Salesforce CEO criticizes Microsoft's AI tools, touts new Agentforce latform

On September 19, 2024, at Salesforce's annual Dreamforce conference in San Francisco, CEO Marc Benioff made bold claims about his company's new artificial intelligence tools while criticizing offerings from competitors like Microsoft.

In an interview with Bloomberg, Benioff stated: "We all know now that Microsoft Copilot is basically the new Microsoft Clippy, that customers haven't gotten value from it." He was referring to Microsoft's AI assistant Copilot, comparing it unfavorably to Clippy, Microsoft's widely mocked animated paperclip assistant from the 1990s.

Benioff's comments came as Salesforce unveiled its new Agentforce platform, which the company describes as a suite of customizable AI agents to support employees and customers. According to Benioff, Salesforce aims to deploy "a billion agents" for its customers within the next 12 months.

The Salesforce CEO emphasized that customers don't need to "DIY their AI" by piecing together various technologies themselves. He claimed the Agentforce platform allows companies to easily implement AI capabilities using their existing Salesforce infrastructure.

Benioff asserted that Salesforce's AI offerings provide "the best AI, the highest accuracy, the lowest hallucination rate." He stated that customers are reporting Salesforce's AI is "two times the accuracy of the best models" from competitors.

When asked about the underlying technology powering Agentforce, Benioff deflected, saying customers "don't need to know" specifics like which language models or cloud infrastructure are being used. He compared it to not needing to know the ingredients of a cake to enjoy eating it.

This launch comes as major tech companies race to integrate generative AI capabilities into their products. Salesforce is positioning Agentforce as a turnkey solution for enterprises looking to adopt AI, in contrast with approaches that require more technical expertise to implement.

Benioff also addressed recent news that Disney had dropped Salesforce's Slack messaging platform due to security concerns, asserting that Slack's security is "rock solid" while acknowledging there's "no finish line when it comes to security."

The Salesforce CEO outlined an ambitious goal of deploying AI agents to "hundreds of thousands of customers" in the coming year. The company is utilizing a mix of per-user and consumption-based pricing models for its new AI offerings.

Salesforce's Agentforce

Agentforce is Salesforce's new artificial intelligence (AI) platform that was unveiled on September 19, 2024 at the company's annual Dreamforce conference in San Francisco. Here are the key points about Agentforce:

1. Definition: Agentforce is described as a suite of customizable AI agents designed to support employees and customers.
2. Purpose: It aims to provide businesses with autonomous AI agents that can work 24/7 to assist with various tasks and processes.
3. Integration: Agentforce is built to work within the existing Salesforce infrastructure, allowing companies to implement AI capabilities without having to piece together various technologies themselves.
4. Deployment Goal: Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff stated an ambitious goal of deploying "a billion agents" for customers within the next 12 months.
5. Customization: The platform allows for building and customizing AI agents to suit specific business needs.
6. Claimed Performance: Benioff asserted that Salesforce's AI offerings provide "the best AI, the highest accuracy, the lowest hallucination rate," claiming it's "two times the accuracy of the best models" from competitors.
7. Ease of Use: Salesforce is positioning Agentforce as a turnkey solution for enterprises looking to adopt AI, emphasizing that customers don't need to "DIY their AI."
8. Pricing: The company is utilizing a mix of per-user and consumption-based pricing models for its new AI offerings.
9. Target Market: Salesforce is aiming to deploy Agentforce to "hundreds of thousands of customers" in the coming year.
10. Underlying Technology: While specific details about the underlying models or infrastructure weren't disclosed, Benioff suggested that customers don't need to know these technical specifics to benefit from the platform.

Agentforce represents Salesforce's entry into the competitive field of enterprise AI solutions, positioning itself as an easy-to-implement option for businesses already using Salesforce products.

Key facts

• Salesforce unveiled its "Agentforce" AI platform on September 19, 2024
• The company aims to deploy "a billion agents" for customers within 12 months
• Benioff claimed Salesforce's AI is "two times the accuracy" of competitors' models
• Salesforce is targeting deployment to "hundreds of thousands of customers"
• The company is using both per-user and consumption-based pricing for AI tools