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Beyond The Pilot: Enterprise AI in Action
Beyond The Pilot: Enterprise AI in Action
Author: VentureBeat
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AI gets real here. On “Beyond the Pilot,” top business execs share what actually happens after the AI proof of concept — from infrastructure and org design to wins, failures, and ROI. Not theory, but deep dives into how they scaled AI that works.
17 Episodes
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In our inaugural episode, we sit down with Ryan Nystrom, leader of the AI team at Notion, to pull back the curtain on Notion 3.0. Ryan reveals the journey of integrating powerful AI agents into the productivity platform and draws fascinating parallels between the current AI era and the mobile revolution he witnessed at Instagram. He shares exclusive insights into the development challenges, the critical role of tools, context, and curation, and how custom agents are poised to reshape work. Plus, Ryan offers essential advice for any company diving into the AI space.
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Lift-and-shift isn’t enough. MongoDB’s Vinod Bagal breaks down how to modernize your data for AI — and why waiting could cost you your competitive edge.
Host: Sean Michael Kerner
Guest: Vinod Bagal
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AI is accelerating the cyber arms race — and former FBI agents Paul Bingham and Mike Morris say most enterprises aren’t ready. In this VB in Conversation, they break down the real-world threats targeting critical infrastructure, how AI is changing the attack surface, and why smart, layered defense starts with training the next-gen cyber workforce.
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Key Insights and Takeaways from VentureBeat Transform Event: AI and Enterprise Innovation
In this episode, Matt and Sam recount their experiences and insights from the recent VentureBeat Transform event, an annual gathering focused on enterprise AI. They discuss the significant takeaways, including the increasing adoption of AI agents in production, the lack of dominance by any single hyperscaler in the AI model space, the focus on practical AI solutions over super-intelligence hype, and the evolving structure of teams in the AI-driven workplace. Highlights include insights from speakers at major companies like American Express, Google, IBM, and Zoom, as well as discussions on AI safety and the changing management dynamics with AI agents. Tune in to get a comprehensive overview of the current state and future of AI in enterprise settings.
00:00 Introduction and Event Overview
00:51 Key Takeaways from VentureBeat Transform
02:46 AI Deployment in Enterprises
04:37 Insights from Industry Leaders
08:48 Hyperscalers and Model Dominance
12:12 Real-World AI Applications
14:04 Focus on Practical AI Solutions
24:08 The Future of AI Teams
30:37 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Visa’s SVP of Data & AI, Sam Hamilton, joins VentureBeat to break down the hidden costs, trade-offs, and infrastructure realities behind running over 400 AI solutions incorporating 300 AI models at global scale.
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Google Cloud Next: In-Depth Discussion with Chief Evangelist Richard Seroter
Join us for an exclusive interview with Richard Seroter, Chief Evangelist of Google Cloud, as he discusses the latest developments and insights from Google Cloud Next. Dive into conversations about AI advancements, the new agent development kit, and the multi-agent protocol, and how they are reshaping the future of cloud services and enterprise solutions. Learn about the balance between pre-built and custom agents, and Google's commitment to open-source and multi-cloud flexibility. Don't miss out on this insider look at the cutting edge of AI and cloud technology.
00:00 Introduction and Recap of Google Cloud Next
02:17 Interview with Richard Seroter Begins
02:51 Discussing the Developer Keynote and Agent Technology
03:31 The Evolution and Readiness of AI Agents
05:19 Google's Approach to AI and Agent Development
07:20 Comparing Google with Competitors in AI
09:02 Agent Development Kit and Industry Adoption
10:51 The Future of Multi-Agent Systems
16:04 Google's Open Source Strategy and Cloud Integration
21:11 Exploring Google's Interest in Agent Technology
21:45 The Future of Agent Marketplaces
22:27 Google's Role in Payment Processing for Agents
23:17 Community Adoption of Agent Protocols
26:20 Enterprise Applications of Agents
28:43 The Evolution of Agent Space
33:48 The Rise of Personal Agents
36:04 Balancing Innovation Across Google Cloud and Labs
38:00 The Impact of Pre-Built Agents
40:18 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Cisco’s Anurag Dhingra joins VentureBeat’s Matt Marshall to unpack what it means to build a truly AI-ready network. From smart switching to agentic operations, Dhingra explains how enterprises must stay ahead of surging network demands — and why network intelligence is now foundational to scaling AI.
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Exploring Napkin.ai: Revolutionizing Graphic Design with AI Agents
Join Matt Marshall, founder and CEO of VentureBeat, and Sam Witteveen as they interview Pramod Sharma, CEO of Napkin.ai, and co-founder Jerome Scholler, about their innovative AI-powered graphic design tool. Discover how Napkin.ai has rapidly grown to 2 million beta users with its unique ability to transform text into compelling graphics effortlessly. Learn about the sophisticated backend structure involving multiple specialized AI agents and the recently introduced custom styles feature that allows users and companies to define and perfect their graphic outputs. Perfect for anyone interested in the future of AI in graphic design.
