Behind the scenes of innovation: The bold moves igniting the AI revolution

Bjorn Laukli, Head of Technology, Rakuten International

The ongoing fascination with artificial intelligence (AI) is driven by its potential to revolutionize businesses and daily life, yet the most transformative advancements being made today often go unnoticed. These advancements are fueled by the diligent efforts of companies integrating AI solutions at an unprecedented pace and scale. Despite challenges such as data privacy laws and high costs, this foundational work is essential for maximizing AI benefits.

As Head of Technology for Rakuten International, Bjorn Laukli details Rakuten’s commitment to the complex and time-consuming process of standardizing core platforms and enhancing interoperability at a global level. These crucial efforts position the company at the forefront of this transformative AI journey.

The world at large is fascinated by the ongoing buzz surrounding artificial intelligence, and it’s easy to see why. Every day brings a new story about how this transformative technology is set to revolutionize businesses, shake up our economies and reshape the world. Generative AI is, in fact, already embedded into our daily lives. It influences the recommendations for the shows we watch and the news we read, and it plays a crucial role in designing new medicines and medical technologies. These are just a few examples of how AI is both ubiquitous and critical.

Less noticed – but arguably more important – are the myriad ways in which virtually every company and organization the world over is working to better understand, integrate and harness AI, not just technically, but procedurally and administratively as well. Developing and scaling training and education programs and establishing procedural guardrails that ensure data privacy and effective collaboration – these are the monumental and foundational efforts that are now underway at an unprecedented pace and scale. They are precisely the kinds of initiatives that my teams and I are focused on.

AI presents companies, particularly those like Rakuten which operate globally, with a series of challenges. Policies and systems need to satisfy a matrix of regional laws related to data privacy and AI safety. The costs and infrastructure required to manage and transfer massive amounts of data, both globally and within Rakuten’s various businesses, are key considerations. While these challenges preceded the AI era, the emergence of AI has intensified these issues and added urgency to our pursuit of solutions.

Over the past year, my teams and I have worked alongside colleagues in virtually every business and department in the Rakuten Group to ensure that cutting-edge AI tools and training are widely available and accessible and that users can leverage their jaw-dropping potential in safe, sound and secure ways.

We are also working to provide visibility into the AI-related efforts of each business. Our collective success largely depends on our ability to learn from the experiences, advances and failures we encounter as we strive to optimally leverage AI. For instance, every business, and the Rakuten Group as a whole, will benefit from understanding how Rakuten’s messaging app, Viber, is now able to summarize unread messages, or how Kobo’s AI solution helps flag and manage inappropriate content on its website. While teams are understandably laser-focused on ensuring the success and profitability of their individual businesses, establishing and maintaining the administrative infrastructure for visibility, transparency and collaboration is crucial. It’s why we’ve created the AI Management Office within Rakuten International and why other companies are also creating high-level AI centers.

AI has also increased the urgency and opportunity for enhancing core shared services platforms, such as Membership and Global Search. While every business within the Rakuten Group shares certain affinities and faces common challenges, each one is also unique and distinct in critical ways. Consequently, using our core platforms requires maintaining a degree of flexibility that allows us to tweak and tailor our highly standardized solutions to meet specific needs. This kind of flexibility and customization is one of the fundamental advantages that AI offers.

Realizing this advantage, however, requires us to speak a common language and manage our data consistently across all businesses. While not as easy to understand as the output from a chatbot, these “collaboration anchors” will help each business realize economies of scale and efficiency, and in turn, the company as a whole. Rakuten has set an ambitious target known internally as the Triple 20 which aims to strengthen its competitive edge through a 20% enhancement in productivity across operations, marketing, and customer experiences. Though currently challenging, these goals are well within our reach.

The fast pace of modern life has shaped expectations for how quickly massive, global changes take shape and are felt. Given the ongoing media frenzy around AI, it’s understandable that people expect an almost instant AI revolution. The reality is the AI revolution is unfolding in a slower, more deliberate, and considered manner. This is precisely why Rakuten is moving at a rapid speed to both immediately realize benefits from the AI tools and techniques already available and, at the same time, construct a rock-solid foundation upon which we will soon be able to build even faster.