Tech CEOs Embrace AI Avatars for Earnings Calls: A New Era of Corporate Communication

After Klarna, Zoom's CEO also uses an AI avatar on quarterly call

CEOs are now so immersed in AI, they're sending their avatars to address quarterly earnings calls instead of themselves, at least partially. After the Klarna CEO's AI avatar appeared on an investor call earlier this week, Zoom CEO Eric Yuan followed suit, also using his avatar for initial comments. Yuan deployed his custom avatar via Zoom Clips, the company's asynchronous video creation tool. "I am proud to be among the first CEOs to use an avatar in an earnings call," he -- or rather his avatar -- said. "It is just one example of how Zoom is pushing the boundaries of communication and collaboration. At the same time, we know trust and security are essential. We take AI-generated content seriously and have built in strong safeguards to prevent misuse, protect user identity, and ensure avatars are used responsibly." Yuan has long advocated for using avatars in meetings and has previously said that the company aims to create digital twins of users. He's not alone in this vision; the CEO of AI-powered transcription service Otter is reportedly training his own avatar to share the workload.

Tech CEOs are using AI to replace themselves

Jay Peters is a news editor covering technology, gaming, and more. He joined The Verge in 2019 after nearly two years at Techmeme. Tech company CEOs aren't just making their companies AI-first: this week, they're using AI avatars to replace themselves in earnings calls. Buy now, pay later company Klarna featured the AI version of CEO and co-founder Sebastian Siemiatkowski in an 83-second about its Q1 2025 results, as reported by TechCrunch. The video's description says that his "AI avatar" is presenting the results, and the AI avatar kicks off the video by saying that "it's me, or rather, my AI avatar." Klarna has already been vocal about how it uses AI in its business, with Siemiatkowski telling CNBC this month that the company shrunk its workforce in part as a result of its AI investments. This also isn't even the first time the company has used an AI version of Siemiatkowski to share earnings. Zoom CEO Eric Yuan also deployed an AI version of himself for the company's Q1 2026 earnings call on Wednesday. "Today, I'm using our custom avatars for Zoom Clips with AI Companion to share my part of the earnings report," Yuan's avatar said in a video. "I'm proud to be among the first-ever CEOs to use an avatar in an earnings call." In the top right corner of the video, you can see a message that says "created with Zoom AI Companion." The human Yuan showed up for the live Q&A portion of the call, though. "I truly love my AI-generated avatar," he said while responding to the first question. "I think we are going to continue using that. I can tell you - I like that experience a lot." Perhaps not surprising from the guy who wants "digital twins" to attend meetings on your behalf.

Klarna's CEO Used an AI Clone of Himself to Report Quarterly Earnings. Here's Why.

