Redbox: Generative AI in government
Department for Business and Trade (DBT)
It might surprise you to learn there’s quite a lot of paperwork in the Civil Service(?!)
For fairness, transparency and rigour, the UK government spends a lot of time producing and synthesising vast quantities of information about incredibly specialised subjects. In DBT, this important work can see Civil Servants dealing with everything. This can include the arcane language of international trade agreements, to protecting consumers with regulatory guidance for products and services. Can generative AI help? We think so.
The Ministerial red box has been the primary destination for state papers since they came into government in the mid-19th century. Redbox was initially envisioned as a way to leverage AI to search through thousands of documents, chat with them and summarise them into tailored briefings.
After a hackathon in July 2023, the incubator for Articifical Intelligence (I.AI) spun up a small prototyping team with members from DBT, the No10 Innovation Fellowship and Evidence House. Within two months the prototype was being trialled within three different Private Offices in the Cabinet Office. DBT created a fork of this project and spun it up internally in a trial to discover DBT specific use cases the project could meet.
Redbox @ DBT has recently completed a large trial of 250 users and is soon rolling out to thousands of users across DBT. Redbox @DBTis great at helping Civil Servants extract, summarise and synthesise information on specialised subjects from documents the length of a bookshelf. Can we go further? Absolutely: multi-agent features allowing for parallel information gathering and processing, custom document comparison features and more are all currently in development for Redbox @ DBT users.
Just like ministers, civil servants deal with a wealth of information on a day-to-day basis. We’re now in the process of building the next generation of Redbox @ DBT in hopes it becomes a powerful tool available through open-source code to all departments; built by government, for government.
About the presenters
Alfie Dennen is Digital Senior Product Manager in AI Enablement for the Department for Business and Trade (DBT).
The presenting team includes members of the Goverment Digital and Data profession.
What you could learn in this session
- Showcase of an impactful project or piece of work
- Sharing experiences of when analysts made an impact
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What you could learn in this session
- Showcase of an impactful project or piece of work
- Sharing experiences of when analysts made an impact
Secure your space today!
About AiG Month (1-31 May 2025)
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