Dive Brief:

• KPMG is experimenting with artificial intelligence “agents” — software tools that can be programmed to perform tasks on behalf of the user — as the Big Four accounting and consulting firm looks to become a leading early adopter of the technology, an executive said.
• The company has “prototyped and incubated” several agents, including one that is intended to support audit teams, according to Swami Chandrasekaran, head of KPMG’s AI and Data Labs.
• “We haven’t rolled out anything in production yet,” Chandrasekaran said in a Friday interview. “We want to make sure that we can really understand what these agents do.”

DiveInsight:

Global consulting firms have been using AI to boost internal capabilities while also enhancing the services they provide to enterprise clients.

In early October, KPMG competitor Deloitte announced an alliance with Pramataa provider of AI-enabled contract management and data analytics services, in a bid to bolster its offerings in that area, for example.

Last week, KPMG said it has made a minority investment in Emahas Mountain View, California-based startup whose platform allows users to build AI agents. The financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.

Chandrasekaran said such technology has the potential to be “the next wave” of AI, but KPMG is still “heavily” testing it.

“We don’t want it to be fully autonomous and doing things which we have no control over,” he said. “So we’re putting in all the necessary guardrails.”

The Ema stake “is part of KPMG’s overall strategy to lead in the emerging AI agent space, where action-oriented assistants will work seamlessly alongside and augment human teams,” according to a Thursday press release.

KPMG invests in early-stage startups through its investment arm, KPMG Ventures.