Shares of Microsoft (MSFT) closed at an all-time high after the U.S. tech giant announced a new Microsoft 365 artificial intelligence (A.I.) subscription service.
The company’s stock rose 4% to close at $359.49 U.S., its highest level ever on a split-adjusted basis.
The previous record came on June 15 of this year when Microsoft’s stock closed at $348.10 U.S. a share. The company’s share price has now gained 50% on the year.
Microsoft’s new “Copilot” subscription service adds artificial intelligence to the company’s popular Office suite of products that includes Word, Excel, and Teams.
Microsoft Copilot can design presentations, offer writing prompts, summarize meetings, and rank incoming emails.
The Copilot product will cost an additional $30 U.S. per month and could increase monthly prices for enterprise customers by as much as 83%, bringing in additional revenue for the company through recurring monthly subscriptions.
Analysts and investors cheered the news of the Copilot subscription service, pushing Microsoft stock higher in the process.
Microsoft has poured more than $10 billion U.S. into generative A.I. technologies, largely through a multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT.
Microsoft hasn’t said exactly when the Copilot subscription service will be available to the general public, though there is speculation it will launch this fall.
The stock of Microsoft has increased 238% over the past five years
