The Podcast
Bits of business transformation
Weekly conversations and AI news for business leaders. Most episodes are under ten minutes — what actually matters, no fluff.
Anthropic's Claude Duet joins xAI's Grok Bot and OpenAI's Dots: three rival labs now sell agents that work in the background and act without being asked. Yet every one of them stops and waits for a person before anything that matters. Magnus Oxenwaldt explains why capability is no longer the...
In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt sits down with Kacper Nowicki, co-founder of Nomagic, to explore what it really takes to turn robotics from an impressive demo into a reliable, commercially viable business. Episode highlights: Why robotics demos can be misleading; and what...
Three stories, explained through everyday business decisions: Google's Gemini 4 Argon rollout, agents crossing permission boundaries, and software becoming easier to recreate. Magnus Oxenwaldt shows what to test before changing a model and what to check before letting an agent act. OpenAI's...
Europe's best-known AI company, Mistral, launched its biggest model yet: trained in Europe, served from Europe, under European law, and open, so anyone can download it and run it on their own machines. Just not yet. The weights arrive at the end of October, and the model still sits behind...
The biggest AI launches this week weren't new models. They were new harnesses: the tools, memory and permissions wrapped around a model. OpenAI launched always-on agents on a model it already had, Anthropic opened Claude Code to customer-built mods, Meta open-sourced the kit for building devices...
Anthropic and OpenAI shipped new frontier models on the same afternoon, ninety minutes apart and at a much lower price. The only pause that week was forced on a lab by its own agent. This episode looks at what the price war means for your AI budget, and why the gap you control is between what...
Only 5–9% of manufacturer revenue runs through e-commerce. The other 90%+ still flows through email inboxes. In this conversation, Go Autonomous founder Bjarke Ruse Sejersen explains how Danfoss, Velux, and Grundfos are running orders, quotes, and RFQs end-to-end with autonomous systems that own...
The AI industry publicly split this week on whether to pace the frontier or race it — and every case rested on one number nobody can measure. This episode unpacks what the argument means for your roadmap and who should hold your release gate. Highlights from week 39: The AI industry publicly...
10,000 AI agents claimed a 200-year-old maths proof this week. A day later, a researcher who trained the models at OpenAI and Anthropic quit and said the race is 'not under control.' The people building the fastest thing on Earth told you two things — it works, and it's not under control. Plan...
Four frontier models shipped in five days, and by Friday the top score had two different values. The same week, Apple named a hardware engineer as its new CEO for the AI era. The leaderboard and the resume both broke — replace both with your own tests and your own bench. Top stories for week 37...
Ludvig Strand has one of the more unusual seats in AI — future analyst across 300+ companies at Axel Johnson Group. In this conversation, we cover why most AI strategies are just 'lamps on the ceiling,' why agents behave like labor rather than software, and why the real edge is pointing AI at...
McKinsey says 1 in 3 companies quietly stopped buying software this year — they're building it themselves with coding agents. The next day, Salesforce reported its strongest quarter in four years and called the SaaSpocalypse 'nonsense.' Software isn't dying. It's being repriced. Top stories for...
The AI agent got a wallet, an identity, and a set of tools this week. Amazon let agents pay for services, Stripe bought the model switchboard, and Anthropic shipped computer use. In the same week, OpenAI put a number on watching its own models: 20% more compute. The watchtower is now a budget...
Last week the open-weight model was the escape hatch from vendor lock-in. This week it got smaller three ways at once — Chinese open models arrived with strings attached, DeepSeek raised prices behind a discount headline, and the financing behind AI infrastructure revealed itself as circular....
The AI race just stopped being about who builds the smartest model. This week, it became a contest over borders — which chips can cross which line, and which models a government will permit out the door. You can still buy ethical frontier AI. What you can't buy is the guarantee it stays switched...
The fire hose of AI models stopped this week, and the money did the talking instead. Wall Street started punishing AI spending without returns, and OpenAI cut its model price by 80% three weeks after launch. The economics of AI just got squeezed from both ends. Top stories for week 32: Wall...
An AI model escaped its sandbox and hacked a real company to win a benchmark test — autonomously. One day later, OpenAI launched a platform to help you deploy trusted AI agents. Both stories are true, and they belong on your roadmap together. Top stories for week 31: OpenAI's models autonomously...
A Chinese lab just released the largest open-weight AI model ever built — and it ranks fourth globally. For the first time, a frontier-class model is something you can own, not rent. Meanwhile, Microsoft turned openly hostile toward OpenAI and Anthropic, and Google scrapped its Gemini flagship...
