Kyriba is a secure and scalable SaaS solution that has been at the forefront of liquidity performance for more than 20 years. Jean-Baptiste Gaudemet, SVP, Strategic Innovation Lab at Kyriba, spoke to Intelligent Fin.tech about AI and customer service.
Firstly, tell me more about Kyriba and the services it offers?
Kyriba is a secure and scalable SaaS solution that has been at the forefront of liquidity performance for more than 20 years. We empower CFOs, treasurers and finance teams to connect, protect, forecast and optimise their liquidity with intelligence and automation. It’s designed for finance teams who want real-time visibility into cash, automate manual tasks and feel confident about their risk exposure, no matter how complex things get. With Kyriba, you get the freedom to focus on what really matters: growing your business and making informed choices every step of the way.
What is your long-term vision for AI within Kyriba?
Our long-term goal is to expand our leadership in SaaS and leverage Trusted AI to make managing finances and treasury even smarter, easier and more productive for everyone. Most organisations regardless of size, encounter some level of treasury challenges in reconciliation, fraud detection, cash forecasting and financing optimisation. To ensure these needs are met and addressed, Kyriba is significantly investing in AI-driven research and development to enable smarter decision-making. Importantly, all of our AI capabilities are built directly and securely within the Kyriba platform, ensuring that clients’ data stays safe and confidential at all times. By building intelligent and predictive treasury solutions inside the secure environment of our platform, businesses can react more quickly and confidently in the face of complexity. Our goal is to ensure that Kyriba remains at the forefront of this transformation and continues to be the reliable, cutting-edge partner for finance teams and CFOs.
What’s your approach to balancing innovation with operational risk with regards to AI?
Clients should be able to focus on strategic growth without overlooking any compliance or security concerns. Our approach to balancing innovation with operational risk is embedded in our Trusted AI (TAI) design, which is built on three key principles: data security, responsibility and transparency.
First, data security is paramount. By provisioning our AI models within our platform, we ensure data residency and isolation. This means sensitive information never leaves our controlled environment.
Second, we emphasise responsibility. TAI is always supervised by a human being user who remains in charge of validating actions and processes. This human oversight ensures that every AI-driven decision is reviewed, reinforcing accountability and reducing the risk of unintended consequences.
Finally, we prioritise transparency. TAI is designed to report back clearly to its supervisor, providing a transparent chain of thought behind every recommendation or action. This not only builds trust with our users but also helps organisations understand and audit AI-driven outcomes.
By embedding these principles in our AI design, we can confidently drive innovation while maintaining robust operational controls and mitigating risks.
How do you keep up-to-date with the everchanging world of technology and AI?
We have adopted a proactive approach by investing significantly in research and development. Recently we announced our own AI solution, Trusted AI, which is a suite of AI tools including TAI, a Liquidity Performance Agent fully integrated into the Kyriba platform.
To stay ahead in the rapidly evolving technology landscape, we have chosen to partner with Databricks, a recognised leader in both Data and AI. This collaboration ensures that we are always at the forefront of innovation and best practices.
Furthermore, to maximise the value of our TAI Agent for Treasurers, we have established a co-innovation group with a select group of customers. These customers have exclusive access to our TAI Lab, where they can experiment with successive development versions and provide us with regular, hands-on feedback. This approach allows us to innovate quickly, adapt to real-world needs and deliver solutions that truly address our clients’ evolving challenges.
How do you make sure you provide excellent customer service?
At Kyriba, we believe in making our customers’ needs our own and empowering them with the intelligence, visibility and innovative technologies to optimise their liquidity. We created Kyriba Elevate, our exclusive customer community and resource hub, where users can connect with peers, share best practices and access the latest learning opportunities. In addition, we have dedicated support teams that ensure every customer feels confident using our platform and leveraging their insights to make key financial decisions for their business.
We prioritise customer input, which is why we built our agentic AI solution. We have developed a dedicated evaluation framework with customers’ input to ensure TAI answers accurately on liquidity performance questions. Before we deliver TAI to our customers, it must successfully pass a Treasury exam. This approach helps us guarantee the quality and reliability of our service.
We believe that strong relationships and open communication are just as important as technology, so we’re committed to being a responsive, reliable partner every step of the way.
How do you foster collaboration between technical AI teams and other teams within the organisation?
In the world of finance and treasury, CFOs are cautious about AI-specific risks, while also viewing security as a broader organisational challenge. This is what we call the ‘trust gap’. The impact of such scepticism can be significant: unresolved security and privacy issues could hamper organisations’ ability to fully leverage AI’s capabilities.
That’s why achieving success with Artificial Intelligence requires more than simply adopting new technologies. It demands a broader cultural transformation. First, structured training programmes are critical for helping finance teams develop confidence and competence in using AI. The role of a CFO has evolved rapidly, now requiring the development of greater AI literacy. Gaining hands-on experience with AI tools in real-world scenarios such as using AI to monitor geopolitical events and model economic scenarios to ensure the company is prepared for any economic impacts, allows professionals to apply their knowledge and adapt to evolving capabilities.
Equally important, finance teams must forge internal connections and external partnerships that instil trust in the tools and data being deployed. It’s important to establish trust through close co-ordination with IT leaders to implement stringent security protocols. Only then can an organisation confidently drive innovation and navigate the complexities of modern finance effectively.
What’s your strategy for building and retaining top AI talent?
As a leader in SaaS for more than 20 years, Kyriba has long fostered a culture of ambitious technological innovation and global collaboration. As we continue to develop and evolve our AI-powered solutions for treasury and finance operations, we are actively investing in talent with a broad range of skillsets and experience. Above all, we look for talented colleagues who are passionate about ML/AI-driven systems with a strong desire to learn and grow within a collaborative and dynamic environment.
What would you say is the biggest gamechanger for customers who use Kyriba?
Finance and treasury teams today are facing a very different world than they did just five years ago, from the speed of technological innovation to unprecedented economic volatility. This new reality demands that CFOs move from reactive to proactive liquidity management – not only cash flow forecasting, but also scenario planning, risk management and access to capital.
Organisations that proactively manage their liquidity by leveraging stronger financing, empowered by real-time and AI-driven technologies, are better positioned to support business growth. These forward-thinking companies are able to reduce financial risk and achieve enhanced strategic flexibility, ultimately creating a genuine competitive advantage compared to non-Kyriba users.
The unveiling of our Agentic AI solution, TAI, has also been a real gamechanger for our early adopters, demonstrating that finance and treasury teams shouldn’t have to sacrifice privacy and security in order to realise the benefits of AI. TAI addresses a real market need by not relying on third-party LLM service integrations and prioritising industry-leading data privacy and compliance while still empowering leaders to make faster, smarter decisions and keeping human judgement and responsibility at the centre.
