How Itaú is building generative AI for its entire customer base

Itaú, one of Latin America's largest financial institutions, is building generative AI capabilities that serve both its customers and its employees. The effort centers on two products: ia.i, a conversational interface designed for customer-facing interactions, and IARA, a governance platform intended to manage AI use internally.

The initiative is notable because it operates within Brazil's highly regulated financial sector, where compliance, data privacy, and explainability requirements are stringent. Building a governance layer alongside the user-facing product suggests Itaú is treating regulatory readiness as a core design constraint rather than an afterthought.

The AI First framing indicates that generative AI is being positioned as a strategic priority at the executive level, not a pilot project. Deploying across the entire customer base — rather than limiting rollout to select segments — signals confidence in the underlying models and infrastructure.

For the broader AI industry, Itaú's approach offers a case study in how large enterprises in regulated verticals can operationalize generative AI at scale. The separation of the conversational product from the governance platform mirrors a pattern emerging across enterprise AI deployments, where model capability and compliance tooling are developed as distinct but integrated layers.

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