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CEO Series: AI and Supply Chains with Francisco Martin-Rayo Feb 24, 2026

Show notes

The next in our series of discussions with CEO's of companies that are putting AI to work has Fransico Martin-Rayo of Helios discussing the agricultural supply chain with host Eric Hanselman. Helios is leveraging AI to generate insights in the complex dynamics of food production and sourcing at a dramatically finer level of granularity. AI not only enables more complex analysis but also allows customized delivery of the results. Shifting interfaces from legacy dashboards and static reports to queryable constructs lets users explore the analyses in ways that better fit their needs. AI can deliver custom insights at scale in ways that weren't possible with traditional application interfaces.

One of the principal shifts accelerating AI, is the availability of better data. Helios integrates massive weather data sets with market history and global events to generate forecasts. While the volumes of data are growing it's seen significant reductions in the cost per token in their infrastructure. Improving efficiency can expand the depth of analysis, as well as the frequency of forecast updates.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guest: Francisco Martin-Rayo, CEO and Co-Founder of Helios
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

CEO Series Kick Off: AI and Energy Markets with Sean Kelly Feb 17, 2026

Show notes

We're kicking off a new series of discussions with CEO's of companies that are putting AI to work to tackle complex problems. Sean Kelly of Amperon joins host Eric Hanselman to dig into how they're using AI for energy grid forecasting. The combination of weather, changes in generation capacity with renewables, and now increased data center demand is making forecasting a critical requirement for grid stability, as well as energy trading. While this might have been a problem that could be tackled with spreadsheets back in the day, scope and scale of the problem has grown to a size that is outstripping traditional methods. AI-based approaches can scale, but there are challenges with managing the size of the datasets being used and the computational costs that some models demand.

Effective integration of AI into complex problem solving demands not only a deep understanding of the problem space, but also innovation in sourcing data and scaling its applications. The payoff can be much faster results with greater perspective depth. But that requires investment in automation and careful engineering to get there.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guest: Sean Kelly, CEO, Amperon
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

AI Data Feb 10, 2026

Show notes

There are such significant changes going on in how data is managed and in how AI manages data, that it's not always clear which requirements are driving which trends. Jim Curtis returns to look data highlights from AWS re:Invent and to identify important changes that are taking place. FinOps and broader cloud cost management efforts are leading providers to offer tools and programs to corral spending. AWS has introduced database savings plans to provide discounts in much the same way they've done with other services as they look to foster platform commitment. AWS is also expanding its platform capabilities for AI development, with AWS SageMaker integrating additional tools to simplify the creation and deployment of AI solutions.

The intersection of databases, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence is creating more focus on vectorization. It's fueled the evolution of search capabilities, which offers a more semantically rich and efficient way to organize and retrieve data compared to traditional methods. AWS S3 now has vector support, taking the venerable object store into AI-capable territory. AI is revitalizing established technologies and compelling cloud providers to deliver more integrated and tailored services.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guest: James Curtis
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

The NRF Conference Feb 03, 2026

Show notes

The National Retail Federation's annual NRF conference has become a showplace for the latest technology, as well its core retail foundations. Sheryl Kingstone returns to discuss what was on display and how it will impact retail and the larger tech landscape with host Eric Hanselman. While we may be a ways off from having robot dogs retrieving shoes at your local mall store, automation and agentic applications are delivering significant value in customer interactions - $22 billion in the recent 451 Research study. The days of clunky chatbot interfaces seem to be well and truly behind us.

One the greater challenges in scaling agentic applications is maintaining consumer trust as applications and use cases grow. Part of that trust will depend on effectively managing fleets of agents. In order to scale, organizations have to develop an AI agent control plane that can manage memory, maintain context and guide agent actions. Regulatory requirements are in their early stages, but enterprises have to focus on controls that will ensure they can maintain customer trust as matter of basic business operations.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guest: Sheryl Kingstone
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

Agentic AI Use Cases Jan 28, 2026

Show notes

The choice of use cases in AI has a significant impact on achieving on project outcomes. The latest results of the 451 Research Voice of the Enterprise AI use cases study are out and Alex Johnston joins host Eric Hanselman to explore the data and its implications. The study highlights a widespread, yet often unstructured and fragmented, adoption of AI within organizations, indicating a stall in overall maturity despite significant growth in usage. Key challenges include a clogged project pipeline, where many initiatives remain in limited deployment, and difficulties in consistently measuring return on investment (ROI), although most projects are seen as delivering value.

Organizations achieving better outcomes prioritize strong governance, consistent measurement, and "human-in-the-loop" applications, rather than attempting immediate full autonomy. There are major concerns around data quality, rising costs, and a lack of centralized control stemming from the diverse sourcing of AI capabilities and varied user proficiency. Cost concerns are driving organizations towards

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guest: Alex Johnston
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

A Wild Earnings Season Jan 16, 2026

Show notes

We're just out of the recent earnings season and we've seen a wild range of results and some interesting implications. Melissa Otto CFA, head of S&P Global's Visible Alpha research team, returns to discuss what that markets have been saying and what she makes of the data with host Eric Hanselman. Macroeconomic effects are having some impact, as consumer sentiment diverges across the top and the bottom of the economy. In technology, there are mixed feelings about AI as the hunt continues for use cases with decisive revenue returns. The hyperscalers are continuing to invest capital at staggering rates and, so far, the markets have mostly approved. AI supply chain companies, like NVIDIA, are generally moving forward with solid results.

