BrQ Digital sees boost from genAI, lists 30 projects in development

Brazilian multinational BrQ Digital Solutions has implemented around 30 genAI initiatives to date in sectors such as finance, telecoms, healthcare and energy, expecting to sign new projects over the next few months in Brazil, the US and the UK, BNamericas was told.

The company has developed a platform called Fusion AI on top of different large language models (LLM) on the market, such as ChatGPT, Gemini or Llama.

“Like any new technology, there is a learning curve in the market and a period for it to gain maturity. But prospects are good with generative AI,” CEO Rodrigo Frizzi told BNamericas.

“In the case of genAI, I believe there is now a better understanding of its use and a better understanding of the power it brings, whether in improving end-consumer experience or in operational efficiency processes. But there are some concerns, mainly with factors related to security and costs.”

BrQ began working on the topic in mid-2022, following a particular demand from a large telecom operator, said Frizzi. It was a kind of pilot, from which BrQ began to develop a product until launching it on the market at the end of 2023 as Fusion AI. 

Currently, most of the projects underway involve analyzing and summarizing contracts and data, in addition to customizing chatbots and analyzing internal company processes, such as monitoring personnel performance, according to the executive.

One of the cases, with a large bank, generated 78 million reais (US$14.3mn) in additional revenue for the institution within a specific business line after the deployment of a solution focused on contracts, Frizzi said. This client and details on the project are not public. 

“They were losing a lot of deals due to slowness in preparing and sending contracts.”

And for a large company in the water sector, BrQ developed a platform based on OpenAI's GPT-4 for the mapping of tenders and opportunities.

The solution had two layers: an interactive chat so that the client could ask questions about the tenders, such as deadline and budget, and a comparative database that allowed different tenders to be analyzed side by side.

The database was created with an open criterion, allowing the client to choose the parameters to be used, according to BrQ. The deployment took place in two weeks.

BrQ's Fusion AI platform, despite being agnostic from an LLM point of view, was certified by AWS and made available in the AWS marketplace, said Frizzi.

BrQ is now working to achieve the same availability with Google and Microsoft, its other priority cloud and AI partners.

MARKET OUTLOOK

Citing a “difficult” 2023 for the technology sector, Frizzi sees 2024 as a year of recovery. There is optimism about new projects, especially during the second half, due to the market interest around AI, he said.

Founded in 1993, BrQ has been listed on Brazil's stock market since 2006. It reports around 3,000 employees, most of which work on a remote basis. In Brazil, they work in 350 locations.

In 2023, BrQ's net revenue was 658mn reais, down 13%, while net profit reached 70mn reais, down 18.4%. 

Despite that, the company said it added 42 clients to its base last year, totaling 150 in 12 countries. These include Telefónica, América Móvil, TIM, Walmart, Bank of America, Santander, Itaú, Bradesco, Saint-Gobain and Renault.