Microsoft is advancing its vision of an AI-driven future by launching Agent 365, a new platform designed to help businesses manage AI agents much like they manage human employees. As part of its broader push to build an AI “agent factory,” Microsoft aims to enable organizations to deploy, monitor, and govern AI agents at scale, treating them as trusted digital coworkers. “Agents are already changing how people work, and IDC predicts there will be 1.3 billion agents by 2028,” said Jared Spataro, Microsoft’s chief marketing officer for AI at work. “Agent 365 is the control plane for agents, extending the infrastructure you trust to manage your people to agents.” Agent 365 acts as a centralized management framework that provides visibility, security, and governance over AI agents. It offers dashboards with real-time telemetry and alerts, allowing IT administrators to track agent performance, behavior, and interactions. The platform integrates with Microsoft Entra, enabling businesses to register agents, define their access rights, and enforce security policies to prevent unauthorized actions. Security is a core focus. Agent 365 helps protect against both external threats and internal risks by ensuring agents operate within defined boundaries and are only granted access to the data and systems they need. It also supports secure integration with Microsoft 365 applications, enabling agents to work seamlessly within existing workflows. Beyond Microsoft’s own tools, Agent 365 is built to support a diverse ecosystem of AI agents from third-party providers, including Adobe, Nvidia, ServiceNow, and Workday. This interoperability allows businesses to manage a mix of agents from different vendors through a single, unified interface. Admins can use the platform to map relationships between agents, people, and data, gaining a clear view of how AI systems interact across the organization. This level of oversight is critical as AI agents take on increasingly complex tasks, from automating customer service to streamlining internal operations. The platform is being made available through Microsoft’s Frontier program, an early-access initiative for cutting-edge AI features. This allows IT leaders and enterprise customers to test and experiment with agent management in real-world scenarios before broader deployment. By giving businesses the tools to govern AI agents with the same rigor they apply to human teams, Microsoft is positioning Agent 365 as a foundational layer for the next phase of enterprise AI adoption.