AI is already poised to disrupt programming, but it could also end up changing how analysts work.
Aiden Gomez, CEO of Cohere and a co-author of the seminal transformers paper, recently highlighted the potential of AI to revolutionize knowledge work. His comments suggest AI could condense a week’s worth of an analyst’s research into a mere 30 seconds. This dramatic acceleration comes from the AI’s ability to access and process vast amounts of both internal and external data, essentially automating the complex research and reporting process.
“The first one that’s really taking off is actually for knowledge workers and researchers,” Gomez explained. He painted a picture of a typical scenario: “So you can imagine if you have a very competent analyst within your organization and you give them a question, they might take a week to respond.” He then broke down the analyst’s week-long process: “And what are they doing during that week? Well, they’re doing external research, they’re consulting the web, they’re consulting, you know, authoritative third-party sources, as well as internal research, internal knowledge within your organization.”
The culmination of this research, Gomez noted, is a comprehensive briefing: “And then they’re putting together a briefing of, ‘Hey, here’s the answer to that complicated question that you asked.'” He emphasized the complexity of this process: “It requires many steps, or requires a lot of checking and cross-referencing, and so that’s a very long-horizon agentic process.” This is precisely where AI excels, according to Gomez: “And these models are extraordinarily good at it.”
He then described how this translates to Cohere’s platform: “So for North in our platform there, we have research agents that are capable of plugging into all of your internal data, external data sources and just doing research for you and preparing reports.” The result is a dramatic time savings: “So something that would have taken a week or weeks, it comes back in 30 seconds.”
This radical efficiency has profound implications for businesses and the workforce. By automating research and reporting, companies can potentially achieve significant cost savings, accelerate decision-making processes, and free up human analysts to focus on higher-level tasks requiring creativity and critical thinking. However, this technology also raises concerns about the potential displacement of human analysts, and how to generate alpha when everyone has access to the same technology and can reach the same conclusions. As AI continues to evolve, navigating these challenges will be crucial to harnessing its transformative power responsibly.