Historical series Itaú Empresas launches Itaú Emps, a smart and secure bank tailored for entrepreneurs
Developed in co-creation with clients, the new solution has no monthly fee and offers a customized product shelf with the main needs of paying, receiving and credit, with integration with acquiring; entrepreneurs will also have personalized advice through contextualized generative artificial intelligence
São Paulo, July 2025 – Itaú Empresas announces Itaú Emps, a smart and secure bank tailored for small entrepreneurs seeking self-service, a practical and personalized experience, and support in managing their businesses’ finances. Through a lightweight app with no monthly fee, it delivers essential products and services for this audience, including payments and receipts, integration with acquiring, and credit, seamlessly. The use of generative Artificial Intelligence is a key differentiator for Itaú Emps: through it, entrepreneurs have access to contextualized and personalized advice that answers questions, provides business information, and supports management.
Itaú Emps is part of the Itaú Empresas ecosystem—a segment of Itaú Unibanco focused on serving small and medium-sized businesses. Initially focused on single-member businesses with average annual revenues ranging from R$200,000 to R$3 million. The combination of a platform tailored to this audience, a lightweight app, and the use of generative AI enabled the creation of a scalable business model with an appropriate cost-to-serve ratio, which will enable the expansion of Itaú Empresas’ consultative value proposition to a new segment of entrepreneurs.
In an economic climate where a third of the Brazilian adult population is involved in entrepreneurship*, Itaú Emps was created to serve the immense diversity of small businesses and self-employed professionals who require solutions increasingly tailored to their specific needs; a public that combines the characteristics and needs of both individuals and SMEs, which demands a new and specialized approach.
Generative AI is the key enabler of this proposal, offering hyper-personalized conversations within each client’s context, helping them with their daily challenges, questions, and decision-making. It already supports clients in areas such as input and output results, analysis and comparison of sales performance in acquiring, pricing, cash flow, and cost management. In the future, it will also be integrated into transactional journeys, bringing even greater agility to interactions, and present in areas such as credit modeling.
The unprecedented research, “From notebook to innovation: the new paths of the Brazilian entrepreneur,” conducted by Quaest for Itaú Emps**, reveals that, despite very diverse profiles when it comes to finances, Brazilian entrepreneurs have one thing in common: the search for greater independence, time optimization, and the perception that innovation is essential to keeping their business afloat. They seek a bank that adapts to their daily routines and offers support in matters such as cost control and management – most still manage their financial records traditionally, whether in passbooks or spreadsheets. The study, therefore, reveals a clear opportunity: entrepreneurs seek financial solutions that combine technology, advisory support, and security as fundamental pillars.
Itaú Emps has a customized product range, with journeys designed exclusively for this entrepreneur’s needs. For payments and receipts, it offers free unlimited Pix and integration with acquiring, with all the information from Itaú’s “laranjinha” (POS machine), the card reader, in the app—in addition to payment of bills, taxes, utilities (water, electricity, etc.), and all financial products for everyday needs. For credit, it offers the products most used by this type of entrepreneur—including account limits, credit cards, and Pronampe (National Support Program for Micro and Small Enterprises). The product range is complemented by human support when needed, in case of problems, 30 seconds away.
“These business leaders play many roles in their companies’ daily routines, including in areas outside their expertise, and they strive for growth that requires significant efficiency. In this context, solutions that free up their time and support them in decision-making are essential for sustainable growth. Itaú Emps was co-created with these entrepreneurs, who helped us develop a smart, practical, and secure financial solution that connects with their daily lives. It addresses key business demands directly via mobile phones and also offers strategic support for challenges. We continue to learn from them, evolving and adjusting our offerings to their needs,” explains Pedro Prates, director of Itaú Emps.
Security is also an important pillar, especially in a current context of rising fraud and scams targeting small and medium-sized businesses. All the bank’s investments in security technology—which doubled last year alone—are crucial for Itaú Emps, and its clients can count on the institution’s solidity and robustness in a topic that’s important to entrepreneurs.
Clients who fit the profile and are interested in Itaú Emps can request to open an account through the app available in the Apple Store and Play Store, in an experience that takes about three minutes.
Scalability with adequate cost of service expands Itaú Empresas’ addressable audience
Itaú Emps is part of Itaú Empresas’ strategy, which over the past year has repositioned its value proposition with a focus on advisory and planning support for small and medium-sized businesses. The initiative was created in response to the need to scale this service, offering a sustainable and accessible model for millions of small entrepreneurs—such as restaurants, grocery stores, and mechanics—and self-employed professionals such as doctors, lawyers, and freelancers, among others.
Aimed at those who prioritize self-service and intelligent, secure, fee-free banking solutions, Itaú Emps serves an entrepreneurial profile with average annual revenues ranging from R$ 200,000 to R$ 3 million. For now, it is available to companies with a single owner—businesses with multiple partners will be able to open an account by the end of the year. In 2026, individual micro-entrepreneurs (MEIs) will also be able to use the bank.
”We created a scalable model that combines technology and conversational, contextualized generative AI with the unique assets that make Itaú the best bank for SMEs—credit modeling, security, and data. We are building a bank focused on a segment of entrepreneurs who, until now, lacked a specific offering in the market. Through technology and innovation, we will scale our specialized consulting services to a potential audience of millions of entrepreneurs, with an appropriate cost of service and competitive pricing for this profile,” explains Prates.
