Customers Bank is expanding its partnership with OpenAI – such that the bank aims to use artificial intelligence to “reimagine its lending, deposit and payment lifecycles” in commercial banking, the West Reading, Pennsylvania-based lender announced Monday.
Customers began its collaboration with OpenAI in 2023, deploying ChatGPT Enterprise.
After its next round of enhancements, to be developed over the next six to 12 months, the $26 billion-asset bank wants to reduce the time it takes to close a commercial loan – including underwriting, document collection and legal negotiations – to roughly seven days, Customers Bancorp CEO Sam Sidhu told CNBC. That’s down from between 30 and 45 days.
By the same token, it can take more than a day to open accounts for complex commercial clients. That could be cut to less than 20 minutes by using conversational AI and automated document gathering, Sidhu said.
Sidhu teased Customers’ AI ramp-up Friday on the bank’s first-quarter earnings call, when he noted: “The prepared remarks you heard on my behalf today were delivered by my AI clone, not read by me.”
Despite leaning into its OpenAI relationship, Customers emphasized Monday that it wants to “[keep] customer relationships fully human.”
By letting AI handle lending-related tasks such as document collection, credit memoranda preparation, legal documents, and portfolio and collateral monitoring, “bankers can focus on structuring the right deal and servicing their clients,” the bank said in its release Monday.
Still, Sidhu seemed keenly aware of the human trade-off.
“When you have an autonomous agent, you’re essentially creating a digital worker … and they can work around the clock,” Sidhu told CNBC.
AI has written roughly half of Customers’ software code, saving about 28,000 hours of work, Sidhu said. That’s the equivalent of not hiring about 15 full-time employees.
“This is an opportunity for us to potentially slow that hiring … and do more revenue per employee,” he said.
Sidhu sees the OpenAI partnership as an avenue to a “fundamental re-engineering of how Customers Bank operates,” according to Monday’s release.
Three-quarters of the bank’s team uses tools powered by OpenAI, Sidhu said.
“This strategic collaboration with OpenAI gives us the frontier models, engineering expertise and ability to co-create a roadmap toward becoming an AI-native bank,” he said.
But the partnership is more than deploying an off-the-shelf suite, Customers said.
OpenAI’s technical teams are engaging with the bank directly onsite to build custom AI capabilities by tapping Customers’ processes, data and institutional knowledge. That system could then be sold and customized to other banks.
OpenAI’s chief revenue officer, Denise Dresser, said the artificial intelligence company is pleased to help Customers “build a more intelligent operating model that empowers employees, strengthens client service, and sets a new standard for regional banking,” according to a statement.
“By the end of 2026, our bankers will spend more of their time on the work that creates value for clients and our shareholders,” Sidhu said.
