Visa aims to be at the cutting edge of the next wave of generative AI (GenAI) technology by investing in digital businesses that will use the technology in payments and commerce.
So to achieve that Visa has created a GenAI venture in which up to $100 million would be invested in these kinds of startups. Visa Ventures, the company's corporate investment department established in 2007, is the driving force falling behind the investment fund.
"We are excited to expand our focus to invest in some of the most innovative and disruptive venture-backed startups building across GenAI, commerce and payments," said David Rolf, Head of Visa Ventures.
Visa explained that a new era of GenAI innovation will have an influence on the banking and financial services sector. "While much of generative AI so far has been focused on tasks and content creation, this technology will soon not only reshape how we live and work, but it will also meaningfully change commerce in ways we need to understand," said Jack Forestell, Visa's chief product and strategy executive.
In terms of criteria, Forestell stated that Visa, in particular, is interested in companies who are "applying GenAI to solve real problems in commerce, payments, and fintech."
Visa says that the company has been a "pioneer of artificial intelligence use in payments" since 1993.
For those who are unfamiliar, generative AI is a new subset of AI that is trained on massive amounts of existing data to produce text, graphics, or other information when given textual prompts.