ServiceNow Inc. today introduced Now Assist for Virtual Agent, a chatbot that uses generative artificial intelligence to help workers quickly find business information.

The chatbot is rolling out on the heels of the company’s Knowledge 2023 conference last month. During the event, ServiceNow introduced several new generative AI features for its platform. Now Assist for Virtual Agent builds on those features. 

ServiceNow’s namesake cloud platform helps information technology teams manage their day-to-day work. Administrators use the platform to answer employee support requests, tackle cybersecurity risks and perform other tasks. ServiceNow’s software is also used outside IT departments for tasks such as processing customer service tickets.

According to the company, its new Now Assist for Virtual Agent tool will help IT professionals and other workers more quickly access the information they need to be productive. The tool allows users to request information with natural language queries. The answers that Now Assist for Virtual Agent generates can include not only text but also images, videos and code.

The tool is an enhanced version of an existing ServiceNow capability called Virtual Agent. According to the company, the answers the software generates are now clearer and more directly address users’ queries. Another feature that sets Now Assist for Virtual Agent apart from its predecessor is that it can retrieve data from not only a company’s internal knowledge base, but also external sources.

ServiceNow envisions enterprises applying the tool to a range of tasks. Help desk teams could use it to automatically answer common support requests. Software teams, meanwhile, could leverage Now Assist for Virtual Agent to more quickly find code snippets. 

The tool is powered by a feature called Generative AI Controller that ServiceNow debuted at its Knowledge 2023 event last month. It allows customers to integrate their ServiceNow deployments with large language models from OpenAI LP. 

According to the company, Generative AI Controller provides two ways of accessing the models. Customers can access them via a cloud-based application programming interface provided by OpenAI. Alternatively, they may use Microsoft Corp.’s Azure OpenAI Service, which combines the startup’s neural networks with additional cybersecurity features.

“Generative AI Controller eliminates the need to rely on tedious script and code,” Victor Chen, a principal product manager at ServiceNow, detailed in a blog post today. “All you need is an API key, and you can quickly begin to integrate generative AI into your workflows.”

Alongside Generative AI Controller, Now Assist for Virtual Agent makes use of a second ServiceNow feature called Now Assist for Search. It too debuted at Knowledge 2023. The feature allows users to fetch data from a company’s internal systems using natural language queries.

Now Assist for Virtual Agent is currently accessible to a limited number of early customers. ServiceNow plans to make it generally available in September. At Knowledge 2023, the company detailed that it will introduce additional AI features down the road to ease tasks such as prioritizing technical support incidents by urgency.

Image: ServiceNow