The move by the Swiss wealth management big hitter illustrates how AI continues to shape thinking and is a prominent strategy area.

UBS is working alongside the University of Oxford to create a centre that explores the use of AI – highlighting how the topic continues to be salient in wealth management and bank strategy. 

The Oxford-UBS Centre for Applied Artificial Intelligence (AI) “aims to be a ground-breaking interdisciplinary partnership involving UBS, Oxford Saïd and the University’s Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences division (MPLS),” UBS said in a statement this week.

The centre will undertake independent research projects on AI as well as joint initiatives, in which centre researchers will collaborate with UBS practitioners to apply their findings to real-world applications.

The Centre, which will be led by a newly-endowed UBS Professor for Applied AI at Oxford Saïd, will be supported by a dedicated team of 20 researchers. 

Banks and wealth managers continue to explore use cases for AI, the ideas for which are legion. According to Francesco Filia and Daniele Guerini, authors of The Future Of Finance: The Rising Tide of Fintech Lending And The Platform Economy, AI capabilities include credit scoring and risk assessment; fraud detection and prevention; chatbots and virtual assistants; personalised banking and financial planning; algorithmic trading; customer relationship management; regulatory compliance; robo-advisors; and natural language processing (NLP).

Areas of focus
The Oxford-UBS Centre for Applied Artificial Intelligence will focus on areas such as how AI interacts with society; applications for use in business and wider economies, and emerging AI models and applications in future.

“This dynamic multidisciplinary partnership will lead to pioneering new AI research solutions and practical applications at a time of unprecedented technological change,” professor Irene Tracey, vice-chancellor of the University of Oxford, said.

The Swiss banking group works with universities in varied ways. For example, in 2014 UBS became a partner of the University of St Gallen, building on the collaboration that began with Credit Suisse in 2021. The Zurich-listed bank has also worked with institutions such as Singapore Management University.