Bank of America (BofA) has been leading in integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into its operations, leveraging these technologies to enhance customer service, streamline operations, and drive financial growth. By displaying a strong commitment to technical innovation and adopting a methodical and strategic approach to implementation, Bank of America (BofA) has been making noteworthy progress in integrating artificial intelligence (AI) and generative AI into its operations as of 2024. BofA wants to improve AI capabilities for both customers and workers, and it expects to invest $4 billion in technology efforts, a significant chunk of which is devoted to AI projects. This strategic focus extends beyond cost-cutting tactics, aiming to improve operational efficiency and customer relations through sophisticated AI-powered projects and a responsible and innovative approach to innovation.
Erica is BofA’s flagship AI initiative, launched in June 2018. This Conversational AI Agent helped power a 19% spike in earnings at Bank of America. Erica, an AI-powered virtual assistant, uses predictive analytics and cognitive messaging to provide personalized financial advice, help with transactions, and identify savings opportunities. Since its 2018 launch, Erica has driven customer engagement and operational efficiency, surpassing 1 billion interactions and handling 1.5 million daily. With over 32 million clients benefiting from proactive insights and notifications, Erica has significantly improved customer experience and cross-sold services, contributing to the bank’s revenue growth. Additionally, Erica’s 24/7 assistance has led to higher customer satisfaction and loyalty, streamlining operations, and freeing up bank staff to focus on more complex tasks, thereby enhancing overall operational efficiency.
“Erica is the definition of how Bank of America is delivering personalization and individualization at scale to our clients,” said David Tyrie, Chief Digital Officer and Head of Global Marketing at Bank of America. “
Bank of America’s Predictive Intelligence Analytics Machine (PRIAM) is a cutting-edge AI system designed to revolutionize the equity capital markets (ECM) sector. Developed over two years by data scientists and engineers, PRIAM leverages a network of supervised machine learning algorithms to analyze relationship trends between ECM deals and investors. By processing over 150 million data points from more than 50,000 historical ECM deals, along with investor and market data, PRIAM can predict the best investors for a deal with over 80% accuracy. This system enhances traditional banker expertise with data-driven insights, allowing ECM bankers to make highly targeted pitches and maximize demand for transactions. The integration of PRIAM has not only saved Bank of America hundreds of hours previously spent on manual data analysis but has also earned the bank a FutureEdge 50 Award for its innovative use of emerging technologies.
“We’re bringing data and analytics to the table,” David Reilly, CIO for global banking and markets and the enterprise risk and finance technology executive at Bank of America. “Not to replace anything, but to supplement that rich relationship and market intelligence data our banking partners have when they’re out in the field.”
Bank of America is elevating the experience of its business clients through enhancements to CashPro Chat, a virtual service advisor within the CashPro banking platform. CashPro, used by over 40,000 corporate and commercial clients globally, now incorporates the same AI and machine learning capabilities as Erica, the bank’s popular virtual financial assistant. This integration allows business clients to quickly access transactions, account information, and navigate CashPro functionality, while more complex requests are routed to specialized service teams. CashPro Chat, supplemented by the CashPro Search feature, significantly enhances efficiency and user experience, making it one of the most heavily used functions on the platform. Tom Durkin, Global Product Head of CashPro in Global Transaction Services at Bank of America, stated, “Finance teams today need access to information quickly, at any time of day, and from any location. Whatever we can do to eliminate friction will help them respond better and faster to real-time events and demands.”
BofA is actively investing in generative AI technologies, with plans to spend $4 billion on new technologies in 2024, including enhancements to its AI tools. This investment underscores the bank’s commitment to leveraging AI for both cost-saving measures and enriching customer interactions. “AI has moved from cost savings ideas to enhancing the quality of our customer interactions,” Brian Moynihan said in a call with analysts. He pointed to the bank’s AI advisor and client insights tool, which it says has delivered more than six million insights this year so far to financial advisors.
The bank is running internal pilot programs to evaluate the potential uses of generative AI before rolling out these technologies to clients. This cautious approach ensures that AI applications are secure, compliant, and beneficial to customers.
