Demystifying AI: A message from your future Work Buddy

TVI invites a Portuguese company, a world leader in innovation with financial management software, to discuss the impact of Artificial Intelligence on society and businesses.

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nBanks was, on October 5th, in conversation with Francisco David Ferreira, reporter for TVI's Jornal da Manhã. The topic of the day was Artificial Intelligence - AI and its impact on society. With an eye on the future, the duo discussed the integration of technology in the financial sector, elucidating viewers about its current value and its prospective potential as an ally in business management.

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With the rapid growth of the topic, the reconfiguration of the societal paradigm is on the horizon, particularly concerning Work. These technologies open space for new functions, more efficient results, and routines that were once costly in terms of money, time, and human resources, now to be distilled into value, as the CEO explains. It will not be a competitor, but rather a “work buddy” that promises to facilitate and add value to the work of the contemporary operational. He uses the practical example of his technology, which already guarantees savings in 86% of the time usually consumed in banking management tasks and an ROI of x5.29, to its vast and diverse client portfolio:

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“Even today, in the financial area, there are people who lose 50% of their time aggregating information, just doing their routine work, which adds nothing to their effective value (...) (AI) will help companies, entrepreneurs and all these types of professionals, accountants and auditors, to better coexist with an increasingly fast reality” Orlando Costa, CEO nBanks

With globalization and the continuous breaking of borders, “AI allows human beings to have more time to anticipate scenarios” a fact he understands as crucial to “anticipate what sales cycle they will have, what threats they will have in their product and even become more competitive, in an increasingly global world”. In practical terms, “we are talking about a reconciliation of AI and Open Banking, of aggregating international bank accounts, even if instantiated in different banking entities” a process that, without the support of this technology, would require human beings “to have to go to all of them and aggregate the files of that entire process”.

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The noted benefits are also accompanied by caveats, as indicated by the study carried out by STADA, where 72% of Portuguese respondents choose not to exclude apprehension regarding its use. This number expresses relative doubt on the part of the sample, which does not, however, refuse its willingness to learn about the technology it believes to be “in the future”. Six out of ten Portuguese believe in the advantages of AI, the highest number among the 23 countries surveyed.

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“In this specific case, it is perfectly normal for there to be a feeling of threat in a first reaction (...), but, looking at a perspective of being more symbiotic in this process and being able to learn what kind of advantages I will have as a human being, it will allow me to be much more creative and freer for those types of scenarios where human beings can score points. It should not be seen as a threat, but rather as an opportunity”. Orlando Costa, CEO nBanks

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At this point, AI resembles other innovative technologies “like the mobile phone or the automobile”, where “we invented and managed to coexist”, and guarantees that “it will be more a question of understanding the context and how to coexist with this circumstance, becoming a better professional, more qualified and being able to adapt, being more flexible to effectively make a difference”.  The example of the analog carriage that coachmen capitalized on gave way to automobiles, which today speaks for itself in terms of utility and convenience, and continues to be a product converted into value by different professionals, namely in public and private transport services. Similar to this scenario, nBanks also created a team that helps with financial optimization and treasury management using AI, and complements the technological offer currently provided by the company's software.  

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Orlando Costa takes this opportunity to also demystify the standardized image of “robots with armed and artificial arms”, still read as the classic example of the materialization of technology, when, in fact, “there are software robots”, like the company's.  In this case, machines are directed with human commands to match or surpass human intelligence, adding value through “the space for not needing so many overtime hours and starting to have more quality of life”, contributions that are verified not only in the team itself but, mainly, in the more than 3000 users of the software, already present in 75 countries with 60 pioneering functionalities.  

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The objective, at the end of the day, “is a symbiosis: human beings coexisting with AI, being able to understand its context and using it to their advantage for all these types of more standardized, more robotic processes, whether in the financial area or in health”, he explains, aware of the progress already achieved. There is, on the other hand, still potential to “double the goal” and continuously find new ways to put AI at the service of society: businesses and people.