The new model complements the value propositions of Itaú Empresas and Itaú BBA – together, the three segments enable Itaú to support companies’ growth at every stage. “We do this with the solidity of a century-old institution and the agility of a technology company. With this strategic vision, we ensure that each company receives the most appropriate solution for its profile and situation, being present throughout its lifecycle and acting as a strategic partner in a dynamic and competitive market – through the most comprehensive corporate ecosystem in Brazil,” adds the executive.
Inteligência Itaú (Itaú Intelligence): Generative AI combined with the bank’s deep history of client and market data
Itaú Emps’ generative AI is another solution from Inteligência Itaú, Itaú’s multi-agent artificial intelligence platform focused on clients interactions. It relies on multiple AI agents capable of automatically meeting specific needs based on different profiles, demands, and behaviors. What sets Inteligência Itaú apart from other financial institutions plugged into advanced language models (LLMs) is its access to Itaú Unibanco’s proprietary data set—tens of petabytes gathered over the years—in addition to the conglomerate’s security. This market insight, combined with the client’s own financial data, are the components that make Itaú Emps’ generative AI unique in the corporate clients segment.
“We’re entering a new era of experience, with simpler, more intuitive products. Itaú Emps’ AI agent acts as an advisor to help companies become more efficient. It was customized based on decades of real data from companies of all sizes and sectors, as well as Itaú Unibanco’s extensive knowledge and insight into the market and financial management. By translating all this technical content into clear, accessible conversational interactions, it offers practical guidance, forecasts, and alerts, helping business owners make more informed and strategic decisions with confidence,” explains Carlos Eduardo Mazzei, Itaú Unibanco’s CTO.
Currently, Inteligência Itaú applied to Itaú Emps allows clients to interact in a conversational and personalized experience, providing insight into account inflows and outflows, analysis and comparisons of sales, and support with pricing, flow management, and costs—all based on the client’s financial information. Soon, personalization will be expanded to provide even more integrated and convenient functionality across sections such as statement, cash flow, credit, acquiring, and card. By the end of the year, it will enable integration of journeys within the app and will be able to support SMEs in purchasing products.
Itaú Emps’ generative AI follows the principles of responsible AI, undergoing rigorous testing by multidisciplinary teams and certified professionals to identify risks, mitigate biases and hallucinations, and correct errors. Meticulously designed to meet clients’ needs, the solution is constantly evolving based on client feedback, ensuring contextual and responsible interaction, with the bank’s security, ethics, and privacy protocols.
“We are pioneers in putting Generative AI in the hands of our clients to support them in managing their finances. Our differentiator isn’t just technology, but also our in-depth understanding of each client’s business, understanding their challenges, and offering solutions that truly make sense—with intelligence, scale, and proximity. Itaú’s AI is customized to understand the entrepreneur’s reality and support them in their daily lives—with the bank’s expertise, data, bias testing, and security guardrails, and a tone of voice and relevance tailored to entrepreneurs,” explains Mazzei.
Innovation is a key factor in boosting business, says Quaest research
Between May 14th and June 2nd, Quaest conducted an unprecedented survey commissioned by Itaú Emps, surveying 600 entrepreneurs from across Brazil with annual revenues between R$200,000 and R$3 million. With a margin of error of 4 percentage points and a 95% confidence level, the study “From Notebook to Innovation: The New Paths of the Brazilian Entrepreneur” reveals that innovation is seen as essential for the continuity and relevance of small businesses.
Entrepreneurs already recognize the value of technology in optimizing processes and client’s relationships, and they see innovation as a driver of growth. Still, many face difficulties in applying technological solutions to their daily routines, especially in financial management.
Almost half of those interviewed (49%) have increasing revenue as their main goal, but there is also a strong concern with structuring and expansion (18%), indicating that many businesses are in transition between survival and the desire for consolidation.
“Even with ambitious goals, most people still manage their finances traditionally, using notebooks (16%), simple spreadsheets (23%), or accountant support (23%)—which offers more specific, tax-focused control than a supportive approach to management and growth. The main needs identified in financial management are cost control (17%) and guidance in decision-making (15%). This reveals a significant opportunity—and even demand—for solutions that combine technology and advisory support,” explains Nathália Porto, director of Quaest.
The vast majority—4.7 out of 5—agree that innovation is essential for maintaining relevance and would like more support in overcoming business challenges. In this context, generative AI stands out as a promising advantage, bringing innovation with direct applications in optimizing tasks and saving time, and is already part of the daily routine for 44% of entrepreneurs in Brazil.
A quarter of the entrepreneurs surveyed already use AI for financial decision-making, such as investments, loans, and cash flow optimization, demonstrating an openness to the potential of innovation. “The use of AI in the financial sector is still in its infancy—a reflection of solutions that, until now, are generic and poorly connected to the realities of companies. However, entrepreneurs’ openness to other uses shows that there is enormous potential to be explored. With the right tools, AI can become an ally, helping businesses overcome challenges and achieve their ambitions,” adds Prates.
Today’s Brazilian entrepreneurs seek autonomy and growth, but still face management and structural challenges. “There’s a lot of interest in innovation, and the use of artificial intelligence is already gaining traction—but there’s still a lot of potential to be achieved, especially in areas like management and finance. Confidence in data security is key to expanding this adoption, indicating that the advancement of AI in this context can be beneficial through greater clarity, accessibility, and alignment with the entrepreneur’s real needs—and most importantly, through integration with their journeys,” concludes Nathália.
* Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, in partnership with Anegepe and Sebrae