Top generative AI use cases for business
Use cases for Generative AI across industries currently focus on advanced chatbots, digital assistants and Coding Assistants.
Advanced Chatbots
Advanced chatbots have been around for a long time, but newer chatbots equipped with gen AI capabilities can engage in more natural conversations and handle a wider range of customer requests.
Digital Assistants
Big IT companies like Microsoft and Google are promoting AI digital assistants or "copilots" that can retrieve information, create documents, summarize emails and video conferences, and even generate supply-chain documents. Additionally, these digital assistants can be customized to meet specific needs, such as adding special instructions to purchase orders.
Coding Assistants
Gen AI serves as a coding assistant, enabling programmers to focus on complex tasks by writing basic software code. This helps maintain concentration on coding, reduces time and cost in web development, and allows users without deep technical expertise to implement code directly on their websites. Enterprises implementing Gen AI are working through its limits and team impacts.
However, there are additional instances where GenAI is being leveraged.
Marketing Support
Many AI experts and users believe that marketing support is one of the critical strengths of gen AI. Gen AI can generate personalized marketing materials, analyse customer data, and assist with content creation. Experts argue that by reducing time spent on routine tasks such as scheduling, optimization, and editing, Gen AI allows professionals to focus on high-value tasks, leading to cost savings in the long run. Additionally, according to some, gen AI can perform market analysis based on product reviews and predict customer issues before they arise.
Cybersecurity
Many cybersecurity firms are using AI to enhance tools for identifying suspicious activity and for advanced fraud detection. Palo Alto Networks offers the Cortex XSIAM security operations platform, which combines machine learning expertise and data storage with Google's BigQuery enterprise data warehouse and Gemini AI model to alert security analysts about threats in real-time.
Business Process Augmentation
Many large businesses use generative AI to enhance crucial processes, with specific industries like finance and insurance utilizing gen AI to assist underwriters in evaluating potential clients. For example, Credibly uses gen AI and machine learning to assess loan risk and expedite lending. According to a survey by EY, almost all insurance companies had either implemented gen AI or were interested in doing so by late 2023, with 42% of insurers already investing in gen AI and expecting a revenue increase of over 10% through its implementation.
Here a great summary of how Generative AI is being applied across various industry sectors:
In the current landscape, industries such as technology, healthcare, finance, and manufacturing are leading in the implementation of Generative AI. Companies within these sectors are leveraging Generative AI technologies to streamline operations, enhance productivity, improve customer experiences, and drive innovation. Its applications range from creating synthetic data for training machine learning models to generating realistic images, text, and even music. As Generative AI continues to evolve, its adoption across various industries is expected to grow, unlocking new opportunities for efficiency and creativity.
Let’s look at some more detailed insights from a few industries.
Airlines
Air France-KLM has seen a significant impact from the use of generative AI, specifically through the introduction of a friendly robot named Louis. Since 2017, Louis has been assisting passengers and company employees by answering 30% of their questions, a notable increase from the initial 20% it handled. Air France has reported that they are currently working on around 80 projects that utilize generative artificial intelligence. One of the most promising applications is in aircraft maintenance, with plans to implement AI before the end of the year. However, technicians still require training due to the tool's fallibility. A specific project named Charlie is particularly focused on aircraft maintenance. Air France has announced this as a groundbreaking advancement, with the project expected to complete its feasibility study in June and potentially be deployed by the end of the year. With multiple projects in progress, generative AI is progressively becoming integral to Air France's operations.
Insurance
Insurance companies increasingly use Generative AI applications to streamline processes such as creating policy documents and generating personalized quotes. USAA, a Fortune 100 company, has successfully balanced traditional member service and innovative digital experiences. Here’s how they do it:
Clear Mission: USAA’s mission is to serve military families by providing auto insurance, personal lines of insurance, and retail banking services. Their unwavering focus on this mission ensures they maintain a strong connection with their members.
Human-Centric Approach: While embracing technology, USAA recognizes the importance of human interaction. They’ve rolled out a natural language conversational AI solution replicating interactions members would have with a service representative on the phone. This allows their member service representatives to handle more complex needs while maintaining a personal touch.
Innovation Incubator: USAA accelerated its digital roadmap during the pandemic, finding new ways to serve members through technology and automation. They view crises as opportunities to innovate and improve member experiences. In an interview with Forbes, Ramnik Bajaj the Chief Data and Analytics Officer of USAA, explains, “One of our focus areas is AI acceleration by expanding the skills and capacity, improving tools, increasing automation through MLOps, and creating more reuse in AI so we can embed AI use in many more of our processes and products. As I’m sure is the case with many of our peers, we are also looking at the power and potential of generative AI to add to our business and our members’ experience.
Diverse Workforce: USAA believes a diverse employee base better prepares them to serve today's and tomorrow’s military. Their hiring practices prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.
USAA combines personalized digital experiences with empathetic member service to cater to its diverse customer base, harmonising tradition and innovation.
Automotive and Vehicle Manufacturing
German automotive company Mercedes-Benz introduced its MBUX virtual assistant, powered by generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), at the CES2024. Mercedes says the new AI assistant will be the company’s most human-like interface. It aims to enhance the driving experience through features like personalized suggestions and interactions. The development comes after fellow German manufacturer Volkswagen announced that it has integrated ChatGPT into its IDA voice assistant. Magnus Östberg, CSO at Mercedes-Benz, expressed, "With generative AI, our MBUX Virtual Assistant brings more trust and empathy to the relationship between car and driver. Thanks to our MB.OS chip-to-cloud architecture, our future vehicles will provide customers exactly what they need when needed." Using the system showcased in the VISION EQXX electric vehicle, MBUX uses generative AI to offer tailored suggestions, such as playing the latest news in the morning or initiating a preferred massage program at the end of the workday, with the option for automation. It comes with four personality modes: natural, predictive, personal, and empathetic.
As industries increasingly recognise the transformative potential of GenAI, they are harnessing its capabilities to enhance efficiency, drive innovation, and deliver personalised experiences, ultimately reshaping the landscape of their operations and strategies.