PwC launches Gen AI tool to streamline regulatory compliance

Professional services firm PwC has launched a new tool in Australia designed to help businesses streamline compliance by compiling and tracking their ever-evolving regulatory obligations.

Dubbed ‘Regulatory Pathfinder’ and powered by generative AI, the new solution aims to fast-track the traditionally manual process of compliance monitoring through automation to identify any gaps and reduce time, risk and costs.

One of the first local consultancies to embrace ChatGPT, the solution was developed by PwC’s recently launched AI Centre of Excellence, which the firm says is seeing multiple Gen AI cases for deployment both internally and for clients.

“Regulatory Pathfinder was a really interesting project for our team,” stated PwC’s AI leader Tom Pagram, who was recently named consultant of the year at the Australian AI Awards. “It unlocks a completely new operating model for compliance teams by tracking regulatory obligations at a level of detail that was virtually impossible to achieve without AI augmentation.”

Organisations within the financial services and mining sectors for example must navigate an increasingly complex and ever-changing regulatory environment, having to comply with an endless number of legal obligations. Regulatory Pathfinder, PwC says, smooths this process by diving into a company’s database and examining external sources, before then generating a report.

“Regulatory Pathfinder helps to automate, accelerate and streamline manual processes,” said PwC’s lead partner for risk & regulatory, Amrita Jebamoney. “But importantly, it also provides them with tailored actions, with detailed traceability to the underlying obligations, so they can confidently address their compliance gaps and prioritise their risk and compliance efforts.”

Described by Jebamoney as a game-changer for the firm’s clients, PwC on the launch of the tool pointed to research (from right wing think-tank the Institute of Public Affairs, railing against ‘red tape’) suggesting that the increased regulatory burden is costing the Australian economy $176 billion a year in lost output, a figure which is the measure of “forgone human potential.”

Still, PwC said the tool is saving clients up to 80 percent of their time spent on compliance and risk-related activities, with Pagram concluding; “Some of our Gen AI programs solve smaller problems for clients by making their business more efficient, but some solve much bigger problems, and that’s one of the ways we can contribute to a client’s business model reinvention.”