BofA’s Sees Returns From Mass AI Adoption
Bank of America is seeing benefits from the mass adoption of artificial intelligence with 90 percent of its employees now using its proprietary virtual assistant.
Since launching its AI-driven virtual assistant in 2020 – Erica for Employees – Bank of America has seen usage from 90 percent of its total workforce of 213,000, according to an announcement.
This includes support for areas like mobile device password reset and device activation. In 2023, this extended to review of health benefits as well as locating payroll and tax forms. Evidence of improved efficiency can be found with digital helper reducing calls to the IT service desk by more than 50 percent.
The first version of Erica was launched by the US lender seven years ago for client usage within its mobile app. Since then, clients have interacted with the virtual assistant 2.5 billion times with 20 million now being active users.
Leveraging Erica
The bank has also implemented use cases by leveraging the technology behind Erica in other parts of the business.
Its wealth management and private banking businesses have been able to more efficiently curate information for better user experience. Clients have also interacted with AI tools 23 million times in 2024, increasing by 1 million compared to 2023.
Additional AI deployments underway include coding assistance, preparation for client meetings, guided assistance to customer service specialists and summarization of research reports.
Patent Portfolio
Bank of America boasts a hefty portfolio of innovations with 7,400 granted patents and pending patent applications. More than 1,200 of these patents are focused on AI and machine learning with others related to information security, online and mobile banking, payments, data analytics, and augmented and virtual reality. Annually, the bank spends $13 billion on technology with $4 billion directed to new tech initiatives in 2025.
«AI is having a transformative effect on employee efficiency and operational excellence,» commented Aditya Bhasin, chief technology & information officer at Bank of America. «Our use of AI at scale and around the world enables us to further enhance our capabilities, improve employee productivity and client service, and drive business growth.»
