Klarna, the buy-now-pay-later fintech giant gearing up for its IPO, just took a bold step into the AI spotlight. When the company released its latest quarterly earnings this week, it wasn’t CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski delivering the update — it was his AI clone.
In a YouTube video shared by the company, a digital avatar of Siemiatkowski highlighted Klarna’s performance. For the average viewer, it wasn’t immediately obvious the speaker wasn’t human. The AI version of Siemiatkowski looked sharp in a brown jacket (a nod to a familiar corporate photo), and while the voice and facial movements were convincing, a few subtle clues gave it away — like a lack of natural blinking and slightly off audio sync.
This move wasn’t just for show. Klarna used the moment to emphasize how deeply embedded AI has become in its operations. According to the company, artificial intelligence played a big role in helping it reach 100 million users and achieve a fourth straight profitable quarter. A key part of that growth? Efficiency. Klarna says AI helped streamline its workforce by around 40%, boosting revenue per employee to nearly $1 million.
Siemiatkowski later confirmed to CNBC that Klarna has reduced its headcount from roughly 5,000 to 3,000 employees.
The concept of AI replacing CEOs is still mostly a tech-world joke — for now. Earlier this year, AI startup Artisan even made a viral April Fool’s video showing its CEO being replaced by an AI version. But the idea may not be entirely far-fetched.
After all, many of a CEO’s core responsibilities — strategy-setting, decision-making, and accountability — could, in theory, be handled by an advanced AI trained on massive amounts of company data and business knowledge. In fact, a study published in Harvard Business Review found that AI, modeled with GPT-4o, could outperform human CEOs in many scenarios.
The catch? That same AI CEO was “fired” by a virtual board in the simulation for failing to handle unpredictable crises — like those brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, proponents argue that these are just early days, and future AI executives might be able to adapt better.
For now, Klarna’s digital experiment is a sign of where things are headed: a future where AI isn’t just in the back office — it’s on stage, in a blazer, delivering the numbers.
Klarna has yet to comment further on the AI avatar rollout.
