Checkpoint Edge released by Thomson Reuters with AI-Assisted Research feature

Thomson Reuters announced the release of Checkpoint Edge with CoCounsel with a new AI-Assisted Research capacity. The enhanced solution is designed to help tax professionals get answers to tax research questions using CoCounsel, the professional-grade GenAI assistant from Thomson Reuters.

“The exacting nature of the tax profession means mistakes can have significant consequences, and with the current tax staffing shortages, our customers are hungry for solutions that can bring them time-savings and augment their work,” said Nancy Hawkins, vice president of product management at Thomson Reuters. “We’re excited to be launching Checkpoint Edge with CoCounsel to redefine how professionals perform tax research. With this solution, we are helping our customers gain more capacity, whether for downtime or business growth, which is truly fulfilling. Many professionals that are required to perform tax research are not attorneys themselves, and making the research process easier and faster for them is what this product is all about.”

Checkpoint Edge with CoCounsel allows the use of a question to get a specific response, with citations, without having to search multiple responses to find an answer to a query. This saves time by providing a focused response versus a list of multiple responses that need to be sorted through to find the desired result.

The new AI-Assisted Research skill leverages large language models so tax professionals can pose questions to it in everyday language. In response, the solution provides relevant answers with links to trusted Checkpoint Edge editorial content. Thomson Reuters said that, during the development of Checkpoint Edge with CoCounsel, human experts played a critical role in training the LLMs to respond to customer questions effectively.

Carter Cousineau, vice president of responsible AI and data, said in a previous Accounting Today article that such experts play essential roles in all of the company’s AI efforts, particularly where it concerns evaluating and testing these models. These experts include attorneys, CPAs and chartered accountants, MBAs and even PhDs in a range of fields such as taxation. This is part of the company’s wider human-in-the-loop philosophy, which also includes a centralized team which is tasked with executing the company’s “Responsible AI” and data practices across the entire organization.

Checkpoint Edge, released in 2019, was the AI-bolstered version of its mainstay Checkpoint solution (see previous story). The most recent release with generative AI comes after a customer beta that started in April (see previous story).