelligence products over tools from OpenAI, Anthropic and Google. For investors, the shift points to a more aggressive effort to prove that Microsoft’s AI spending can turn into higher-margin products it controls more directly.
Bloomberg reported that Microsoft executives laid out the approach at an internal meeting Tuesday, described as a strategy session for the company’s new fiscal year. According to Bloomberg, the pitch centered on portraying Microsoft’s in-house AI models as more efficient and less expensive than competing systems.
An AI model is the software engine trained on large amounts of data to generate text, code, images or other outputs. Companies pay to run those models, and the cost can rise quickly when millions of users are asking them to perform tasks inside workplace apps. If Microsoft can use more of its own models inside products such as Copilot, Word and Excel, it may reduce reliance on outside providers and keep more of the economics inside Microsoft.
Bloomberg reported that Executive Vice President Jay Parikh told employees that competitors were selling individual components while Microsoft was selling a full system. Parikh said that was the message employees needed to deliver in fiscal 2027, according to Bloomberg.
The reported sales training also included a direct comparison with Anthropic’s Claude chatbot. Bloomberg said Executive Vice President Jacob Andreou presented Copilot against Claude and argued that Anthropic’s model was slower, less accurate and missing the right security connections when used inside Microsoft’s office apps.
TechCrunch reported that it contacted Microsoft and Anthropic for comment.
A partner becomes more of a rival
The reported strategy is notable because Microsoft’s AI rise has been closely tied to OpenAI. The companies struck an unusual partnership years ago in which Microsoft supplied funding and computing power to OpenAI, while Microsoft gained exclusive access to OpenAI’s application programming interface and models. An application programming interface, or API, is a software connection that lets one product use another company’s technology.
OpenAI and Microsoft changed that arrangement in April, according to an OpenAI announcement cited by TechCrunch. The update removed the exclusivity provision, allowing OpenAI to sell its technology to Microsoft’s competitors.
TechCrunch also reported earlier this month that Microsoft has been replacing OpenAI and Anthropic models in major apps including Word and Excel with its own systems. That report described the move as a cost-cutting effort.
The financial backdrop matters for how Wall Street reads the AI push. TechCrunch reported that Microsoft has faced pressure over the past year as investors questioned the scale of its AI buildout. The company has been spending heavily on computing infrastructure, a costly layer that includes the data centers and chips needed to train and run AI models.
A stronger sales message around Microsoft-built AI could help the company argue that those investments are leading to products it can sell at scale. Bloomberg’s reporting suggests Microsoft is now preparing its sales organization to make that argument more directly, including against companies that have supplied key technology for its own AI products.
This story draws on original reporting from TechCrunch.
