BASF employees can now get extra help with their daily inquiries thanks to an AI-powered assistant available via Microsoft Teams chat. Global Digital Services (GD) has rolled out chatBASF, a BASF-developed, GPT-like chatbot that can help you with any general-information queries.

How does it work?

An employee types in a request: “I am launching a new product, what details should I keep in mind?” “I am new to supramolecular chemistry, please explain it to me as if I’m a 5-year-old.” “Please check the spelling of my sentence.” “Shorten my text draft.” Within seconds, chatBASF responds and gives the answer.

What makes chatBASF different from the publicly run ChatGPT?

chatBASF runs in a secure BASF technical environment in the Azure Cloud, ready for information sharing – up to strictly confidential. “Additionally, you do not have to go to another app to utilize it. chatBASF is available at your fingertips, right in your Teams chat as if you were messaging any other coworker,” says Tobias Stichter (GDA/EB), Product Manager, Share & Collaborate, Global Digital Services. “Questions can be entered in more than 30 languages.” Public AI solutions, on the other hand, do not meet BASF’s requirements with regards to cyber security, legal, or intellectual property aspects. Its providers could copy and re-use BASF prompts, or company input at any time. chatBASF does not share any input nor output of information. The employee’s chat is only visible to them.

As there are benefits to using chatBASF, there are also limitations in what it can do:

• chatBASF is based on information publicly available on the internet up to September 2021. It has no access to the internet in real time.
• chatBASF has no link or access to BASF-specific data, BASF intellectual property nor personal or employee information. This means it cannot help you with the set-up of meetings, scheduling reminders or sending emails/chat messages to colleagues.
• There can only be one chat session at a time with the BASF chatbot. chatBASF cannot be trained over multiple conversations.

How employees can register for chatBASF

Employees need to register for the use of chatBASF. Upon registration, you will receive an email with instructions on how to upload chatBASF. The registration may take a few days depending on the activation sequence of your legal entity and the amount of interest – we thank you ahead of time for your patience. The link to the registration and further information can be found in the chatBASF SharePoint.

“We had a sense early on that generative AI had a disruptive impact on many things we do,” says Maik Friedel (GDB/XG), Key Digital Capability (KDC) Manager of Generative AI. “To leverage the full potential of AI solutions it is important to combine new technology with existing experience and expertise.” This cannot be done by a team of AI experts alone, according to Jasmin Weimüller (GDB/XI), who leads the Data & AI Academy. “Our aim is that AI solutions are widely accepted and leveraged by BASF colleagues in their daily business,” she says. “The Data & AI Academy offers easy-to-use options for each employee to understand and learn about both, capabilities as well as limitations of AI solutions.”

In addition to a broad adoption rate by BASF employees, it is crucial to identify the most relevant and impactful solutions to achieve a true competitive edge. The Generative AI team is hard at work evaluating more than 200 ideas that colleagues from the operating and service divisions submitted. New use-case ideas are continuously collected in the Ideation Campaign.

Aside from chatBASF, the company also utilizes the BASF Playground, a generative AI application with 500+ users daily. While chatBASF is meant for business use, the Playground is being utilized more informally, for comparing and testing various models with new project ideas, according to Friedel. More exciting generative AI pilots are currently being developed to join the ranks of chatBASF soon.