The rise of AI has accelerated dramatically in recent years, turning what was once experimentation into expectation. Clients now intuitively recognise what effective digital personalisation looks like, not because it is explained to them, but because they experience it daily. This shift raises the bar for how financial interactions are perceived and evaluated.

Building a global AI capability, accelerated by Asia

Rather than waiting for technologies to mature, Julius Baer began exploring early how new technologies could support wealth management in practice. In 2021, a small team in Singapore started testing practical applications, from voice-to-text solutions to early concepts for augmenting the advisor’s role.

Singapore, at the heart of Julius Baer’s second home market in Asia, offered the right conditions: technologically advanced, open to innovation, and fast-paced enough to enable rapid experimentation. This early work helped identify where new technologies could meaningfully enhance the service model — and where further development was needed.

Since 2006, the Singapore office has grown from 34 to over 1,000 colleagues, making it the organisation's  second-largest location outside Switzerland. Today, teams including technology specialists collaborate globally from locations such as One@Changi City to develop and implement new initiatives, supporting digital transformation across the Julius Baer.

AI exploration was driven by several teams globally, with Asia playing a particularly strong role as a hub for innovation and technology within Julius Baer over the past two decades. Over time, these efforts became more connected, drawing on expertise across the organisation and evolving into a coordinated, global approach. Today, this enables Julius Baer to observe trends across regions, test ideas more systematically, and develop capabilities that scale internationally. What began as distributed experimentation has become a strategic, firm-wide capability that helps anticipate developments in AI and align initiatives across markets.

Jonathan Chan, Head Innovation Ventures, says: “Asia gave us the momentum to experiment quickly, but the long-term opportunity is global. Our focus now is on anticipating where AI is heading and ensuring Julius Baer can translate those shifts into meaningful, lasting value for our clients while also improving operational efficiency.”

Laying the foundations for AI at scale

Building on this groundwork, Julius Baer is now shifting focus to the longer-term implications of AI and how emerging capabilities may shape the industry in the years ahead. With AI seen as a strategic enabler and core driver of business value, the emphasis is no longer solely on experimentation, but on building the structures needed to embed it responsibly and effectively across the organisation. This includes rethinking how technology may reshape the client experience, augment the expertise of relationship managers and advisors, drive operational efficiency across the value chain, and strengthen risk and compliance processes.

Underpinning this strategy is Julius Baer’s own talent – bringing together upskilled banking experts and a growing in-house team of AI specialists, including machine learning engineers and graduate talent from Switzerland's leading universities. This internal expertise is complemented by close collaboration with external partners across academia, research, and the global technology ecosystem, ensuring that new ideas and developments are continuously evaluated in a broader context.

As Koh Min, Innovation Data Scientist, explains: “Our work now is about long term readiness. We are looking at how AI will influence Julius Baer’s service model and processes globally and what we need to build today so that we can adapt quickly when new directions emerge.”

Looking ahead: Turning AI into everyday capability

Julius Baer is now focused on equipping the organisation for the next decade of technological change. The emphasis is on how future AI systems can support advisory preparation, enhance decision-making, and bring greater clarity to client interactions.

The aim is not to introduce isolated tools, but to build scalable foundations with transparency, regulatory alignment, and adaptability at their core. This improves operational efficiency while ensuring the client experience remains intuitive and grounded in the firm’s values.

Examples already in place include:

• Advisory support: An AI-powered tool provides relationship managers with instant access to investment insights, turning time-consuming searches into actionable guidance – and giving back time to focus on what matters most: high-value client advice.
• Risk and compliance: AI enhances screening workflows, helping teams identify and prioritise issues more effectively, so that human judgement is applied where it matters most.
• Internal productivity: A proprietary generative AI assistant, built and operated on secure on-premise infrastructure, supports day-to-day operations, giving employees faster access to relevant knowledge.

What sets these efforts apart is not the technology itself, but the data behind it. While large language models are increasingly becoming a commodity, Julius Baer’s real competitive advantage lies in more than 135 years of proprietary banking know-how, now made actionable through AI.

A culture of innovation and entrepreneurship

As these capabilities scale globally, the focus is clear: applying AI where it delivers real value, while ensuring it is integrated responsibly and in line with regulatory expectations. In doing so, Julius Baer continues to evolve alongside technology without losing sight of what has always set it apart: the personal, human relationship at the heart of its client service.

What began as experimentation across several teams has grown into a more connected, global capability, bringing together expertise across regions and strengthening how the organisation approaches AI across markets.

“Entrepreneurship and innovation have always been part of our DNA and culture. The approach of trying fast and learning quickly is not new to us and helps us evolve and stay competitive in today’s rapidly changing technology landscape,” says Jonathan Chan, Head Innovation Ventures.