OCBC rolls out AI avatars for wealth management

Singapore’s OCBC Bank has unveiled a first-of-its-kind mobile app in Southeast Asia that uses artificial intelligence (AI) avatars to provide round-the-clock wealth management services to its customers. Dubbed OCBC WoW, the app features two digital avatars – Wendy and Wayne – that can interact with customers via voice or text, track investment portfolios in real-time, deliver personalised market news, and offer actionable investment ideas based on the bank’s proprietary research. The launch marks a major milestone in the bank’s Next Frontier corporate strategy, which places AI, digital, and data (ADD) at the core of its growth. “We are changing the face of banking,” OCBC group CEO Tan Teck Long said during a media briefing. “Starting with wealth management, we are transforming how we engage customers with the use of avatars and hyper-personalisation in real-time.” On how OCBC measures the impact of its AI initiatives, Tan said the bank, which expects to spend over S$1bn annually over the next few years to shore up its digital infrastructure and AI capabilities, prefers not to obsess over exact metrics. That’s because trying to isolate the specific financial benefits of AI from broader digitalisation efforts can be a counterproductive exercise, Tan noted. “The energy we spend on trying to quantify the benefits of AI is probably equal to what we can do here (in executing projects),” he explained. And so, instead of getting bogged down in calculating whether a particular saving came strictly from AI or from a newly streamlined digital process, the bank prefers to channel its energy into innovation and execution. Tan pointed out that the avatar banking initiative is primarily focused on driving revenue and market share rather than cutting costs, noting that the new channel was developed in-house at a “fraction of the cost” of traditional technology. Augmenting the human touch Despite advancements in AI in recent years, Tan stressed that the technology would complement, not replace its human workforce. Along with the app’s roll-out, OCBC plans to hire an additional 600 human relationship managers (RMs) over the next three years to support its whole of wealth strategy. Tan noted that the avatars will handle baseline education and real-time queries, such as explaining a sudden market movement at 3am, allowing human RMs to focus on more complex advisory needs and relationship building. OCBC's AI avatars will interact with customers 24/7 through voice or text in English, with more languages to be progressively introduced over time “Instead of AI reducing the workforce, AI like [avatar banking], which grows the business, will allow us to increase the workforce to support a much bigger business,” Tan said. Sunny Quek, OCBC’s head of consumer banking, pointed out that human RMs are inherently limited by time and schedules. “Today, you can talk to the RM, you can come to the branch, but the RM may not be there for you all the time. The RM could be meeting customers, or on holiday,” Quek said. “What we truly want to transform is that your RM is with you 24/7. It’s a two-way conversation that will allow us to have more meaningful conversations with our customers.” Quek expects the avatars to boost customer engagement and market share, putting the consumer banking division on track to double its wealth income by 2029 – a full year ahead of its original 2030 target. Safeguards and rollout plans OCBC WoW was designed to be model-agnostic and uses a mix of large language models (LLMs). To ensure the avatars provide safe and accurate advice, deterministic guardrails have been implemented to make sure they only draw recommendations from OCBC’s proprietary research, preventing them from pulling unverified information from the internet. While the avatars can facilitate simple transactions like buying equities, more complex product purchases will still require customers to undergo proper suitability checks with a human RM to meet regulatory requirements. The app is currently in its beta version and is being tested by an invited group of 50 digitally active customers from the OCBC Premier Private Client segment, which caters to individuals with a minimum of S$1.5m in assets under management. Over the next 12 months, the app will be progressively rolled out to more customers in Singapore, with plans to eventually expand to overseas markets. While Wendy and Wayne currently converse in English, languages such as Mandarin, Bahasa Melayu, and Bahasa Indonesia will be progressively introduced. OCBC also plans to expand the app’s capabilities beyond wealth management to include tailored insurance offerings and everyday core banking services. Read more about AI in financial services HSBC plans to create more than 200 AI use cases across its business and expects to make hundreds of millions of pounds in revenue and efficiency gains as a result. 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