Was that Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski on the screen or an AI clone? When "buy now, pay later" fintech company Klarna reported its first-quarter financial results this week via video, it placed a realistic AI clone of Siemiatkowski, 43, front and center. The clone started the one-minute, 23-second presentation by admitting it was an "AI avatar, here to share Klarna's Q1 2025 highlights." Related: 'Not Necessarily Super Excited About This': Klarna's CEO Says AI Can Take Over All Jobs, Including His Own According to Klarna's first quarter 2025 results, the company hit 100 million active consumers in the first quarter of 2025, a new record and the fastest growth in two years. Klarna also delivered its fourth profitable quarter in a row, achieving an adjusted operating profit of $3 million. Revenue rose 15% year-over-year to $701 million for Q1, with the U.S. driving 33% of that growth. On the call, Siemiatkowski's likeness voiced that AI was the reason behind the company's growth. Klarna said that 96% of its roughly 3,000 employees use AI daily, resulting in a 152% increase in revenue per employee since the first quarter of 2023. The company is aiming to eventually reach $1 million in revenue per employee with the help of AI, up from $575,000 per worker last year. "AI is helping us work smarter, scale faster, and deliver more value," the AI clone stated. Despite being upfront with the admission that it was an AI clone giving the results, Entrepreneur had a hard time telling the AI apart from Siemiatkowski. Related: Duolingo Put Its Sarcastic Teen Chatbot to Work on Its Earnings Call TechCrunch noted that the clone didn't blink as much as a human would, and its voice didn't sync up perfectly with its lip movements. Siemiatkowski's AI avatar said in the presentation that Klarna is using AI for marketing, product development, customer support, and insights. "100 million consumers, profit, growth, and AI is the engine driving it all," the avatar stated. Klarna leads the U.S. market as the biggest "Pay in 4" loan company and was named Walmart's exclusive installment loan provider in the U.S. in March. However, its net loss for the first three months of 2025 was $99 million, more than double the $47 million it reported at the same time last year. The company first showcased an AI avatar of Siemiatkowski in December to talk about earnings for the third quarter of 2024. The voice of the AI avatar had a different accent, was more robotic, and the voice sync lagged more than the more recent version, but it was able to deliver the results in one minute and 22 seconds. Klarna has worked for years to position itself as an AI-first company, cutting its workforce by 40% since 2022, and asking employees to use AI to fill in the gaps. In February 2024, the company announced a customer service AI that it claimed could do the work of 700 human customer service agents and handle questions in more than 35 languages. Related: There Are New Rules for 'Buy Now, Pay Later' Programs -- Here's What to Know According to Klarna's first-quarter results, AI has had the most profound impact on Klarna's customer service department. AI slashed costs by 40% while maintaining customer satisfaction rates, the company said. However, AI alone is not enough to handle customer requests. Earlier this month, Siemiatkowski reversed an AI-induced hiring freeze to hire human workers again for customer service. He told Bloomberg that it was "so critical" to provide human support for customers if they needed it.

AI to replace CEOs? Tech bosses test the waters with digital twins

With AI becoming more integrated across industries, some tech CEOs are now using digital avatars for earnings calls. Klarna's Sebastian Siemiatkowski and Zoom's Eric Yuan are among the first to trial AI versions of themselves, signalling a shift in how companies may present to the public in future.With AI becoming deeply embedded across industries, some tech leaders are pushing the boundaries -- by letting digital avatars take their place during company earnings calls. Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski and Zoom's Eric Yuan are among the first to experiment with AI versions of themselves for public-facing presentations. At Klarna, an AI-powered avatar of Siemiatkowski handled most of the fintech firm's recent earnings call -- with only subtle giveaways, such as a slightly out-of-sync voice, hinting that it wasn't the real CEO. The fact became apparent when the avatar disclosed its AI identity. Soon after, Zoom's Yuan followed suit. His AI avatar delivered the opening remarks at the company's earnings call using Zoom Clips, its internal video tool. "I am proud to be among the first CEOs to use an avatar in an earnings call," said the digital Yuan. "It is just one example of how Zoom is pushing the boundaries of communication and collaboration. At the same time, we know trust and security are essential... We've built strong safeguards to prevent misuse, protect identity, and ensure avatars are used responsibly." This move comes on the heels of a Harvard Business Review study published last September, which tested GPT-4o's performance in a simulated CEO role. The results: the AI outperformed human participants on most metrics -- yet it was fired sooner. The AI failed during simulated market shocks, akin to the unpredictability of the Covid-19 pandemic. Human participants, mostly business students from top global universities, adopted more conservative strategies, avoided risky inventory, and emphasised flexibility and sustainable growth. GPT-4o, on the other hand, pursued aggressive expansion and quick wins -- a strategy that fell apart when volatility struck. The study concluded: "Despite its impressive performance, AI cannot assume the full responsibility of a CEO in markets that serve humans. Instead, it can significantly improve the strategic planning process and help prevent costly mistakes." In other words, the chaos and unpredictability of real-world markets -- and the need to navigate human relationships -- still make the CEO job uniquely human. At least for now.