00:00 Introduction to Napkin AI
00:24 Interview with Pramod Sharma
00:44 How Napkin AI Works
00:59 The AI Agency Model
01:56 Deep Dive into Napkin AI's Features
04:34 User Experience and Customization
08:00 Future Plans and Innovations
15:11 Technical Insights and Agent Structure
28:09 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Part 1: Inside the Cybersecurity-First AI Model
LLMs are inherently non-deterministic — but more data isn’t always better. As Cisco’s Jeetu Patel explains, Cisco Foundation AI distilled 900 billion tokens down to the most relevant 5 billion to create the industry’s first AI model purpose-built for security.
Part 2: AI Security: Built-in, Always-On
Cisco’s Tom Gillis and Splunk’s Mike Horn reveal how distributed enforcement, self-upgrading firewalls, and AI-powered infrastructure are redefining security architecture and transforming what a SOC can do in the AI era.
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Originally published in September 2024
As orgs race to progress from proof-of concept to full, scalable production in AI, there are many lessons and resets. Key to these are choices made around infrastructure. Intuit’s Credit Karma, with over 100 million users, has been one of AI’s success stories. Vishnu Ram, Credit Karma’s VP of Engineering, spoke with VB about those lessons – and how the learning will continue.
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NFL CISO Tomás Maldonado speaks with VentureBeat about defending Super Bowl LIX from adversarial attacks that potentially include weaponized AI, endpoint attacks, deepfakes, and finely tuned social engineering – and require collaboration with the FBI and Secret Service.
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Originally Released in February 2024
In his role as Global Leader for Tech and Digital Advantage at the Boston Consulting Group, Vlad Lukic has overseen hundreds of AI deployments. Now working with scores of enterprise companies racing to embrace gen AI, he finds that critical considerations are often overlooked, such as readiness of data and pivotal financial factors. Missteps such as deploying AI where it’s not really needed and neglecting the essential task of managing organizational change for seamless AI adoption can also tank the best intentions to capitalize on gen AI. He also has lots of advice on how to do it right.
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Originally published in July 2023
Kamran Ziaee, SVP, Technology Strategy & Global Infrastructure at Verizon sits down with VB Editor-in-Chief Matt Marshall to discuss how data centers now must handle greater and greater demands. While high-performance computing used to be reserved for exceptionally data-intensive applications, like gene sequencing or self-driving cars, every industry is seeing real use cases for adopting HPC. Verizon is an example of a company that says HPC is now table stakes for many applications it runs in its data centers. While Verizon has consolidated down to three data centers from nine, it has also invested in multi-access edge computing (MEC) to ensure rapid response time for customers. We explore his unique approach to an optimized hybrid cloud, where many critical applications stay on-prem and highly elastic applications migrate to the public cloud to enjoy performance gains there. We touch on the Gen AI craze and the proof of concepts the company is running, which also point to a hybrid future.
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Originally published in October 2023
VentureBeat Editor-in-Chief Matt Marshall talks with Mazen Rawashdeh, SVP & CTO of eBay, about how one of the world’s largest online marketplaces is using innovative technologies to power its data centers and reduce its environmental impact while meeting the growing demand for data processing in the age of generative AI. Rawashdeh explores the importance of fungibility between CPUs and GPUs, hybrid cloud, open source, running their data centers on 85% utilization and more.
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Originally Published in July 2023
FedEx handles 100 billion daily transactions, from tracking packages to routing flights. To keep up with this massive data demand, the company has invested in data center performance, especially in high-performance computing. Ken Spangler, EVP of IT and CIO of Global Operations Technology, FedEx, talks with VB Editor-in-Chief Matt Marshall about how the company has adopted the co-location model for the data center, which allows it to leverage the benefits of cloud computing while maintaining control of the technology stack. He also reveals how FedEx is partnering with edge computing providers to deploy “mini data centers” that can reduce latency and enhance security for its customers – and of course AI and automation.
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Originally published in October 2023
VentureBeat Editor-in-Chief Matt Marshall talks with Archana Deskus, EVP & CIO of Paypal, on how the payment giant, with more than 400 million users, is meeting the need for more computation, more power and more storage, particularly during peak periods — all while committing to sustainability and greater efficiency. Deskus dives into bursting capacity, data center consolidation, asset utilization, efficient code and more.
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Originally Released in October 2023
How do companies identify the best uses cases for gen AI — and then navigate the complexity of AI-first products and tools to drive that innovation at scale? VB’s editorial director, Michael Nuñez, speaks with Databricks co-founder Reynold Xin and Vijoy Pandey, SVP at Outshift by Cisco, about the many factors that will determine how organizations succeed, or don’t, during a time of, as Xin says, bottom-up innovation.
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