According to Nikki Katz, Managing Director, Head of Digital at Bank of America takes a cautious, “controlled AI” approach, especially given the sensitivity of dealing with personal finances. They recognize there’s no room for AI hallucination or errors when handling customers’ financial information. The bank is very deliberate about where and how they apply AI, with all of Erica’s responses going through rigorous review to ensure accuracy and reliability. While they see tremendous value and opportunity in AI for their industry, they err on the side of caution due to potential risks. They are constantly evolving and fine-tuning Erica, making thousands of adjustments since launch to improve its natural language understanding and knowledge base. This includes quickly adapting to new situations like the Paycheck Protection Program during the COVID-19 pandemic. As they expand Erica’s capabilities to serve different customer segments (like wealth management clients) and power other tools like CashPro Chat for business customers, they remain focused on careful implementation. While they have a large portfolio of AI patents and many AI projects in the pipeline, they are not rushing to discuss or deploy these publicly, prioritizing thoughtful development and risk management in their AI strategy.
BofA is exploring generative AI applications in several areas, including:
In a recent talk Former Head of Preferred Segment Marketing at Bank of America, Jim Brown, offered a balanced perspective on artificial intelligence in marketing and business. He highlighted AI’s significant benefits, particularly its ability to accelerate information processing and strategy development, as well as its crucial role in enhancing coding capabilities. However, Brown also emphasized the importance of viewing AI as a tool rather than a replacement for human intelligence. He stressed that while AI can greatly assist in various processes, it cannot substitute for human judgment, insight, or unique perspectives. Brown cautioned that AI should not be relied upon to “manufacture a point of view,” underscoring the continued importance of human expertise and critical thinking in leveraging AI technologies effectively in business contexts.
Bank of America has demonstrated a strong commitment to technological innovation, particularly in the realm of AI and machine learning. The bank has seen a significant increase in its patent portfolio, growing to nearly 6,600 granted patents and pending applications, representing a 70% increase since 2019. Notably, almost one in five patents granted to the bank in 2023 related to AI and machine learning innovations. The bank’s Chief Technology and Information Officer, Aditya Bhasin, emphasized the role of technology in delivering world-class capabilities to clients, stating, “Technology helps us deliver world-class capabilities to clients, enabling them to manage their finances efficiently and securely and to interact with us when, where and how they want.” Bank of America’s substantial investment in technology, including $12 billion annually with $3.8 billion allocated to new initiatives in 2024, has resulted in enhanced client experiences across all channels and improved operational efficiencies. The bank’s focus on AI and technology has contributed to record digital engagement, with 57 million clients leveraging their digital capabilities and 23.4 billion digital interactions recorded last year.
Source: Bank Of America
Bank of America’s unified app represents a significant advancement in their digital banking strategy, integrating five separate apps into a single, cohesive platform. A key component of this unified experience is Erica, Bank of America’s AI-powered virtual assistant. Erica plays dual roles in the app: as a navigational assistant guiding users to the right place for transactions, and as an executor helping customers complete their tasks. Erica has been trained to understand capabilities across banking, investment, and retirement services, handling over 1 billion customer interactions annually. Notably, despite the current excitement around generative AI, Bank of America is taking a cautious approach. Jorge Camargo, managing director and SVP for digital product management, emphasized that they prioritize 100% accuracy in customer interactions, which current generative AI models cannot guarantee. While the bank is experimenting with generative AI use cases in the background, they are not planning to implement any consumer-facing generative AI features in the near future. “People don’t like dramatic change. They prefer smaller, incremental, digestible improvement in their digital experiences as opposed to big changes.” said Jorge.
BofA Data Analytics offers powerful tools such as alternative job data, social media monitoring, industry surveys, and other third-party data sets. When combined with the expertise of its skilled research staff, these tools give new insights on significant problems that span sectors, regions, and asset classes. Bofa is now hiring for more roles around AI and is BofA appears to have a bright future with generative AI because to large investments and a calculated strategy to combining these technologies. The bank wants to keep improving its AI skills in order to give consumers more individualised and effective services, increase operational efficiency, and keep its top spot in the financial industry.
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