Slack, a business chat platform, is rebranding itself as a “work operating system” that integrates artificial intelligence (AI) applications from Salesforce, Adobe, and Anthropic. The company’s CEO, Denise Dresser, sees Slack as more than just a place to chat with coworkers but rather a hub for AI-powered tools.
The latest update includes AI-generated Huddle summaries and the ability to chat with Salesforce’s AI agents in Slack. Users can also use third-party tools to enable AI web search and image generation.
Salesforce purchased Slack in 2021, and now three years later, it is pivoting hard towards AI agents. Dresser believes that Slack will play a key role in this transformation since people already interact with each other throughout the workday, making it a natural place for AI-powered tools.
However, some critics argue that Slack’s integration of AI features is just an attempt to appear “cutting edge” without providing much value to the core product. Dresser argues that Slack is not just a messaging platform but rather a digital workplace or work operating system that brings people and processes together.
The new AI-powered agents include Agentforce, which allows Salesforce customers to perform on-demand analysis of business data directly in Slack. Cohere and Anthropic’s Slack agents will also offer similar services for paying customers. Perplexity is releasing an agent that lets you search the web, while Adobe Express’s agent will let you create branded content from text prompts within the messaging service.
Despite some concerns about AI-powered tools, Dresser believes that enterprise AI solutions need to be trustworthy and safe, which Salesforce is trying to guarantee for its customers.
Source: https://techcrunch.com/2024/09/16/slack-is-turning-into-an-ai-agent-hub-should-it/