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Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Why Salesforce, PayPal, and Team Car Care leaders call AI agents a game changer for finance
Good morning. We're only in the early stages of exploring the capabilities and applications of AI agents in finance. That was a key takeaway from Fortune's Emerging CFO event on Thursday, held in partnership with Workday, a sponsor of CFO Daily. My colleague Geoff Colvin and I spoke with Silvio Savarese, EVP and chief scientist at Salesforce AI Research; Jamie Miller, chief financial and operating officer at PayPal; and Matt Castonguay, CFO at Team Car Care, about how their companies are leveraging this technology. 'AI agents can act as workflow and workforce multipliers for humans—like having a fleet of agents at your disposal, 24/7,' Savarese said. He described four key components of an agent: memory (for retaining and using information), a brain (for reasoning and planning), actuators (for executing actions via APIs), and sensors or interfaces (for communicating with the outside world). In finance, Savarese explained, agents can automate and personalize customer interactions in retail banking, streamline processes like mortgage lending, and improve customer satisfaction with faster approvals. He added that agents will soon be able to communicate with each other, requiring new protocols for secure interactions. As compliance frameworks for agentic AI are still evolving, Savarese advised finance leaders to work with legal and risk teams to develop internal policies aligned with upcoming AI accountability standards. At PayPal, Miller said the company targets use cases involving high-volume manual work, such as invoice processing and accruals. Agents can harmonize data from multiple formats and automate tasks like travel and expense compliance by auditing receipts and making recommendations. 'As CFOs, we're responsible for financial statements and compliance, so it's critical to have the right checks, balances, and oversight,' Miller said. 'With the right framework, the potential applications are limitless.' Castonguay shared that Team Car Care, operator and franchisee of the Jiffy Lube brand, is focused on automating high-volume manual tasks such as accounting reconciliations and store support. The company is deploying an agent to help reconcile inventory transactions, a data-intensive process. Processing that much data has been a challenge, he said. 'But it's promising, and we expect to see ROI soon,' he added. This work requires data-focused accountants who understand both the process and how the agent operates. And it requires all the team members to bring ideas to the table. 'Whether it's in Salesforce, whether it's in Workday, whether it's in a native third party tool—how can we leverage the use cases and the technology?' Castonguay said. Miller called agentic AI a 'game changer,' noting the massive capital investment from technology firms and private equity. 'We're just at the beginning,' she said. Castonguay agreed, adding that for private equity-backed companies like Team Car Care, managing costs with agentic AI is a top priority. Have a good weekend. See you on Monday. Sheryl This story was originally featured on
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Pharma tech CFO says finance is at the center of AI strategy
Good morning. As investment in AI accelerates, CEOs expect their CFOs to play central roles in leading the strategy. Finance leaders should treat enterprise AI oversight as a 'proof of concept'—carefully assessing potential impacts and investments, tracking outcomes, managing risks, and regularly evaluating whether to continue the initiatives, Marco Steecker, a senior director and analyst at Gartner, explained earlier this week at the firm's annual CFO conference. I brought up this topic during my conversation with Josh Schwartz, SVP and CFO of Medidata Solutions, a SaaS platform provider for clinical trials in the life sciences. Schwartz recently took over Medidata's enterprise IT team. 'We need to get to business intelligence, and a lot of that sits within the CFO office,' he said. When Medidata launched about 25 years ago, its goal was to streamline the mountains of paperwork required for drug approval, Schwartz told me. Over time, the company began digitizing this process and then built out a platform as the operating system for running clinical trials. Medidata, acquired by Dassault Systèmes in 2019, has run over 35,000 trials, with nearly 75% of novel drugs marketed in the last five years using their platform, Schwartz said. The New York-based company has shifted from simply digitizing workflows to generating actionable insights for patients and pharmaceutical clients. Medidata has embraced the idea of 'AI everywhere' to shorten the clinical trial cycle, ultimately bringing drugs to market faster and lowering costs for clients, Schwartz said. The company's partnerships with data firms like Snowflake further enhance its ability to curate and analyze massive datasets, giving researchers insights that would be impossible to generate manually, he said. However, Schwartz pointed out that, along with AI, there's still a human at the center of the process. He became CFO of Medidata in 2022 but has been with the company for more than 15 years in leadership roles. Schwartz is focused on finding tactical-use cases internally for automation in finance and accounting for a group of 90 professionals who report to him. By using enterprise software company Workday's platform (a CFO Daily sponsor), accounts payable automation now processes nearly 90% of invoices, up from zero just a few years ago, he said. 'With our extreme focus on cash flow, 98% of invoices are paid right on time versus 60–65% previously—ensuring we are maximizing our net terms for cash flow while maintaining our vendor relationships,' Schwartz said. Medidata has saved over $1.46 million annually in costs through the automation of finance and HR workflows, he said. Before using a unified system, the company lost time, efficiency, and value when moving through each application differently, he said. As a CFO investing in technology to support growth, I asked Schwartz what he thinks are some of the challenges facing the clinical trials industry. 'I think there's revenue pressure, cost pressure, and then there's this worldwide change where velocity is becoming even more important,' he told me. 'So there needs to be a way where you can differentiate.' For Medidata, that means a focus on digital therapeutics—patient-facing software applications that help treat, prevent, or manage a disease. To that end, Medidata has recently partnered with Click Therapeutics, he said. To stay competitive during uncertain times, 'You've got to think long term,' Schwartz said. CFO Daily will return Tuesday after the Memorial Day holiday. Have a good weekend. Sheryl This story was originally featured on Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
23-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Tariff uncertainty prompts analysts to slash earnings estimates: Report
Good morning. As earnings season continues, new data from S&P Global Market Intelligence takes a look at the dialogue around tariffs and their impact on forecasts. Tariffs have dominated investor discourse since April 2 when President Trump announced sweeping tariff reform. Trump announced on April 9 a 90-day pause on certain tariffs. Meanwhile, a 10% tariff on nearly all global imports, a 25% levy on imported cars and certain auto parts, and a 145% tariff on goods imported from China are still in effect. S&P Global Market Intelligence finds that, out of 423 earnings calls, 42% have included a discussion of tariffs, with 22% citing material risks. The analysis from April 1-16 is based on the S&P Total Market Index for U.S. companies. And data from the S&P Global Broad Market Indexes for the U.K., Canada, Europe, Australia, China, India, Japan, Mexico, and emerging countries. According to the findings shared with CFO Daily, analysts are lowering earnings forecasts to account for tariffs. Consensus full-year revenue estimates for 40% of companies worldwide have now been revised lower. This is most notable in the U.S., Europe, and the U.K. For U.S. firms, analysts are downgrading earnings projections the most for those in the energy sector (61%), consumer discretionary (59%), materials (59%), and financials (57%), according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Fueled by growing economic worry due to the trade war, oil prices are falling to the lowest levels since 2021. And economic uncertainty is pressuring consumer discretionary spending. This week, Big Tech kicks off its quarterly earnings season. Tech analysts are focused on Tesla today as it's scheduled to report Q1 earnings after the closing bell. Sheryl This story was originally featured on Sign in to access your portfolio
