3414: Self-Healing Machines and Robotics with Grace Technologies
Release Date: 09/08/2025
3418: Scaling IoT Security with Real Time Visibility at Wireless Logic
Tech Talks Daily
Here’s the thing. Connecting thousands of devices is the easy part. Keeping them resilient and secure as you grow is where the real work lives. In this episode, I sit down with Iain Davidson, Senior Product Manager at Wireless Logic, to unpack what happens when connectivity, security, and operations meet in the real world. Wireless Logic connects a new IoT device every 18 seconds, with more than 18 million active subscriptions across 165 countries and partnerships with over 750 mobile networks. That reach brings hard lessons about where projects stall, where breaches begin, and how to build...
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3417: Inflection AI and the Rise of Contextual Intelligence
Tech Talks Daily
Here's the thing. Most enterprise AI pitches talk about scale and speed. Fewer talk about trust, tone, and culture. In this conversation with Inflection AI's Amit Manjhi and Shruti Prakash, I explore a different path for enterprise AI, one that combines emotional intelligence with analytical horsepower, enabling teams to ask more informed questions of their data and receive answers that are grounded in context. Amit's story sets the pace. He is a three-time founder, a YC alum, and a CS PhD who has solved complex problems across mobile, ad tech, and data. Shruti complements that arc with a...
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3416: DEUNA: From One-Click Checkout to Intelligent Payments Infrastructure
Tech Talks Daily
Here’s the thing. Payments only look simple from the outside. In this Tech Talks Daily episode, I sit down with Roberto “Reks” Kafati, CEO and co-founder of DEUNA, to unpack how a scrappy one-click checkout idea grew into an intelligent payments infrastructure that now touches a large slice of Mexico’s online economy. Reks explains why Latin America’s high decline rates aren’t just an inconvenience but a growth killer, and how DEUNA’s early focus on orchestration and checkout opened the door to something bigger. When a region routinely sees more than four out of ten online...
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3415: Secure GenAI for SAP: Syntax Systems CodeGenie on BTP
Tech Talks Daily
I sat down with Leo de Araujo, Head of Global Business Innovation at Syntax Systems, to unpack a problem every SAP team knows too well. Years of enhancements and quick fixes leave you with custom code that nobody wants to document, a maze of SharePoint folders, and hard questions whenever S/4HANA comes up. What does this program do. What breaks if we change that field. Do we have three versions of the same thing. Leo’s answer is Syntax AI CodeGenie, an agentic AI solution with a built-in chatbot that finally treats documentation and code understanding as a living part of the system, not an...
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3414: Self-Healing Machines and Robotics with Grace Technologies
Tech Talks Daily
Drew Allen, CEO of Grace Technologies, shares real stories from the floor, the ideas shaping safer plants, and why culture matters more than slogans. Drew’s background stretches from a family line linked to Samuel Morse to teenage years in China to global business development at 3M. That range shows up in how he leads. He listens, he moves fast, and he expects teams to work on things that matter. In his world that means saving electricians from shocks and arc flash while helping manufacturers modernize without losing their soul. Grace started with mechanical and analog products, then took...
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3413: Why Medium-Range Forecasts Could Save Millions: Lessons from Planette AI
Tech Talks Daily
I spoke with Kalai Ramea at a timely moment. We recorded this conversation during a heatwave in the UK, which made her work at Planette AI feel very real. Kalai calls herself an all-purpose scientist, with a path that runs through California climate policy, Xerox PARC, and now a startup focused on the forecast window that most people ignore. Not tomorrow’s weather. Not far-off climate scenarios. The space in between. Two weeks to two months out, where decisions get made and money is on the line. Kalai explains Planette AI’s idea of scientific AI in plain words. Instead of learning from...
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3412: PuppyGraph at the IT Press Tour: Graph Power Without the Pain
Tech Talks Daily
During the IT Press Tour, I had the pleasure of speaking with Weimo Liu, CEO and co-founder of PuppyGraph, and hearing firsthand how his team is rethinking graph technology for the enterprise. In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, Weimo joins me to share the story behind PuppyGraph’s “zero ETL” approach, which lets organizations query their existing data as a graph without ever moving or duplicating it. We discuss why graph databases, despite their promise, have struggled with mainstream adoption, often because of complex pipelines and heavy infrastructure requirements. Weimo explains how...
