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Today, Microsoft announced the general availability of Copilot Cowork. For partners, this isn't just news to read and file away. It's a live business opportunity and a clear call to action.
Starting today, you can build your business by identifying the customers affected by the Cowork announcement. You can help them understand what’s changing and then turn what looks like a billing update into a much bigger (and more profitable) AI advisory conversation.
In this post, I'll tell you exactly how to do that in just five steps.
What's changing today
Generally available from today, Cowork is a different kind of AI from the Microsoft 365 Copilot that many of your customers will be used to.
It’s important to understand this difference.
- Microsoft 365 Copilot handles per-seat assist work such as brainstorming, catching up on emails, drafting in Word or PowerPoint.
- Copilot Cowork goes further. It plans and executes multi-step jobs across systems, creates multiple artifacts in a single run, and can work in the background managing a customer's day rather than just responding to prompts.
When you are close to the technology as we are in the channel, it’s easy to assume that everyone (particularly customers with budget to spend) understands such differences. In many cases, they won’t so this capability gap and the productivity benefit it will bring is a critical place to start conversations with many prospective customers now that Cowork is generally available.
Customers will also need to understand that Cowork comes with a different billing model and isn't included in the per-seat Microsoft 365 Copilot license.
It will run on usage-based billing through Copilot Credits, priced at $0.01 per credit. Customers can go pay-as-you-go for flexibility, or prepay annually for the lowest rate with both options eligible on MACC and CSP.
For context, a typical multi-step Cowork job runs around 11 credits, so roughly $0.11. That's a useful number to have ready in customer conversations, and a much easier one to explain than a credit formula.
Finally, if you have customers who were active in the Frontier preview of Cowork, their clock is already running.
They have just 14 days (until June 30) to get usage-based billing set up, or their access stops. There's no grace period beyond that, and no automatic continuation either.
Five steps to move forward with Cowork
- Identify your affected customers. ASPA goes live June 20 and will let you find Frontier reseller tenants directly in the partner portal. But you don't need to wait until then to start realizing this opportunity. If you already know which customers were on Frontier, reach out to them today. This is your low-hanging fruit.
- Get them ready for usage-based billing before June 30. This is the one deadline that can't slip. Prioritize the accounts most likely to be affected rather than waiting for customers to come to you.
- Become customer zero. Deploy Cowork inside your own organization before you sell it to new customers. Firsthand experience builds a far more credible advisory conversation than a spec sheet ever will, and it gives your sellers a real answer when customers ask what it's actually like to use.
- Fold Cowork into your existing AI and Copilot proposition. Position it as the next step for customers ready to move from AI assistance into AI-driven work, not as a separate product to bolt on. It's the same conversation you're already having about Copilot adoption, just one stage further along.
- Join two upcoming calls. Microsoft have two calls coming up that you must join for full context and guidance on Cowork. On June 18, a Jumpstart call will provide a deeper dive into today's announcement while the July 22 MCAPS Start for Partners session will look at the broader Copilot roadmap.
The bigger opportunity
Cowork opens up a third revenue stream alongside the ones you already know: recurring per-seat licensing, and services like AI strategy and Copilot credit spend management services.
The usage-based stream that Cowork offers you will be different from licensing and services. It will grow as customers go deeper into agentic workflows, rather than staying flat at the point of sale.
Partners who position Cowork well today will earn the right to grow with it as customers adoption deepens.
Where to go from here
Start with the five steps above. And if you want support structuring these conversations, building Cowork into your customer offerings, or making sense of the new revenue model, SoftwareOne is here to help.
For more insights and updates on topics that really matter to the channel, bookmark the SoftwareOne channel blog and follow our dedicated SoftwareOne channel page on LinkedIn
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