Dive Brief:
- ChatGPT developer OpenAI is teaming up with PwC to build artificial intelligence agents for a wide range of corporate finance uses including planning, forecasting, reporting, procurement, payments, treasury, tax and accounting, the companies announced this week.
- The effort is focused on “practical, high-value workflows where AI agents can execute and coordinate work under human supervision,” PwC said in a Tuesday press release.
- “Finance is at an inflection point, where organizations are moving from process efficiency to intelligent, decision-centric operations,” Tyson Cornell, PwC’s U.S. advisory leader, said in the release. “Through our collaboration with OpenAI, we’re helping clients embed agentic AI into the core fabric of the finance function, enabling more proactive insights, stronger controls and a more adaptive operating model.”
Dive Insight:
The deal adds to a growing wave of agentic AI partnerships between major consulting firms and technology companies.
In late April, KPMG said it was launching an AI assistant for the month-end close, powered by Google Cloud’s Gemini Enterprise and integrated directly with the Workday platform.
Deloitte, meanwhile, said last month that it was expanding its alliance with Google Cloud by establishing a “dedicated, end-to-end agentic transformation practice.” Deloitte has also teamed up with Hewlett Packard Enterprise in an initiative aimed at testing agentic AI in finance workflows.
PwC said its collaboration with OpenAI is focused on building applications “in the real world, not just designing in theory.”
“For example, PwC and OpenAI are building a procurement agent inside the OpenAI finance organization, and are applying those learnings to additional agents across core finance workflows,” PwC said in its release. “That hands-on model is intended to speed innovation, prove the value of an AI native finance function in practice at OpenAI, and continuously improve the offering based on learnings.”
Other agents will handle tasks such as accelerating contract reviews, performing risk assessments, speeding close activities, streamlining reporting and delivering customized dashboards, the release said.
In a separate announcement, OpenAI said its finance organization is serving as “customer zero” for the initiative, testing “enterprise-scale workflows, governance models, runtime controls and human–agent collaboration patterns.”
“OpenAI has already been applying AI agents across its own finance organization, using tools like ChatGPT and Codex to support workflows across investor relations, treasury, tax, reporting, corporate development and contract review,” the AI company said. “Now, PwC and OpenAI are building on those learnings to help other CFOs apply AI agents across their organizations.”
