The ICAI lab for fintech research is a collaboration between TU Delft and ING focused on the intersection of AI, data analytics, and software analytics. The financial sector is by itself a very data and software driven environment. With the rise of AI technologies the researchers try to improve the workings of the financial system making it more efficient and effective. 
The researchers work on various challenges related to the banking system. A first venture is about algorithmic recourse where researchers look at what would happen if the bank would give all its clients personal advise on a financial service such as a mortgage and what that action would imply for a bigger group of people. It is expected that such practice will change the average characteristics on which such advice is based changing the risk factors and the impact on the performance of the bank.
Another venture is that researchers work on making the software development of the bank smart. They are developing evolutionary algorithms that help to ease the manner in which software programmes can fix themselves automatically .
And third venture is that they are looking at the product planning with machine learning. They take the data of previous performance into account to predict for new products if there will be delays in the planning and which factors will be most likely to cause these delays. 

The next step for the researchers is for their research to have an impact on ING’s way of working. They work closely together with ING teams to steer their scientific efforts into valuable contributions at ING. Ultimately, the goal is to deploy some of the software and algorithms to make the life of the people at ING more efficient and effective.