OpenAI Expands BBVA Partnership To Propel AI In Global Banking

In May 2024, Spanish multinational financial services company BBVA (Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, S.A.) partnered with artificial intelligence (AI) leader OpenAI to roll out 3,300 ChatGPT accounts to its employees.

Soon after, BBVA decided to scale up and expand the rollout to 11,000 employees in the company, having witnessed success with its first deployment.

“We deployed initially to 3,000 employees, then very quickly jumped to 11,000 employees,” said Antonio Bravo, Global Head of Data & AI, BBVA, in November.

Now, BBVA is further expanding its partnership with OpenAI, which will see it bring access to OpenAI’s ChatGPT Enterprise to all 120,000 global employees across 25 countries. This includes security and privacy controls, access to OpenAI’s latest models, and tools for creating internal agents.

The expansion marks a 10x increase on BBVA’s current deployment and also makes it one of the largest enterprise deployments of generative AI (GenAI) in the financial services industry.

However, this time, OpenAI will also play an active role in advancing BBVA’s AI strategy, which includes transforming customer experiences, enabling new ways of working, and optimizing internal operations.

The two will also create new AI solutions to enable bankers to better support clients, transform customer interactions, streamline and enhance risk analysis, and redesign internal processes such as software development and employee productivity support, as well as build specialized training programs and a structured adoption model.

The expansion builds on nearly two years of successful AI deployment, which has resulted in benefits such as nearly 3 hours saved per employee per week, with 83% weekly active usage, and efficiency improvements of up to 80% in workflow tests.

It has also seen BBVA create more than 20,000 custom GPTs that are used across the bank—with around 4,000 GPTs used frequently—and the launch of a virtual assistant called Blue using OpenAI models, which helps people manage cards, accounts, and everyday questions using natural language.


“BBVA is a strong example of how a large financial institution can adopt AI with real ambition and speed. With this expansion of our work together, BBVA will embed our AI into the core of their products and operations to enhance the overall banking experience for their customers,” said Sam Altman, CEO, OpenAI.

“We were pioneers in the digital and mobile transformation, and we are now entering the AI era with even greater ambition. Our alliance with OpenAI accelerates the native integration of artificial intelligence across the bank to create a smarter, more proactive, and completely personalized banking experience, anticipating the needs of every client,” said Carlos Torres Vila, Chairman, BBVA.

BBVA also published a video of the signing of the expanded partnership agreement between the two head honchos.


Under two weeks ago, BBVA launched its first conversational app that’s connected to ChatGPT and available in Italy and Germany.

The app will allow users to handle informational queries and gather information about BBVA's products and offerings by asking questions in natural language. This includes information such as account conditions, types of cards, savings products, and more.

It’s not just BBVA.

The outlook remains positive for banks across Europe, with investors expecting shares to grow due to strong earnings and cost savings propelled by AI, which helps by improving operational workflows, enhancing fraud detection, and reducing staff costs.

“European banks could be a real beneficiary of AI,” said Helen Jewell, Chief Investment Officer for Fundamental Equities at BlackRock. “A lot of the AI story has been focused on the revenue winners, but we also know that when it comes to AI, there is a beneficiary from the cost winners.”

Do you think this move will help BBVA improve its overall customer experience? Will it inspire other banking institutions and financial firms to follow suit?

Let us know in the comments below!