Klarna has reiterated the significant contribution of generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) to its business, revealing that nine out of 10 of its employees use the technology on a daily basis.
The Swedish fintech attributed much of this AI usage to the development of its internal AI assistant, Kiki. The platform has responded to over 250,000 inquiries, amounting to 2,000 per day, since launch in June 2023.
A total of 85% of Klarna employees are using the Kiki system, which the firm asserts is driving what it calls an “internal AI revolution”. Klarna has previously pointed to AI as a key growth driver for its business in financial updates to investors.
“We push everyone to test, test, test and explore,” said Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO and Co-Founder at Klarna.
“As Klarna continues to discover applications for OpenAI’s tech, there’s the potential to take the business to new heights. We’re aimed at achieving a new level of employee empowerment, enhancing both our team’s performance and the customer experience.”
Elaborating further on Kiki’s role at Klarna, the firm believes that the platform reinforces a “culture of transparency and open information flow” by offering personalised responses to questions based on team objectives in a short time frame.
The impact of AI is being felt across the group’s teams, most notably in its communications, marketing and legal departments. These divisions have seen adoption rates of 93%, 88% and 86% respectively.
As stated above, Klarna is no stranger to using AI for business purposes. In its full year financial results published in March, Siemiatkowski said that the group’s objectives are being “increasingly delivered through generative AI”.
He added: “We not only achieved our first month and quarter of profitability in four years, but also did so while maintaining a great growth trajectory across all markets and driving a gross profit margin of 50%. But those weren’t the only firsts in 2023. In fact, the year was full of them.”
The company has experienced strong growth over recent years, particularly for its ‘buy now, pay later’ product, active in several European markets. In tandem with this growth has come adoption of AI, with Klarna being one of the first companies to incorporate ChatGPT into its operations.
Usage of AI in general is accelerating across fintech, and other sectors. This heightened interest in the technology has also led to increased investment.
