Eliza Wu

Colonial First State (CFS) has announced a strategic partnership with the University of Sydney Business School to launch the CFS Future AI PhD Internship Program, a new initiative aimed at accelerating the responsible development of artificial intelligence (AI) solutions and driving innovation in the wealth management sector.

The program will embed University of Sydney doctoral candidates within CFS teams, combining academic research and industry expertise to prototype and test AI tools that help employees work more efficiently and harness new technologies. PhD students will contribute to four projects spanning investment, human resources, risk and compliance, and technical advisory.

“This partnership reflects our commitment to building a future-ready workforce. By investing in emerging talent and exposing our people to cutting-edge research, we’re creating an AI-ready culture that will enable our teams to develop new capabilities which will lead to improved outcomes for our members and the financial advisers we work with,” said Shenaz Waples, Group Executive for People and Culture at CFS.

“These PhD internships are pivotal in fostering both learning and innovation. They provide our graduate research students from the University of Sydney Business School a unique opportunity to collaborate directly with Colonial First State on complex business projects. These projects emphasise the human-centered application of AI, effectively bridging the gap between theoretical research and practical business applications,” said Professor Leisa Sargent, Dean of the University of Sydney Business School.

The program is part of CFS’s AI strategy to improve experiences for employees, members and financial advisers through the responsible use of AI and a culture of continuous learning.  Investment in people is central to the strategy with key initiatives including the AI Centre of Excellence and the Ignite AI Talent Program, which equip CFS employees with the skills to adopt and apply AI safely and effectively.

“AI and cloud technologies are pivotal in our mission to help Australians achieve financial freedom. Our partnership with the University of Sydney brings deep technical capability into our teams. It’s about moving fast, solving real problems, and scaling innovation responsibly,” said Jeroen Buwalda, Group Executive for Transformation, Technology and Operations at CFS.

“Internships like these are invaluable in providing our PhD scholars with new insights into complex issues facing business and society. They present a great developmental opportunity for our doctoral researchers to grasp how their research can be applied to deliver tremendous impact on business practice,” said Professor Eliza Wu, Associate Dean (Research Education) at the University of Sydney Business School.

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Under the agreement, CFS will continue to use Microsoft Azure as its preferred cloud provider. The company already relies heavily on Azure to help power its data estate and security infrastructure, using tools such as Azure Data Factory, Microsoft Power BI, Microsoft Defender and Microsoft Sentinel.

The agreement will also focus on ensuring CFS drives AI innovation within Australia’s wealth management sector. The company is a successful early adopter of Microsoft’s generative AI technologies, including Copilot for Microsoft 365 and Azure OpenAI Service, with this agreement signalling an expansion of Copilot across their workforce.

“AI and cloud technologies are pivotal in our mission to help Australians achieve financial freedom,” said Jeroen Buwalda, Group Executive of Transformation, Technology and Operations at CFS.

“Our extended partnership with Microsoft places us in a strong position to harness these technologies. It will enable CFS to identify new and innovative ways to deliver enhanced services for our members and the financial advisers we work with.”

Steven Worrall, Managing Director at Microsoft Australia and New Zealand, said: “We’re very excited to strengthen our partnership with Colonial First State. Together, we will continue to drive innovation in wealth management and the broader financial services sector.”

The company is working on several generative AI use cases in collaboration with Microsoft and partner Avanade. These include using:

• Using Azure OpenAI Service to analyse member feedback and gain insights by identifying specific themes and patterns to enhance services and overall member experience.
• Using Azure Open AI Service to assist the CFS FirstTech technical advisory team to quickly locate information from their extensive library of superannuation legislation to answer questions from financial advisers.
• Using Azure Open AI Service to identify ways in which AI can assist CFS contact centre agents by providing faster access to information.
• Microsoft Power Platform’s AI Builder, Power Automate and Power BI tools to analyse and extract insights from feedback provided by financial advisers who work with CFS.

CFS began rolling out Copilot for Microsoft 365 across its workforce in January 2024 to a pilot group, with 75 per cent of employees now having access to the generative AI tool. According to survey data, all pilot group users believe that Copilot is making them more productive, with 40 per cent classified as power users, saving more than 30 minutes per day.

CFS employees have already discovered several valuable use cases for Copilot. They include running market analysis which saved one product manager about 70 per cent of the time required to complete this work and the insights they gained are now being used to prioritise changes.

A second use case involves speeding up proposal development for process changes, with one employee using Copilot to quickly access a repository from a previous project proposing similar changes. This saved them 90 per cent of the effort and avoided rework.

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The testing of this functionality was supported by EY (Ernst & Young). As the next step, Australian superannuation functionality is being developed and integrated into the Avaloq Banking Suite.

