Harnessing the power of AI
In March, we became the first UK bank to sign a strategic collaboration with OpenAI. The wide-ranging, large-scale collaboration has the potential to accelerate how quickly and widely NatWest Group can deploy some of the latest and most powerful developments in generative AI (GenAI), providing direct access to OpenAI’s latest technology and insights, while upholding industry-leading data privacy guardrails.
The development of the bank’s digital assistant services for customers will be a key area of focus, including new ways that customers can use AI to help them with more complex tasks, including the identification, reporting and resolution of fraud and scams.
It also means we have the opportunity to increase the use of our digital assistants to help customers better understand their financial position, using AI to help them to plan and set goals for the future.
Bolstering our expertise
Our appointment of Dr Maja Pantic, announced in June, as our first Chief AI Research Officer, is also a clear commitment of how we’re advancing the bank’s AI capabilities to meet customer needs.
Maja joins us from Imperial College London, where she is Professor of Affective & Behavioural Computing (a position she will retain), having previously been Founding Research Director of Samsung AI Research Centre in Cambridge, and AI Scientific Research Director at Meta London.
Maja brings with her deep AI expertise, which will help drive cutting-edge research and innovation across the bank, such as accelerating state-of-the-art AI to combat deepfakes and GenAI to advance responsible AI controls.
This new role will also provide a forward-looking view on AI advancements – how they impact the banking industry, and anticipate future shifts in behaviour and technology – as well as progressing the use of AI tools and automation to enable colleagues to better serve customers.
