Microsoft is giving a cloud-based AI update to its products

The Redmond technology giant has unveiled a set of new and upgraded products and services for Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, Excel, and Sway at its annual Microsoft Ignite conference in Atlanta.

The new features that use cloud-based artificial intelligence to automate many tasks include Tap for Word and Outlook, which will make it easier for people to pull information from relevant files around their organization into an email or document to help finish a project, for instance.

PowerPoint and Sway will have a QuickStarter feature that gives you curated outlines for given topics, saving you the trouble of creating the foundation of a presentation from scratch.

Excel, will have a way to turn raw geographic data into Bing-based maps. But Excel will get this Map visualization type only later this year.

Apart from the above-mentioned features, there are some other uses of AI as well. Microsoft's sales service, Dynamics 365, will also use AI assistance to bring up relevant data and point sales reps in the right direction when they're trying to clinch a deal.

Microsoft will also be using an AI agent in its American call centers to help staff answer your questions.