Deep Insight Think Deeper. See Clearer
Key Takeaways:
- IDC predicts 1.3 billion AI agents in use by 2028, transforming enterprise workflows.
- Microsoft Agent 365 offers a unified platform for deploying, governing, and securing AI agents.
- Built-in tools like Defender, Entra, and Purview provide defense-in-depth.
At its Ignite 2025 conference for IT Pros, Microsoft put the spotlight on how AI agents are rapidly reshaping the way businesses operate, driving automation and collaboration at an unprecedented scale. With Microsoft Agent 365, organizations gain a unified control plane to securely manage, govern, and integrate these agents into their existing workflows.
According to new research from IDC, the number of AI agents in use will surge to 1.3 billion by 2028. As AI agents become embedded in enterprise workflows, IT leaders face the challenge of driving innovation quickly while minimizing risk and avoiding a complete infrastructure overhaul.
Microsoft Agent 365 acts as a control plane for AI agents that enables organizations to deploy, organize, and govern agents securely across Microsoft, third-party, and open-source platforms. It comes with Microsoft’s security tools (such as Microsoft Defender, Entra, and Purview) to protect and govern agents as well as Microsoft 365 apps to offer work context and boost productivity. This new solution also includes the Microsoft 365 admin center to help IT teams manage agents within their organizations.
“Whether your agents are created using Copilot Studio or Microsoft Foundry, open-source frameworks, or third-party agents from a growing ecosystem of partners, including Adobe, ServiceNow, Manus AI, Workday, and more, Agent 365 helps you deploy, organize, and govern them securely,” explained Jared Spataro, Chief Marketing Officer, AI at Work.
Five core capabilities of Microsoft Agent 365
Microsoft Agent 365 provides a single view of all AI agents in the organization through telemetry, dashboards, and alerts. It allows IT teams to monitor and manage every agent in use or development within enterprise environments. Microsoft Agent 365 includes the following key capabilities:
- Registry: It’s a centralized inventory of all agents, which helps to prevent sprawl and enables quarantine of unsanctioned agents.
- Access Control: IT admins can access unique agent IDs and policy templates to enforce least-privilege access and adaptive security measures.
- Visualization: A unified dashboard and advanced analytics provide administrators with insights into agent performance, compliance, and ROI.
- Interoperability: Microsoft 365 Agent offers seamless integration with Microsoft 365 apps, business data, and external platforms. It also supports multiple development frameworks.
- Security: It offers a defense-in-depth approach using Microsoft Defender, Entra, and Purview to block threats, prevent data leaks, and ensure compliance.
Microsoft Agent 365 helps to move organizations from isolated AI experiments to a unified, governed system. It includes Microsoft-built agents, partner solutions (Adobe, NVIDIA, ServiceNow, etc.), as well as open-source agents (LangChain, OpenAI, Anthropic).
Starting today, Microsoft Agent 365 is available in the Microsoft 365 admin center with the Frontier program. If you’re interested, we invite you to check out these featured sessions and learn more about Microsoft Agent 365 on this support page.
Lastly, Microsoft has introduced the Security Dashboard for AI, a new unified preview tool that offers a single view of real-time AI posture and risks. It consolidates signals from Microsoft Defender, Purview, and Entra to provide complete visibility of AI assets, combines security and data posture insights for a comprehensive risk profile, and accelerates mitigation through AI-driven recommendations and Security Copilot guidance.
