‘I would encourage people to think of this as an enormous opportunity to elevate the IR function’
Generative artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to create better insights and data on the investment community and the capital markets for IR teams, according to James Tickner, global head of product for IR intelligence at Nasdaq.
Tickner participated in an AI-focused session at this year’s NIRI 2023 Annual Conference. After the session, IR Magazine spoke to him about where AI is heading and how IROs can leverage its potential while being aware of its risks.
‘In the session, we talked a lot about the opportunity for IR and what that means in terms of things like task automation,’ he said.
‘We spoke about this co-pilot concept, which looks at getting people a first draft of some of the things they need to generate in their day-to-day work. We also talked a bit about how to summarize market events, for example, and helping keep executive teams well informed on capital markets events.’
‘Hazards for today’
Looking at some of the challenges AI could pose for IR teams, Tickner said IROs trying to use generative AI tools find they have a very wide or shallow range, rather than offering a narrow and deep focus to users.
Touching on regulation, he added that while innovation is happening very quickly within companies, it must be matched by high ethical standards: ‘The book is being written, but collaborating with policymakers and other companies to try to establish the rules here on how to make responsible AI is key.’
When asked whether AI poses risks to the IR function in the long term, Tickner explained that when anything is this transformational, it comes with some element of risk. ‘Overall, I would encourage people to think of this as an enormous opportunity to elevate the IR function and to remove some of the manual tasks involved,’ he said.
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