Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has transformed 76 per cent of its services using agentic artificial intelligence, with some operational processes now taking up to 95 per cent less time to complete.
The authority said 16 of its 21 services have been converted to agentic AI-powered systems in less than 90 days. The remaining five services are expected to undergo the same transformation within the next two months.
The programme covers key services including electricity and water supply activation, technical notifications and 13 services linked to DEWA’s payment reconciliation framework.
Rather than using AI solely to provide information or assist customers, DEWA is deploying agentic AI to independently execute multi-step tasks and manage operational workflows.
DEWA applies agentic AI to millions of transactions
One of the largest deployments involves DEWA’s payment reconciliation system, which supports 13 services and processes around 13.3 million transactions each year.
The new AI-driven system can process and validate data, identify anomalies, manage exceptions and continuously monitor operations.
According to DEWA, the daily reconciliation cycle has been reduced from around four hours to just 12 minutes, representing a 95 per cent reduction in processing time.
The authority has also redesigned its electricity and water supply activation service, which handles approximately 210,000 transactions annually.
Customer inputs have been reduced from 10 to three, while the number of steps required to complete the process has fallen from nine to three.
As a result, average completion time has dropped from about eight minutes to two minutes, making the process 75 per cent faster.
Technical notifications shift to autonomous processing
DEWA has also introduced an autonomous AI system for handling electricity and water technical notifications.
The system receives incoming requests, classifies and verifies them, and then coordinates the required workflows through to resolution.
DEWA said the process has shifted from relying on 16 coordinators to an autonomous system capable of operating around the clock.
The announcement does not indicate that 16 employees have been replaced. It refers to the previous operational model involving 16 coordinators and does not specify whether their responsibilities have been reassigned or changed.
Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, Managing Director and CEO of DEWA, said the authority was among the first government organisations in the UAE to deploy agentic AI at this scale.
DEWA launched its broader artificial intelligence programme in 2017 and has since developed a roadmap aimed at becoming what it describes as the world’s first “AI-native utility”.
Al Tayer said DEWA will continue expanding the use of agentic AI across its operations in line with Dubai’s broader artificial intelligence strategy.
How agentic AI differs from conventional AI
Agentic AI differs from traditional AI systems that primarily respond to prompts, provide information or assist users with individual tasks.
The technology deployed by DEWA is designed to perform sequences of actions, make decisions within defined workflows and execute operational processes with limited human intervention.
At DEWA, this approach is being applied beyond customer-facing services, with AI integrated into areas such as payment reconciliation, service activation and technical notifications.
Once the remaining five services are converted over the next two months, DEWA expects its agentic AI programme to cover all 21 services in its portfolio.
