Looking in the future of financial services at AI Summit
AI on all fronts
How do financial institutions make sense of the AI potential?
At very warm and steamy (no air conditioning) AI Summit held in London’s Tobacco Dock on 14-15 June 2023, there was no end to presentations outlining the use cases and the accompanying processes and procedures required in a world where the use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools and technologies are growing rapidly.
The intersection of AI with quantum computing and open data presents a very powerful image of the future. In sum – everything will change.
AI is touching (or will soon) everything we see and do. From what you find at the top of your Deliveroo app to the responsibilities you have at work, it has never been more important to understand the potential for all aspects of a business. Of equal consideration are the governance frameworks that need to be in place straight out of the gate.
The data trail that changes the future
It is not just the data trail that we leave that is fascinating but even more so how what we do now (where we click, what we buy, the channel we choose, and the very words we use to search) impact the future. The next person follows in our path will see something different on the back of our actions.
At the event, Shutterstock had a very fun to play with image generating tool on display. The images generated on the back of searching “embedded finance focus on payments” (for example) didn’t spit out show-stopping, relevant, at last I’ve found what I’ve been looking for results. However, the next time someone searches for that (perhaps niche) content, the world will have moved on and likely improved in matching what was searched, with what is generated.
In the same way that human activity impacts the physical world, it changes the digital world.
How can the financial services industry navigate change
How does an industry like financial services make sense of all of this potential? How do financial institutions incorporate the myriad of tools and accommodate the changing processes required, the shift in culture and everything that comes along with that?
According to IBM, since 2017 the adoption of AI has more than doubled, yet 50% of projects fail. So clearly the technology designed to make everything easier, is not yet easy.
There was plenty of discussion throughout the day about how best to successfully implement AI and machine learning (ML) technologies and projects, but there was, equally, a lot of airtime given to over to concerns around governance frameworks and ethical considerations.
And there are many.
There is a lot of development coming on the regulatory front – The EU AI Act – which aspires to set a global standard in creating “human centric rules and protection” – has progressed. Also noted by presenters was the NY State Law governing (and prohibiting) the use of AI technology for workforce decisions, such as hiring and promotion.
For an industry like financial services, which is already heavily regulated, the use of AI tools and technologies will bring a new wave of considerations, regulation, and ethical challenges. The scale of the change was compared by speakers throughout the day to the impact of the internet on every aspect of our lives.
And we know that the job of regulating the use of the internet to share data, sell products or even simply identify users has not been an easy one for financial services providers.
After a day of veering between exciting visions for the future and feelings of doom around a world where everything is somehow curated by curators beyond our control, it was good to return to an air-conditioned overground train to arrive home and find out the Wi-Fi was down.
