Lloyds Bank and Coinbase Inside Their Generative AI Playbooks

Lloyds Banking Group's AI Agent Launch

Lloyds Banking Group, one of the U.K.'s largest financial services firms, is planning to launch a consumer-facing AI agent as early as August. This rapid development was highlighted by Lloyds Chief Data and Analytics Officer Ranil Boteju, who noted that AI agents went from "PowerPoint slides 12 months ago to MVPs" today. The bank leveraged Google Cloud's AI tools to build an architecture supporting various use cases, including financial advice and software development.

• Key Initiatives:
  • Building a bank-wide AI workbench for employees.
  • Implementing central guardrails for AI agents.
  • Upskilling 350 senior leaders and technicians on AI.

Coinbase's Generative AI Platform

Coinbase, the cryptocurrency exchange, has also embraced generative AI, creating its own platform called Coinbase-GPT. The platform powers customer-facing features like AI-driven search and chat, as well as employee tools like AI avatars in Slack. Rajarshi Gupta, Coinbase's Head of AI, emphasized the efficiency gains from using smaller, cheaper AI models for simpler tasks.

• Notable Features:
  • AI-powered employee avatars with access to personal documents.
  • Integration with Gemini for customer support.
  • Multi-cloud infrastructure for scalability.

Addressing AI Hallucinations

Both companies initially hesitated due to AI's tendency to hallucinate (generate false information). However, they now employ techniques like fine-tuning, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and human oversight to mitigate risks. Lloyds and Coinbase have adopted phased rollouts, starting with internal use cases before exposing AI directly to customers.

• Guardrails:
  • Lloyds uses a "reviewer" agent to verify AI outputs.
  • Coinbase follows a three-step approach: internal, assisted, and direct customer-facing AI.

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