PwC and AWS Join Forces on Enterprise AI Controls System

The race to implement enterprise-grade generative AI has created new challenges for regulated industries, where accuracy and compliance continue to cause concern.

Companies in sectors such as healthcare, financial services and pharmaceuticals face particular pressure to prevent AI systems from generating incorrect or misleading information – a challenge which has led to increased focus on controls and verification systems for AI outputs, particularly in addressing ‘hallucinations’ - instances where AI models generate plausible but false information. The issue has become central to enterprise AI adoption, with organisations seeking ways to implement Gen AI while maintaining regulatory compliance.

Now, professional services firm PwC has announced it has expanded its partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to develop enterprise controls for Gen AI systems, focusing on highly regulated industries including pharmaceuticals and financial services.

The collaboration, announced at AWS re:Invent 2024, centres on Amazon's Bedrock system – a platform that provides foundation models for building Gen AI applications. These models include text generation systems capable of producing human-like writing.

New automated reasoning checks aim to enhance AI accuracy

A key component of the partnership is the integration of new automated reasoning checks within Amazon Bedrock: aimed at preventing factual errors caused by AI hallucinations by implementing logical verification steps.

The verification system uses automated reasoning to validate AI outputs, providing customers with documentation of how conclusions were reached. This feature addresses concerns about AI reliability in regulated industries where accuracy is essential.

Matt Wood, Global Commercial Technology & Innovation Officer at PwC, says: “In a field where breakthroughs are happening at incredible speed, reasoning is one of the most important technical advances to help our joint customers succeed in Gen AI.”

The system will be incorporated into PwC's existing products, including its Maestro Medical Legal Review solution, which analyses healthcare documentation. The controls are designed to ensure AI-generated content adheres to industry regulations and company protocols in areas such as call centre operations.

PwC and AWS expand industry-specific AI applications

The partnership builds on previous collaborations between the firms, including PwC's AI annotation system. This technology extracts data from documents such as contracts and has been used by clients including Amazon for processing entertainment rights agreements. The system can digitise various file types and extract hundreds of business terms and clauses.

Kathrin Renz, Vice President of Industries at AWS, says: “Model selection and security controls are fundamental for unlocking the transformative potential of Gen AI in enterprise applications.”

Recent PwC research from their US 2024 Cloud and AI Business Survey indicates organisations achieving productivity gains through generative AI are more than twice as likely to benefit from industry-specific implementations rather than generic solutions. The partnership aims to address this through targeted applications for regulated sectors.

The collaboration includes access to Amazon's Nova foundation models, designed for enterprise tasks. These models will be available through Amazon Bedrock alongside the automated reasoning capabilities, offering what AWS describes as state-of-the-art intelligence across multiple tasks.

Continental Resources, an energy company, has engaged PwC to develop its AWS generative AI strategy from the start of 2024. Joe Davis, CIO at Continental Resources, says: “PwC offers the experience to build Gen AI solutions tailored to the specific needs of our business, which complements the enterprise-grade solutions in Amazon Bedrock.”

The partnership focuses on developing applications for sectors including financial services, pharmaceuticals and energy, where regulatory compliance and accuracy are essential. PwC, which operates across 149 countries with 370,000 staff, brings sector expertise to complement AWS's technical infrastructure.

WellSense, a healthcare organisation, has selected both firms to accelerate its AI development. Raj Nair, CIO of WellSense, says: “The domain experience from PwC, combined with the wide selection of models and the flexibility and security of AWS, aligns with our strategy and enables us to innovate faster with confidence.”

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