Scotiabank has launched an AI framework, Scotia Intelligence, for data and AI operations that joins various platforms, data oversight, and software tools into a single instance.
According to a press release from the bank, the stated purpose of Scotia Intelligence is to give employees, especially client-facing teams, access to AI under the bank’s existing governance and security rules. Scotiabank has published a short data ethics commitment paper, the existence of which is unique in Canada, the bank says.
Tim Clark, Scotiabank’s group head and chief information officer, said Scotia Intelligence is a new approach that combines the bank’s existing infrastructure with AI abilities that connect computing environments, governance, and security so employees can use the technology more confidently.
The difficult problem in the financial sector is how to make AI tools available at enterprise scale without creating new operational and regulatory risks for the organisation. Scotiabank’s response comes in the form of Scotia Navigator, the employee-focused component of Scotia Intelligence. It provides assistive AI for staff in multiple business units to in support of decision-making and software development, and is the means by which staff can build and deploy their own AI assistants within the company’s governance rules and stipulations.
There’s particular weight on AI software development, with automated coding in play in the bank’s technical teams. Code generation in a regulated environment has to conform to set standards for product quality, so code checking for security and auditability is a business imperative.
The bank has presented performance figures it says support the case for greater rollout of AI, citing contact centres where AI now handles more than 40% per cent of client queries, a fact that has led to industry recognition for its efforts in digital transformation. It says AI automatically forwards around 90% of commercial emails addressed to the bank, cutting the manual work of achieving this task by 70%. In digital banking, Scotiabank points to Scotia Intelligence at work giving predictive payment prompts to customers via a mobile app, helping customers manage recurring bills, email money transfers, and transferring money between a customer’s Scotiabank accounts.
Phil Thomas, the bank’s Group Head and Chief Strategy & Operating Officer, described the launch as a step in the company’s AI strategy focused on client-centred experiences, and said AI tools would allow the bank’s workforce to spend more time on higher-value work. All AI uses are reviewed internally on grounds of fairness, transparency, and accountability before they are launched. Employees working with Scotia Intelligence get mandatory training and annual attestations.
For CIOs, CTOs, and enterprise architecture leaders, Scotiabank’s combination of platform standardisation and formal governance creates the message that controls on AI have to exist as AI moves into production, and that exhibiting the existence of controls is important before incidents make their absence obvious. The scale of AI deployment success will depend at least partly on elements of safety and observability. The examples given by the bank’s statements suggest a programme of AI rollout where every function’s effectiveness can be measured in terms of reduced handling time, high-level automation, and customer engagement.
In its public statement, Scotiabank hasn’t given detail regarding architecture, cost, model strategy, or provided evidence of external benchmarks, so total ROI is unclear. However, should its existing AI projects continue to produce cost reductions, more code, and better customer experiences, it seems likely that Scotiabank will apply the technology elsewhere in its business.
Scotiabank envisages future use of agents for research and analytics, and says there’s scope for “more autonomous, context-aware, and action-oriented capabilities over time.”
(Image source: Pixabay under licence.)
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