What is BNY's AI strategy and future technology vision?
BNY's strategy, in CEO Robin Vince's words, is that 'AI is for everyone, everywhere, and everything', delivered through Eliza, the enterprise AI platform the bank began building in 2023, and a platform operating model that reorganized BNY from three siloed businesses into client and engineering platforms. The record shows the scale-up: 117 AI solutions in production in October 2025, 160 at year-end with 134 'digital employees', about 220 and 140 digital employees in April 2026, more than 300 by October 5, 2026 and '400-plus' on the October 15, 2026 Q3 call. About $4 billion of BNY's $13 billion annual expense base goes to technology; Vince will not break out AI spend, saying it 'could be counterproductive' to do so, and that 'yes, we're generating returns, and yes, we want to lean in more'. For 2026 the stated next step is depth: 'moving from AI point solutions to using AI to enhance end-to-end processes'. The bank frames AI as creating capacity for growth rather than cutting headcount, and Vince, on OpenAI's boards since July 2026, says model capability, alignment and chain-of-thought monitoring should advance 'in lockstep'.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]
Data as of Oct 16, 2026 · BNY profile updated Oct 13, 2026 · 26 sources cited on this page · 140 banks profiled on this site · Markdown
What have BNY's executives said about the bank's AI strategy, and when?
Dated statements by the CEO, CFO and CIO, as reported.
| Who | What they said | Where | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Robin Vince, CEO | 'At BNY, AI is for everyone, everywhere and for everything'; 117 AI solutions in production, up 75% in a quarter | Q3 2025 results | October 16, 2025[5] |
| Leigh-Ann Russell, CIO | BNY reorganized from 'three big businesses that tended to operate in a bit of a silo' into a platform operating model; 'Resiliency and cybersecurity are job one' | Forbes interview | January 9, 2026[4] |
| Dermot McDonogh, CFO | BNY still spends more on cyber resiliency than on AI | Q4 2025 call | January 13, 2026[12] |
| Robin Vince | 2026 is about 'moving from AI point solutions to using AI to enhance end-to-end processes' | Q1 2026 call | April 16, 2026[9] |
| BNY leadership | 'With AI creating an abundance of capacity, we can start doing things that previously sat below the line' | Q1 2026 investor materials, per PYMNTS | April 16, 2026[13] |
| Robin Vince | 'It would be a mistake to think about this as just an efficiency creator'; AI runs the company better, builds better products and expands BNY's perimeter | Q2 2026 call | July 15, 2026[14] |
| Robin Vince | Model capability, alignment and chain-of-thought monitoring should be 'roughly operating in lockstep'; AI 'will create more opportunity and more fairness' | Northeastern University fireside chat | September 15, 2026[10] |
| Robin Vince | '400-plus' AI solutions in production; will not break out AI spend; 'yes, we're generating returns, and yes, we want to lean in more' | Q3 2026 call | October 15, 2026[1][2] |
How fast has BNY scaled AI in production?
The counts BNY has published or its executives have stated. Definitions are BNY's; the figures are not audited.
| Date | AI solutions in production | Digital employees | Other measures | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 2024 | More than 20 | — | More than 600 AI opportunities identified; NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD deployed | NVIDIA[15] |
| September 30, 2025 | 117 | — | Up 75% from the second quarter; Eliza 2.0 launched | Q3 2025 results[5] |
| December 31, 2025 | 160 | 134 | 99% of staff on Eliza; more than 60 AI-related patent applications | Q4 2025 deck[6] |
| April 16, 2026 | About 220 | About 140 | About 50% daily AI users; more than 50% building agents | Q1 2026 deck[7] |
| October 5, 2026 | More than 300 | — | 40% of code authored by AI in Q2 2026; more than 40 AI solutions in Asset Servicing | BNY fund operations insight[8] |
| October 15, 2026 | '400-plus' | — | About $4 billion of a $13 billion expense base on technology | Q3 2026 call[1] |
How is BNY's technology organized to deliver the AI strategy?
CIO Leigh-Ann Russell runs 'all of technology at the bank', including cybersecurity, infrastructure, AI, data, software, architecture and controls. Under the platform operating model, client-facing CIOs run business platforms while horizontal practices run cyber, production services, infrastructure, data, AI, architecture and controls, aiming to reduce duplication and increase reuse. BNY runs a hybrid of cloud and its own data centers and reports a 90% decrease in serious (P1 and P2) incidents, partly from machine learning and AI for anomaly detection.[4]
Eliza is the shared layer: a marketplace of AI solutions, approved datasets and a community, named after Eliza Hamilton, wife of founder Alexander Hamilton. BNY now markets it to clients as 'AI Built In', embedding Eliza-powered monitoring, exception handling and anomaly detection in platforms such as Global Payments & Trade. It integrates models from OpenAI, Google and Anthropic.[16][17][13]
The Q2 2026 deck says the platform operating model finished its activation phase and that BNY is tracking toward about $500 million of incremental investment and about $450 million of efficiency savings in 2026. In September 2026 the CFO raised the 2026 expense-growth outlook to 6%-7%, partly on data and AI investment; in October the bank moved it to 7%-8%, mostly on higher revenue.[18][19][1]
Not disclosed: a dollar figure for AI spend, which Vince said on October 15, 2026 'sort of folds into the inputs across our expense base', and an audited measure of the savings attributed to AI.[1]
What does the BNY profile record on this topic?
