By Alice Chambers |
Microsoft has introduced two new AI agents designed to help organisations modernise IT systems more efficiently, reducing the time, complexity and risk typically involved in digital transformation.
Azure Copilot Migration Agent aims to simplify and accelerate the complex process of digital transformation, such as dealing with changing business demands and security requirements.
The agent, now in public preview, embeds AI across discovery, assessment, planning and deployment. It works across servers, virtual machines, applications and databases. By leveraging existing knowledge of an organisation’s environment, the agent creates a clear picture of servers, databases, applications and their dependencies. Tasks that previously took months of manual planning can now be completed in minutes through a simple conversation with the agent, generating a data-driven plan.
Similarly, the modernisation agent in GitHub Copilot, also in public preview, acts as an orchestrator. It runs multiple code assessments, creates custom modernisation plans for each application, and executes them with automated framework and runtime upgrades.
“This is a major step forward in how application owners, architects and developers can transform a broad set of applications at scale while keeping the customisation needed for each application,” said Jeremy Winter, corporate vice president and chief product officer for the Azure Platform at Microsoft, in a recent blog post.
By working together, Azure Copilot and GitHub Copilot are designed to bridge gaps between infrastructure and code. Historically, developers modernised code without knowing how it would run, scale, or be governed in its target environment.
“Our agents are making more possible,” said Winter. “We’re moving away from one-off use of agentic tools to consistent, repeatable agentic execution. This is the importance of pairing agentic tools with structured delivery models, so organisations can scale modernisation confidently across teams and environments.”