Payment giant Visa is betting big on artificial intelligence, announcing a new $100 million generative AI ventures fund for companies developing related technologies and applications for commerce and payments.

According to an Oct. 2 announcement, the investment initiative will be led by the company’s investment arm, Visa Ventures, which has invested in and partnered with companies working on innovation in payments and commerce since 2007.

“Visa considers this initiative an extension of the company’s leadership in AI use to drive innovation in payments, create value for partners and clients, and enable and empower global commerce,” the announcement said.

Generative AI is a type of AI technology designed to generate new, original content, data, or media similar to or derived from existing datasets. These tools learn patterns and relationships within the data they are trained on, which allows them to create novel and realistic outputs. Major AI chatbots such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Bard show generative AI capabilities to understand and create human-like writing.

Jack Forestell, Visa’s chief product and strategy officer, noted that generative AI has the potential to impact the world of commerce. He said:

“While much of generative AI so far has been focused on tasks and content creation, this technology will soon not only reshape how we live and work, but it will also meaningfully change commerce in ways we need to understand.”

The history of Visa’s use of AI models spans 30 years, utilizing the technology “to maximize value and security across the ecosystem.” Since 1993, the company said it has deployed AI-based applications for risk and fraud management. For instance, its real-time payment fraud monitoring solution helped prevent an estimated $27 billion in fraud in 2022.

In 2021, the payment giant launched VisaNet +AI, a suite of AI-powered services that aims to address delays and confusion with managing account balances and other issues of daily settlements for financial institutions.

Visa also has a history of being crypto-friendly, forging partnerships with several crypto companies and platforms, including stablecoin issuer Circle, exchange Coinbase, and crypto app Wirex, for digital asset-enabled services.