Emirates NBD Puts Half Its Tech Budget Into AI as Critical Flaws Jump to 15,000 a Month

He tied the jump to advanced AI models becoming better at finding flaws in code, and said cybersecurity would see the biggest change of any area. The bank is answering with the same tools, using an advanced OpenAI model to test its own systems for weak points.

The rapid pace of digital transformation in the region has raised exposure to cyberattacks, and the need for operational resilience in the Gulf has become more urgent, according to the report.

Rio-Tinto said banking would change more in the next five years than it had in the last 30. He said generative AI and advanced frontier models open up new room for automation in customer service, internal operations and staff support, and that AI would decide how competition in the sector plays out.

In June, Emirates NBD ranked first for the Middle East and Africa in the Evident AI Banking Index, published by London-based market data company Evident to assess how banks deploy the technology. The survey covered more than 100 companies, including insurers and payment processors, and found that Emirates NBD explicitly links AI to productivity, modernising operations and the UAE's national AI agenda.

Last month the bank became the first in the Middle East and North Africa to deploy OpenAI's GPT models on infrastructure inside the country. The arrangement lets it run large language models at scale while complying with the UAE's data residency, privacy and regulatory rules. It plans to use them across customer service, risk management and financial crime prevention, process automation and staff productivity.

Commercial Bank of Dubai used the Dubai FinTech Summit 2026 to announce a set of technology partnerships. Microsoft will support wider AI adoption, Silent Eight will work on AI-driven compliance and risk management, and Comarch AI Wealth on the bank's digital wealth platform and investment offerings. The bank also teamed up with Zamp on intelligent automation and signed agreements with Harvey, Sirion and Flank to develop its legal infrastructure and governance.

Thomas Cherian, CBD's Chief Technology and Services Officer, said the bank is moving away from traditional AI applications towards agentic AI, systems that make decisions and carry out tasks on their own with minimal human input. He said the shift would speed up service delivery and make banking smarter and safer for customers.

Cherian estimated that AI agents could take on 55% to 60% of operational tasks, with people still signing off on the results. CBD intends to own the agents it builds and the intellectual property in them.

The lenders are moving in step with government targets. In April the UAE government launched a plan to shift 50% of federal government operations, services and tasks to agentic AI systems by 2028. Dubai followed a month later with a two-year plan to speed adoption of the technology across the emirate's private sector.