Could Disease Chemistry Help Treat the Brain With Enabled Therapeutics
Tech Talks Daily
What if the chemistry created by neurological disease could help activate medicine precisely where it is needed? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Sara Isbell, neuroscientist and co-founder of Enabled Therapeutics, about a proposed approach to one of medicine’s most stubborn problems: delivering effective drugs to diseased brain tissue without exposing healthy areas to the same activity. Sara explains how the blood-brain barrier prevents many promising compounds from reaching the brain. When drugs do enter, they may spread across healthy and diseased regions alike, creating a...
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Preparing Unstructured Data for Enterprise AI With CTERA
Tech Talks Daily
Could the real reason enterprise AI projects remain stuck in pilot mode be hidden inside the company’s unstructured data? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I welcome back Oded Nagel, CEO of CTERA. We discuss why enterprise AI success depends on the condition, location, permissions, and business value of the data sitting underneath models and agents. Oded defines AI-ready data as information that is searchable, classified, and permission-aware. Many enterprises have petabytes of files distributed across offices, edge locations, legacy network-attached storage, and cloud platforms. Before...
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Quillbot on How Is AI Changing the Way People Think at Work
Tech Talks Daily
What happens to the value of human judgment when AI makes execution faster, cheaper, and available to almost everyone? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Eric Wang, Vice President of Product and AI at QuillBot. Eric has worked in artificial intelligence since 2006, with previous leadership roles at Turnitin and Chegg. He now works on AI products used by millions of people to develop ideas, improve their writing, conduct research, and create new forms of content. Eric argues that AI’s workplace impact extends far beyond automation. These tools are changing how people develop an...
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Industrializing AI: How Enterprises Turn AI Into Measurable Business Value
Tech Talks Daily
Has enterprise AI finally reached the point where impressive demonstrations are no longer enough? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Bruce McMahon, Chief Product Officer at CallMiner, about what he describes as the industrialization of AI: the move from experimentation and excitement toward repeatable processes, measurable ROI, better customer experiences, and technology that can operate reliably at enterprise scale. Bruce explains why business leaders are increasingly asking a much simpler question about AI: how is this going to create value? Drawing on CallMiner's experience...
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AI Agent Security: Why Identity and Access Control Matter More Than Guardrails
Tech Talks Daily
What happens when an AI agent is compromised, manipulated, or simply does something nobody expected, but already has permission to access your most sensitive systems? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Geoffrey Mattson, CEO of SecureAuth, about why securing enterprise AI requires businesses to think beyond protecting models and start paying much closer attention to identity, authorization, access control, and what AI agents are actually allowed to do. Geoffrey argues that AI agents present a different security challenge from traditional software. Conventional applications can be...
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Is Your Network Holding Back Your AI? Kentik CEO Avi Freedman on AI Infrastructure
Tech Talks Daily
Companies are spending billions on GPUs, data centers, foundation models, and AI infrastructure. But what happens when the network connecting all of it cannot keep up? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I welcome back Avi Freedman, co-founder and CEO of Kentik, five years after our previous conversation. Avi has been operating large-scale networks since the 1990s, including more than a decade at Akamai, and brings a rare combination of founder experience and hands-on knowledge of how the internet actually works. We discuss why network performance is becoming an important factor in...
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What Clarecast Data Reveals About AI and Quiet Restructuring
Tech Talks Daily
Is AI really causing widespread job losses, or are a small number of announcements creating a much larger narrative? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Marvin Pohl, chief data scientist and cofounder of Clarecast, about AI layoffs, quiet restructuring, predictive workforce intelligence, and the responsibility that comes with forecasting company growth. Marvin’s career began in physics and physical chemistry. After completing his PhD in Germany, he worked at Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley before moving into data science at BASF. He describes how his role changed as generative AI...
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Creating a Coordination Layer for AI Agents With Blue Language Labs
Tech Talks Daily
What happens when an AI agent is authorized to make a payment, but nobody can verify the wider agreement behind it? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Zor Gorelov of Blue Language Labs about the infrastructure businesses may need as AI agents move from answering questions to negotiating, approving, purchasing, coordinating, and settling commercial activity. Many current business processes depend on human coordination. People reconcile spreadsheets, chase signatures, confirm deliveries, review exceptions, and resolve disagreements between systems. This work often remains...
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Scaling Embedded Finance Around Customer Value With Zip Co
Tech Talks Daily
What separates an embedded finance partnership that changes customer behavior from an integration nobody would miss? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Rory Herriman, Chief Technology Officer and Chief Operations Officer for Zip’s US business. Rory works across product, technology, operations, and business strategy, giving him a broad view of what happens after the API connection is complete and real customers begin using the service. Rory challenges a common understanding of embedded finance as placing one financial product inside another company’s experience. Customers...
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Building Creator Trust Through Better Payments With Tipalti
Tech Talks Daily
What happens to creator loyalty when somebody delivers the work, attracts an audience, and then waits weeks to be paid? In this episode of Tech Talks Daily, I speak with Rob Israch, President at Tipalti, about the payment infrastructure supporting the creator economy. Platforms may be able to add thousands of creators quickly, but the systems behind onboarding, tax collection, approvals, global payouts, communication, and reconciliation often struggle to keep pace. Rob cites research suggesting 87 percent of creators have experienced late payments. For a creator, payment is a direct test of...
info_outlineWhat happens when one of the world's largest enterprise software companies declares that it is no longer a software company, but an AI company?
At SAP Sapphire, I caught up with James Bates, Head of Customer Advisory at SAP UK & Ireland, to discuss the company’s vision for what it calls the Autonomous Enterprise and why this year's event felt different from any SAP conference before it. From standing-room-only AI sessions to bold declarations from SAP leadership, there was a clear sense that the conversation around AI has moved beyond experimentation and into the world of measurable business outcomes.
In our conversation, James explained why so many organizations remain stuck in what he described as the experimentation phase of AI, despite years of investment and countless pilot projects. We explored why successful AI initiatives begin with business outcomes rather than technology choices and why data, governance, and process context have become the foundations of enterprise AI success.
We also examined some of the standout announcements from Sapphire, including SAP’s AI Agent Hub, the growing role of Joule as a new interface for work, and the company's expanding ecosystem of partnerships with organizations including Anthropic, NVIDIA, Microsoft, Google Cloud, Palantir, and Mistral. James shared why SAP believes the future lies in combining large language models with business context, process knowledge, and trusted enterprise data.
The discussion also touched on real-world examples that demonstrate how AI agents are beginning to transform customer experiences, automate complex workflows, and support employees across finance, supply chain, and customer-facing operations. Rather than replacing people, James sees AI assistants and agents working alongside employees, removing repetitive tasks and helping teams focus on higher-value activities.
We also explored the challenge many business leaders continue to wrestle with: how to balance autonomy with governance. As AI agents become more capable, maintaining visibility, accountability, and control becomes increasingly important. James shared why governance, trusted data, and strong business processes must remain at the center of every AI strategy.
If you've been wondering whether enterprise AI is finally moving beyond the hype cycle and into meaningful business transformation, this conversation offers a fascinating perspective from the heart of SAP's AI strategy and its vision for the future of work. What role do you think AI agents will play inside your organization over the next few years? Share your thoughts.