Providing financial institutions with dedicated country-specific solutions is one of Avaloq’s key areas of expertise. Avaloq – which established its local presence in Australia just over a year ago – has established a team of local experts with substantial know-how, experience and knowledge of the country specific requirements of the Australian financial market.

“Our product developers and local banking experts work hand in hand when developing new solutions,” says Iain Dunstan, Regional Head Australasia at Avaloq.

“This approach, combined with our years of international experience, ensures that country specific requirements are always fulfilled.

That is why Avaloq is one of the few international financial solutions providers that have implemented the complex Australian tax regulations successfully,” Dunstan continues.

“We were engaged by Avaloq to help them fully understand the significant complexity of the Australian tax system”,says Jeroen Buwalda, Partner at EY.

“It is exciting to see a global provider like Avaloq introduce new technology to the Australian wealth and superannuation market,” Buwalda continues. 

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Professor Deborah Ralston

Technological innovation is underpinning a revolution in how financial services are delivered in Australia, says Professor Deborah Ralston, Executive Director of the Australian Centre for Financial Studies (ACFS).

“Today this technology enables wealth managers to deliver financial advice to three million people annually, to oversee the administration of 20 million superannuation member accounts and to manage investments totalling $1.8 trillion on their behalf – and this revolution is still in its infancy,” she says.

“For example, how far away is the integration of advice and investment platforms, how will the regulators respond to this technological revolution, and will access to individual superannuation accounts in APRA-regulated funds lead to a decline in the growth of SMSFs?”

These are just some of several themes about the role of technology in financial services that will be teased out at morning briefing session being sponsored by ACFS and EY on 14 May in Sydney. It is titled “Riding the digital wave: are wealth platforms about to take off or wipe out?”

Speakers include former Labor Superannuation Minister Nick Sherry, EY Partner Jeroen Buwalda, ASIC Senior Executive Leader Ged Fitzpatrick, SuperIQ CEO Andrew Bloore and Colonial First State Executive General Manager, Linda Elkins.

Buwalda says wealth managers are facing unprecedented opportunities and challenges as a result of the increasing uptake and convergence of consumer technologies.

“In an environment where evolving technology makes it easier than ever to engage with customers, providers need to ensure they are making the best use of their platforms – whether collaborating with clients, advisers of platform partners in real time or managing regulatory compliance obligations more effectively,” he says.

Prof Ralston says every day we hear about new innovations in technology and how they are changing the way we live; smart phones, tablets and social media are already ensconced in our daily routines and wearable devices and 3D printing are almost upon us.

“These massive changes obviously beg the question about how wealth platforms are responding to technology innovation to better meet the needs of customers, trustees, administrators and asset managers.”

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FSC Annual Conference begins July 31 in Brisbane.

The Advice stream at this year’s FSC Annual Conference in Brisbane is stacking up as one of the strongest ever with as speaking lineup including industry experts and academics.

The Financial Services Council’s Senior Policy Manager Advice Cecilia Storniolo said the program covered considerable ground from a discussion on the emerging competition in the advice industry to overviews of emerging world first research into the value of advice being conducted by Australian Universities.

Full detail of the Advice sessions are as follows:

Advice – Clash of the Civilisations – the emerging competition in the advice industry

Paul Barrett, Managing Director, Global Advice and Distribution – ANZ Wealth

Rod Bristow, CEO – Infocus

Bill Danaher, CEO, Industry Funds Services

For all the pervasive changes created by FoFA and MySuper emerges a new world order in advice. Has competition changed? What are the new advice models? Has FoFA created a level playing field for advice? What is the new world advice order?

Advice – Value of advice: Does the consumer value advice?

Professor Natalie Gallery, School of Accountancy – Queensland University of Technology

Professor David Michayluk, University of Technology, Sydney

Mark Spiers, General Manager Advice – BT Financial Group

In 2011/2012 Queensland University of Technology# and a consortium of universities led by Adelaide University were successfully awarded government funding to progress two world leading and distinct research projects into the Value of Advice in partnership with the FSC. What are the two projects researching? What stages are these projects at? How can the industry help? What are the results saying about the value of advice?

Advice – Are we there yet?

David Lane, CEO – Count Financial Limited

Michael Vrisakis, Partner – Herbert Smith Freehills

John de Zwart, Managing Director – Centrepoint Alliance

Geoff Lloyd, CEO and Managing Director – Perpetual

Jeroen Buwalda – Partner, Ernest and Young

A Q&A session – The Advice industry has been under significant reform and other significant changes including FoFA, TASA, Competency changes, APES230, Codes of Conduct – which largely culminated in 2013. What are the priority issues to be resolved by government or industry response ?  What are the practical implementation challenges and opportunities afforded by the changing landscape of advice?

The conference runs from July 31 to August 2 at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre.

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