The rows below are the entries of the BNY AI strategy profile that bear on this page, as of Oct 13, 2026; the profile holds the full record of 38 dated moves, 14 use cases and 56 sources.
| Date | Move | Detail | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sep 19, 2026 | CFO: ~$4 billion annual engineering spend funds Eliza; expense outlook raised partly on AI | At an investor conference McDonogh frames BNY's next growth phase around cross-selling and AI investment, says AI is meant to create capacity to reinvest in client delivery and product development rather than just cut headcount, flags AI's potential to modernise spreadsheet-heavy loan-market processes, and raises the 2026 expense-growth outlook to 6%-7%, partly on added data and AI investment. | [19] |
| Jul 31, 2026 | Q2 10-Q: AI enhances cyber threats | The quarterly report says recent advancements in artificial intelligence have enhanced threat actors' capability to identify and potentially exploit previously unidentified cybersecurity vulnerabilities, and lists AI among the forward-looking topics alongside the transition to a platforms operating model. | [20] |
| Jul 21, 2026 | Vince joins OpenAI's boards | Named to the OpenAI Foundation and OpenAI Group PBC boards ahead of a prospective IPO. | [11][21] |
| Jul 15, 2026 | Q2 call and deck: AI value in three dimensions; operating model activated | Vince frames AI as running the company better, building better products and expanding BNY's perimeter, and says it is 'a mistake' to see it only as efficiency. The deck says the platform operating model's activation phase finished in Q2 and BNY is tracking toward about $500 million of incremental investment and about $450 million of efficiency savings in 2026; the CFO puts AI spend as 'de minimis' within a roughly $4 billion engineering budget. | [14][18] |
| Jul 15, 2026 | Q2: record $5.7 billion revenue, headcount −7%, guidance raised | Client impact of AI called 'measurable'; CFO declines to track prompt counts, focuses on outcomes. | [22][23] |
| May 4, 2026 | Vince: AI is 'a jobs creator, not a destroyer' | At Milken: savings in one place create capacity to do more elsewhere. | [24] |
| Apr 16, 2026 | Q1 call: 218 AI solutions in production, up fourfold | Vince recounts the 2023 AI Hub and BNY's DGX SuperPOD with NVIDIA, the first at a global bank, and says 2026 moves from point solutions to end-to-end processes. | [9] |
| Apr 16, 2026 | Q1 deck: 50% daily users, >50% building agents, ~220 solutions, ~140 digital employees | Record quarterly revenue; the transformation agenda's metrics. | [7][25] |
| Jan 13, 2026 | FY2025 scorecard: 99% of staff on Eliza, 160 solutions, 134 digital employees | The fourth-quarter deck adds more than 60 AI-related patent applications; on the call the CFO says BNY still spends more on cyber resiliency than on AI. | [6][12] |
| Oct 28, 2025 | Vince at Money20/20: adoption, not capability, is the constraint | 'Human adoption and culture and potentially organizational inertia' will get in the way. | [26] |
| Oct 16, 2025 | 117 AI solutions in production; Eliza 2.0 | Up 75% from the second quarter; Vince: 'AI is for everyone, everywhere and for everything'. | [5] |
| Mar 18, 2024 | First major bank to deploy an NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD | BNY revealed a SuperPOD built on DGX H100 systems with InfiniBand networking, installed ahead of typical timelines; then-CIO Bridget Engle said it would accelerate processing capacity. The AI Hub had more than 20 solutions in production, a firmwide exercise had found more than 600 AI opportunities, and early use cases were deposit forecasting, payment automation, predictive trade analytics and end-of-day cash balances. | [15] |
What is BNY's technology vision?
BNY describes it as AI 'for everyone, everywhere, and everything', run through the Eliza enterprise platform and a platform operating model that replaced three siloed businesses. For 2026 the CEO's stated priority is depth: using AI on end-to-end processes rather than point solutions, and treating AI as a source of capacity for growth rather than only cost cutting.
How many AI solutions does BNY have in production?
Robin Vince said '400-plus' on the Q3 2026 earnings call on October 15, 2026. The published trail runs from 117 at September 30, 2025 to 160 at year-end 2025, about 220 in April 2026 and more than 300 by early October 2026. BNY also counted 134 digital employees at end-2025 and about 140 in April 2026.
How much does BNY spend on AI?
BNY does not disclose it. Vince said on October 15, 2026 that about $4 billion of the bank's $13 billion annual expense base goes to technology and that breaking out AI 'could be counterproductive'. In July 2026 the CFO called AI spend 'quite de minimis and quite modest' within that roughly $4 billion.
Is BNY cutting jobs because of AI?
Headcount fell 7% year on year by mid-2026, but BNY's stated position is that AI creates capacity for growth. Vince said in May 2026 that AI is 'a jobs creator, not a destroyer' and on October 15, 2026 that generating capacity without growing the expense base is 'phenomenal'. The bank has tripled its intern and analyst classes since 2022.
What is Robin Vince's role at OpenAI?
Vince was appointed in July 2026 to the boards of the OpenAI Foundation and OpenAI Group PBC. BNY runs OpenAI models on Eliza under a multi-year deal signed in February 2025, alongside Google and Anthropic models. In September 2026 he said AI capability, alignment training and chain-of-thought monitoring should move in lockstep.
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