PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC), a ‘Top Four’ consulting firm, has joined forces with ChatGPT owner OpenAI to create advisors for clients generated by artificial intelligence.
PwC aims to use its new AI tools to consult on tax, legal, and human resources questions, helping it perform internal due diligence research on clients, identify compliance problems, and recommend courses of action for businesses. ChatGPT is not part of the partnership, but Harvey, an AI startup with funding from OpenAI, is.
This is part of a wider trend where the leading consulting firms are attempting to cut costs and increase productivity. PwC is also pausing pay increases and bonuses for its 25,000 UK employees. Meanwhile, Deloitte LLP is poised to slash over 800 jobs in the UK, Ernst & Young LLP to eliminate 5 percent of its UK financial services consulting staff, and KPMG LLP wants to lay off 125 consultants.
Our 2023 Global Asset and Wealth Management Survey paints a portrait of an industry in the throes of unprecedented change. Among the survey’s most striking findings: a projected boom in robo-advice.
Find out more about integrating #AI: https://t.co/LDIUIZ6I2C pic.twitter.com/yrB4S47bRp
— PwC (@PwC) October 12, 2023
Learn the benefits of becoming a Valuetainment Member and subscribe today!
PwC has become the first of the Top Four to actively partner with the leading AI firm, representing a qualitative jump in the industry’s AI arms race. Nevertheless, other firms have gotten in the AI game as well. KPMG invested $2 billion into Microsoft’s AI and cloud programs, Ernst & Young is launching an AI partnership with IBM for HR processes, and Deloitte has partnered with Google Cloud.
In the short term, PwC claims its partnership with OpenAI won’t lead to job losses. The new system is being implemented in the UK and roughly 650 staff members will be using the software for testing and training. PwC said it will allow them to tackle several projects at once and projects so large they were previously thought impossible.
PwC’s new AI system is “behaving like a 25-year tenure partner,” said Bivek Sharma, COO of tax, legal and people and PwC UK.
“The compliance burden globally is increasing and with geopolitics, the level of complexity that the C-suite is facing is like you’ve never seen before,” Sharma said. “A lot of people talk about how there’s gonna be job displacement with AI, but the reality, to navigate these very complex situations, AI is going to be necessary to actually do that work.”
Add comment