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3411: Why The Browser Is The New Security Perimeter
Tech Talks Daily
When I invited Or Eshed, CEO and co-founder of LayerX Security, onto Tech Talks Daily, I wanted to challenge a blind spot most teams carry into work each day. We talk about phishing, ransomware, and endpoint controls, yet we skip the place where employees actually live online. The browser. That quiet tab bar has become the front door to identities, payments, SaaS, and now AI. Or calls it a different operating system in its own right, and once you hear his examples of how extensions can intercept cookies, mimic logins, or even meddle with AI chats, the penny drops fast. Here’s the thing....
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3410: Smartly CEO Laura Desmond on how AI is Rewriting the Rules of AdTech
Tech Talks Daily
I invited Laura Desmond, CEO of Smartly, to make sense of what feels like the biggest shake-up in marketing since the mobile era. She has led through every cycle I can remember, from the early internet to the rise of social, and she sees AI changing the rules faster than any previous wave. Across our conversation we unpack how AI is rewriting creative work, buying, and measurement, while forcing brands to rebuild trust with clear rules on data, models, and creator rights. Here’s the thing. Attention is shorter, and the thumb moves fast. Most people give an ad about two seconds, and video is...
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How Fugro is Using Tech to Chart the Ocean Floor
Tech Talks Daily
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Drew Allen, CEO of Grace Technologies, shares real stories from the floor, the ideas shaping safer plants, and why culture matters more than slogans. Drew’s background stretches from a family line linked to Samuel Morse to teenage years in China to global business development at 3M. That range shows up in how he leads. He listens, he moves fast, and he expects teams to work on things that matter. In his world that means saving electricians from shocks and arc flash while helping manufacturers modernize without losing their soul.
Grace started with mechanical and analog products, then took the hard road into fully digital systems. The shift took time and patience. Today their platform brings sensors, AI, and cloud tooling into maintenance and safety. The example that stuck with me is a proximity band for electricians. It lights, beeps, and vibrates as a worker approaches live voltage. At TriCity, that band prevented three near misses in a three month pilot.
A fourth incident still ended in a hospital visit and a costly outage because the worker left the band in his car. Another apprentice nearly placed a hand on a live bus bar until the band told him something was wrong. These moments remind you that technology can change a day and a life.
Drew’s take on culture is refreshingly direct. Values are not a poster. They are a filter for who you hire. He looks for customer obsession, ownership, curiosity, and candid communication. Then he pairs that with high expectations and real care. Autonomy comes with accountability. Impact matters. If someone does not want to work on meaningful problems, this is not their place. It sounds firm. It also explains why the company keeps earning top workplace recognition while raising the bar on performance.
We also talked about Maple Studios, the startup incubator Drew launched in Davenport, Iowa. He sees gaps in the industrial ecosystem. Fewer big exits. Slow adoption cycles. Founders stuck inside large companies. Maple gives them tools, space, and hard feedback so they can iterate faster and build things factories will actually deploy. His advice is simple. Ship, learn, and repeat. Do customer reviews early. Expect a thousand small gotchas. Move through them rather than pretending they will not appear.
Looking ahead, Drew expects robotics to accelerate for a very practical reason. Companies cannot find enough people. Dangerous work will be automated. He imagines maintenance tasks shifting toward humanoid robots, with machines designed so robotic agents can service them. He also references GM’s self healing language to point at a coming blend of sensing, prediction, and automated repair.
On AI, he shares Satya Nadella’s challenge. Measure productivity and GDP impact rather than hype. The promise is there. The scoreboard will tell the story.
If you work in industrial tech, this conversation lands close to home. You will hear how to bring digital tools into legacy environments, how to design for safety from the start, and how to keep teams motivated without losing kindness. You will also catch an open invitation.
Drew wants to partner with builders who care about this space. If that is you, reach out to him on LinkedIn or visit graceport.com. And if you are curious about the band that vibrates before a bad day begins, this episode is a good place to start.
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