In just eight years, Advance Intelligence Group has become a fintech powerhouse valued at $2.6 billion. Co-founder and CEO Jefferson Chen discusses the future of artificial intelligence with Sumiko Tan and says that AI is like “a tsunami coming”.
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00:00Artificial intelligence is meant to be acting like a human as much as possible,
00:04but we're still far away from the AGI, human-level intelligence.
00:08It will take some time.
00:10Jefferson Chan is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Advanced Intelligence Group,
00:16a technology startup providing products and services powered by artificial intelligence.
00:23Its brands include Atomi, a buy-now-pay-later platform
00:27allowing consumers to split their bills into multiple payments.
00:31Born in Fujian, China, the 42-year-old Singaporean was a hedge fund manager before starting at Vance.
00:39I'm Sumikri Tan, executive editor of The Straits Times.
00:43I'm meeting Mr Chan for lunch at Tong Le Private Dining in Oyu Itawa.
00:57Your most consumer-facing product would be Atomi. How did that come about?
01:01So, Atomi means available to me.
01:04In my first year of business planning, we started different fintech business models around the world.
01:11And one of the companies that we started was Klarna.
01:14They were the pioneer for buy-now-pay-later products back in Europe.
01:17And then around 2018, Afterpay took off from Australia in a very similar space.
01:24Fundamentally, it's a platform that connects the merchants with the consumers
01:28and be able to help the consumers improve their affordability of the product
01:32and also help the merchants achieve higher commercial rates on their sales process.
01:36So, we learned about the story about Afterpay and Klarna.
01:41And then around COVID, a lot of retail companies were looking for new solutions
01:47to improve the affordability of their customers.
01:51We launched that in Singapore and then we expanded to Southeast Asia.
01:56What's the biggest challenge or challenges of being in the AI business?
02:00I think it's about speed to learn.
02:04Because this space evolves so fast.
02:06Almost every other few weeks, there's a new breakthrough in the field.
02:12So, we need to really understand what's happening, understand what's the breakthrough and what's the boundary.
02:20What are the limitations of technology?
02:23And be able to articulate and define the ability of adopting this kind of technology
02:30in the financial services industry.
02:32Why did you choose to headquarter Advance in Singapore?
02:35I came here in 2006.
02:37So, I've been living here for the past almost 20 years, 18 years.
02:40So, Singapore feels home to me.
02:42When I started the business, I think the US, China and some other markets
02:45already saw the first wave of innovations in the fintech space.
02:48And AI, I think, was more developed in those markets.
02:51So, I think there was an opportunity for us to take the learnings from some of the other markets
02:58and bring it here to Southeast Asia.
03:00So, Singapore was the right place to be.
03:02And AI, I mean, is the buzzword.
03:04Are there any downsides to AI in our lives?
03:06Definitely.
03:07I mean, AI safety is one of the biggest concerns for people.
03:10And also, if you look at the transformer-based foundation models,
03:14essentially the backbone for ChargerBT,
03:16I think there are limitations.
03:18For example, hallucination.
03:19It means that some information or output generated from the model
03:23may not exactly represent the truth.
03:25What's an average person to do to safeguard against that?
03:29Be open-minded to try some of these applications
03:34so that you know what are the capabilities of this new technology.
03:40This is like tsunami coming.
03:41It's not like you can hide away from it.
03:43You know, Facebook, Google, Apple even now, right?
03:47Everybody is already integrating this technology into the device,
03:51the services, which is consumed by pretty much everybody.
03:54So, inevitably, they'll be exposed to that.
03:57To protect themselves against this potential risk,
04:00I think one is the platforms.
04:02They need to be very, very cognizant of setting up the right framework.
04:07And then the government, including Singapore government,
04:09I think they are spending a huge amount of time
04:11setting up the regulatory framework
04:13to make sure that there's a certain level of protection for the consumers.
04:16And then for the consumers themselves, I think,
04:18in a way, treat AI as the human also.
04:20It's like when you get to know someone new,
04:22that you need to have a certain level of awareness
04:25and be able to tell what to believe in and what not to believe in.
04:29And then gradually, the trust will really get built up.
04:32And there are certain things that you will tell the bots
04:34and certain things you wouldn't.
04:35And your hobby is very interesting.
04:37Could you share a little bit?
04:38Well, I like basketball.
04:40I watch NBA almost every night for 10 minutes.
04:42I play basketball every Sunday.
04:43My profile photo is always associated with some kind of basketball.
04:47Another hobby is that I like creative things, animation.
04:51I spend weekends playing with the AI tools
04:53for creating short videos and animation films.
04:56And that is the future, you think?
04:58I think it is.
05:00I mean, everybody's got a passion or a story
05:04that he or she wants to tell.
05:06And now finally, there are tools available
05:08that make that process of telling the story
05:10much more easily and also interestingly.
05:14Reading a book sometimes is not a thing for everybody.
05:16But a lot of people like watching videos, watching films.
05:19A lot of people, whether they are young or old,
05:20they like watching animations.
05:22And I think that kind of format is very welcoming for most people.
05:26So I think this creates new tools and new possibilities for people.
05:29And the cost of doing so is much less.
05:31It speeds much faster.
05:33If all goes to plan,
05:34what would the next eight years be like?
05:36I'll continue to devote myself to the AI field.
05:38I think we're pretty lucky.
05:40So from the technology cycle perspective,
05:42we are finally re-entering a new wave of upcycle.
05:46The previous one was mobile.
05:48The previous one was the PC for internet.
05:50Finally, I think after mobile, which is AI.
05:53So I think I will continue to devote myself to this field
05:56in different capacities.
05:58Thank you very much for having lunch.
05:59Thank you. Thank you so much.
06:01I didn't do so well when I was in the government as a citizen.
06:04In fact, I didn't get promoted the entire five and a half years as a government scholar.