An Exclusive Interview with Mr. Balakrishnan Kavikkal, Co-Founder & CEO of Autonom8 Inc, a Technology Company
In this exclusive interview, we speak with Mr. Balakrishnan Kavikkal, Co-Founder and CEO of Autonom8 Inc, to explore his vision for the future of automation.
With a wealth of experience in technology and innovation, Mr. Kavikkal shares insights into the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead for the industry.
Could you begin by sharing the founding vision behind Autonom8 Inc?
Balakrishnan Kavikkal: IT projects are notorious for delays and complexity. Even implementations of products such as CRM and ERP take months and years. And the end result often leaves the customer unhappy. Autonom8 wanted to fix this challenge for enterprise business processes.
Our objective was to build a platform where customers can roll out new workflows in days, and can make ongoing changes in hours. The platform drove concepts such as co-pilot and hyperautomation much before these words became popular.
We integrated LLM natively into the platform much before ChatGPT was launched. The platform lets users set up smart workflows once and then let those workflows run autonomously.
From your perspective, how do you define “Gen-AI driven Conversational Banking,” and what are its fundamental differences from earlier generations of chatbots or virtual assistants in the banking sector?
Balakrishnan Kavikkal: Gen-AI-driven Conversational Banking utilises large AI models that learn from vast amounts of data to understand and generate human-like responses. Earlier chatbots used fixed scripts and could only answer set questions.
Gen-AI models can handle new queries, maintain context across multiple turns, and assist with complex tasks such as explaining a fee or guiding a loan application.
The end-result is a conversational framework that literally works as a co-pilot to handle all queries – allow transactions, answer queries, support workflows and prompt action.
Can you elaborate on how Generative AI, beyond just Natural Language Processing (NLP), is truly transforming the customer experience in banking?
Balakrishnan Kavikkal: NLP lets the system read and write text. Generative AI adds the power to create new content, such as writing summaries of recent transactions or drafting simple financial advice.
It can spot patterns in customer behaviour and offer tips or alerts automatically, without a human crafting each message.
What specific Gen-AI capabilities are proving most impactful in your conversational banking solutions?
- Supports transactions : Transact through a conversational front end wherever your customers are
- Context awareness: The AI remembers the entire conversation history, so it does not repeat questions.
- Content creation: It drafts emails, summaries, and advice instantly.
- Data insights: It transforms raw account data into clear, actionable tips or simple charts.
- Multilingual support: It can converse fluently in multiple languages.
What are the key considerations and steps Autonom8 takes to ensure data privacy, security, and compliance (e.g., GDPR, local regulations) in its conversational banking deployments?
Balakrishnan Kavikkal: We have built a proprietary “Efficient Frontier” framework to address the concerns around use of LLMs.
The framework supports removal of PIIs if needed. This framework also helps address the concerns around hallucination. We encrypt data both at rest and in transit.
We employ strict access controls, ensuring that only approved systems and individuals can access sensitive data. We keep detailed audit logs of every action.
We map and align our processes with regulations such as GDPR and local rules.We conduct regular security reviews and penetration tests to identify and address any vulnerabilities.
How does your platform balance the need for seamless integration with legacy banking systems while delivering the agility GenAI promises?
Balakrishnan Kavikkal: We build small, focused connectors that link legacy systems to our AI layer. These connectors pass only the data the AI needs.
Banks keep their core systems untouched, while our AI works on fresh data to give fast answers. When a legacy system is updated, we update the connector without affecting the AI logic.
What advice would you give to traditional banks or financial institutions hesitant about moving toward GenAI-driven digital transformation?
Balakrishnan Kavikkal: Partner with experts who possess in-depth knowledge of both banking and AI.
Start with small automation projects – preferably not customer facing. Build confidence internally through these projects.
Move to simple customer facing projects – maybe an AI-powered FAQ chatbot. Show clear processes for privacy and safety to build trust. Expand gradually, adding more complex use cases as you learn and scale.
As we conclude our conversation, Mr. Kavikkal’s passion for driving technological advancements shines through. His commitment to innovation at Autonom8 Inc promises to shape the future of automation, making it an exciting journey to watch.
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