The larger question is where is the AI boom headed. There are constraints not only in supply chains for data centers, but also in energy supply. Agentic AI has a lot of promise, but needs to prove out its value and earn trust, as providers look to improve efficiency with more targeted silicon, like ASICs, to stand up alongside the forests of GPU's being deployed. As investors hunt for improved returns, they may be rotating to international opportunities and small cap companies that might be able to see faster returns from AI deployments.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guest: Melissa Otto, CFA
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

The Agentic Enterprise Jan 13, 2026

Show notes

For the 250th episode, we're looking a bit further forward to explore what enterprises should be thinking about as they look to put agentic capabilities to work. Melissa Incera, Alex Johnston and Sheryl Kingstone return to discuss the challenges and potential with host Eric Hanselman. As AI agents evolve beyond simple chatbots in customer experience and business operations, enterprises have to adapt both their infrastructure and data management capabilities to benefit from agentic potential. Automation is great, but getting to fully autonomous operations requires building more trust than exists today for most. In fact, 451 Research Voice of the Enterprise study results show that those who show a healthy skepticism about agent capabilities are the most successful in achieving their AI project goals.

Agents are making big step forward in establishing continuity in processes by adding memory to AI model interactions. At the same time, concerns about cost are bringing up the need for the same types of visibility and control that's being used with FinOps efforts in cloud. All of this is taking place in an evolving regulatory landscape where the need for a balanced approach between innovation and safety is guiding the best outcomes.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guests: Melissa Incera, Alex Johnston, Sheryl Kingstone
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

AWS re:Invent conference Dec 23, 2025

Show notes

This year's AWS re:Inforce conference was larger and fueled by greater agentic capabilities. Part of the 451 Research team that was at the conference, Henry Baltazar, Scott Crawford, William Fellows and Melanie Posey, join host Eric Hanselman to explore the announcements and progress that's been made in expanding agentic capabilities and much more. As an incumbent infrastructure provider, AWS is looking to the top of the infrastructure stack to secure their advantage. A suite of developer tools, including the Kiro IDE, are looking to make the creation and operation of agents simpler. There was progress in FinOps, with greater cost transparency and support for partner opportunities in helping customers manage their cloud spend.

There was also a more enthusiastic embrace of multicloud environments, with the introduction of AWS Interconnect, a service that provides easy and scalable interconnection with other cloud providers, with Google being the first and Microsoft Azure said to be in the works. 451 Research's Voice of the Enterprise (VotE) data shows dramatic increases in data migration volumes, making interconnection performance more critical. With the holidays in full swing, how many Mariah Carey song title references can you spot in this episode?

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guests: Henry Baltazar, Scott Crawford, William Fellows, Melanie Posey
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

SC25 Supercomputing Conference Dec 16, 2025

Show notes

Supercomputing has shifted from an esoteric and exotic part of technology to much more mainstream, mostly driven by AI. The massive amounts of computational power that once were reserved for the largest of computing problems in high performance computing (HPC), like weather and seismic analysis, are now commonplace in the world of AI. Analyst Gabriella Brown returns to talk about complex computing problems, quantum computing and photonics with host Eric Hanselman. SC25 has grown to over 16,000 attendees and almost 600 exhibitors, enough to sprawl across St. Louis' Americas Center and into its football stadium. As they mature, the next step in enterprise adoption is working out how all of these will work together. AI is tackling many problems, but quantum could address a whole different class of computing questions.

Quantum computing is scaling up and moving closer to becoming a key part of an everyday computing portfolio. Techniques like quantum annealing are finding practical applications today while pure-play quantum approaches are increasing the density and stability of their computing capabilities as they push for quantum advantage, the point at which they're doing things that classical computers can't. New areas like photonic computing were also on display at SC25, as well as all of the supporting infrastructure to power, house and cool HPC installations. As AI clusters head toward gigawatt power dissipation, they require specialized support.

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Credits

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guests: Gabriella (Ellie) Brown
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

Security and Observability Dec 09, 2025

Show notes

The worlds of IT security and operations are being pulled together and AI is a catalyst that's making it happen. The focus on observability that's been part of the DevOps movement, is playing an important role in improving security effectiveness and Scott Crawford, Mark Ehr and Mike Fratto return to look at how this is happening with host Eric Hanselman. Security teams have always wrestled with making effective use of telemetry data from the infrastructure and applications they are securing. Correlating data from just the security tooling is hard enough, let alone adding operational data to the mix. Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) systems came into existence many years ago specifically to address this problem, but they were complex to configure and operate and needed tending to stay accurate. The volumes of data coming from observability initiatives was promising, but new approaches were required and AI and ML have been key to unlocking that value.

Once again, we've hit an opportunity where it's all about the data and getting it to where it can be put to work. The Open Telemetry project simplified data interchange, but the question remained as to where all of this data had to live. It's not practical to get all of the data in one place, but data fabrics and federation can manage access effectively. Better correlation opens the door to many possibilities, including building a single source of truth for IT assets. There's a lot of benefit to bringing security and operations together.

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Credits:

Host/Author: Eric Hanselman
Guests: Scott Crawford, Mark Ehr, Mike Fratto
Producer/Editor: Feranmi Adeoshun
Published With Assistance From: Sophie Carr, Kyra Smith

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