Customers talk AI at Refresh Virtual Summit 2025
To cap the day, Panasonic and Marathon Health joined Freshworks CCMO Mika Yamamoto for a conversation on customer and employee experiences
At Freshworks' recent Refresh Virtual Summit, two customer leaders shared how they're using AI not just to automate tasks, but to fundamentally transform experiences for their customers and employees. The key? Keeping humans at the center while letting AI handle what it does best: freeing up people to focus on what only they can do.
The session, "AI and the future of work: Uncomplicating engagement and productivity," featured Mika Yamamoto, Freshworks' chief customer and marketing officer, in conversation with Roger Crown, VP of Technology Operations at Marathon Health, and Michelle Esgar, director of Marketing & Experience at Panasonic.
At one point, Yamamoto asked each panelist to reflect on the way AI is impacting customer and employee experiences within their organizations:
Michelle Esgar, director of Marketing & Experience, Panasonic: "For us, it's about becoming more efficient in areas where AI can support us, so we can put our time and energy into areas where it can't—like that customer who just wants to have a real conversation. We started with AI chatbots, and about 80% of our chats are now agent-free. But here's the thing: About 80% of what customers call us about is actually information that’s already in the manual—it's just not digestible, often buried in size-6 font.
“Having AI digest those manuals and spit back information in a much more intuitive, friendly way opens up huge opportunities. My team's vision for our support site is simple: just one search query. Whatever your question is, you start there. That's what we're working toward—freeing up our humans to focus on elevating experiences and having those meaningful conversations that only people can have."
Roger Crown, VP of Technology Operations, Marathon Health: "We've turned on Freddie AI Copilot for both our technology support team and application support teams, and we're starting to see real productivity increases. I love the fact that you can generate a quick summary of a service ticket—if you're getting an escalated ticket that needs attention, you can quickly digest what's going on without having to read through everything. The resolution capability is game-changing too; generating resolution notes is far quicker than it used to be.
On the user side, we're using the Microsoft Teams interface for more conversational service ticket entry, leveraging our knowledge base to help users self-serve. If we can improve ticket deflection through better self-service, that ultimately improves satisfaction for our end users. The goal isn't just efficiency—it's making sure technology never gets in the way of patient care."
Below is a clip from the session at Refresh Virtual Summit, or watch the full event to catch up on all the sessions.