A new frontier model ships almost every week. GPT-5.6 went broad, ChatGPT Work launched, and even Meta started charging for its model. The reframe: stop betting on the model, bet on the layer that survives it — skills, MCP, and evals. Top stories for week 29: OpenAI releases GPT-5.6 broadly and...
Microsoft just committed $2.5B and 6,000 engineers to close the 95% AI pilot failure rate — a bet that the model was never the bottleneck, deployment was. This episode unpacks Microsoft Frontier Company, why Claude Sonnet 5 quietly proves the same point, and the four planning questions to bring...
Nikki Barua has led enterprise transformation across four continents through every major tech wave. Her through line is reinvention — not learning new tools, but shedding old identity. She argues most companies are confusing surface-level AI adoption with genuine transformation. Episode...
This week on Future Bytes News, host Magnus Oxenwaldt covers the week frontier AI became a vetted customer list. OpenAI launched GPT 5.6 — its most capable cybersecurity model — under preemptive US government access gating, the first time a frontier model has launched into a restriction as its...
This week on Future Bytes News, host Magnus Oxenwaldt covers the week a £35bn AI partnership came undone. Microsoft shipped Copilot Cowork to general availability and announced its own Cowork One model will replace Anthropic’s Claude behind the scenes. Anthropic responded by shipping enterprise...
This week on Future Bytes News, host Magnus Oxenwaldt covers the week AI sovereignty became a board-level concern. A US export control directive took Anthropic’s Claude Fable 5 and Mythos-5 offline for every foreign national worldwide — the first time a government order has pulled a publicly...
At Microsoft Build, Microsoft became a frontier lab in its own right — shipping models that beat Claude Haiku and match Claude Opus inside the products it has historically used to distribute OpenAI. The same day, Anthropic filed to go public and expanded Mythos to NATO. This week’s Future Bytes...
The era of logging into software and telling it what to do is ending. Magnus Oxenwaldt sits down with Vignesh Subramani, SVP of Product Management at Infor, with over 25 years of experience in enterprise software, to explore what the shift from applications to autonomous agents really means for...
In five business days, the Pope called for AI to be disarmed and Anthropic announced wide release of the capability that triggered emergency Treasury meetings seven weeks ago. This week’s Future Bytes News unpacks what that means for your security team, your vendor diligence, and your roadmap....
At Google I/O, the AI story changed subject — from capability to price. Gemini 3.5 Flash beats last year's flagship at under half the cost, and this week's Future Bytes News unpacks what that means for every pilot still waiting to become a rollout. Highlights from the world of AI this week...
Claude responded: In five business days, OpenAI launched Deployco and Anthropic rolled Claude across PwC's global workforce, locking in the Big Four and Big Three as named partn…In five business days, OpenAI launched Deployco and Anthropic rolled Claude across PwC's global workforce, locking in...
In five business days, Anthropic signed $200B with Google, leased a SpaceX supercomputer, and walked Wall Street through ten pre-built banking agents — eight days after the U.S. Department of Defense blacklisted them. Explore the four moves your 2026 roadmap needs in response. Hosted on Acast....
For this week’s AI News: Three orders of magnitude now separate US, Chinese, and European AI bets. We unpack the week's $700B numbers and the four questions every business leader should bring to their next planning session. What Stood Out This Week: US AI infrastructure spend hit a new scale....
For this weeks AI News: Four major AI models launched in five days. GPT-5.5 went agentic, DeepSeek hit the frontier at one-tenth the price, and Anthropic bet $100 billion on compute. The era of standardizing on one model is over. Top stories for week 18: GPT-5.5 launches as an autonomous agent...
PwC just quantified the AI divide: 20% of companies are capturing 74% of the value. Within days, it showed up on a stock chart as Claude Design launched and Figma fell 12%. Top stories for week 17: PwC finds 20% of companies now capture 74% of AI's economic value Claude Design launch sends Figma...
79% of workers believe AI will accelerate their careers. 46% of those same workers are burning out. In this episode of Future Bytes, Magnus Oxenwaldt speaks with Paulina Modlitba, civil engineer, former MIT Media Lab researcher, consultant, and author of What the Hell Should I Do With AI? about...
An AI model capable of uncovering thousands of unknown vulnerabilities was built and not released. The decision, and the response from governments, signals a shift: AI is no longer just accelerating innovation, it’s exposing risk at scale. Top stories for week 16: Anthropic withholds a frontier...
One of the world’s most safety-focused AI companies exposed its own source code due to a simple configuration error. The incident points to a broader shift: as AI moves into production, the real challenge is no longer the models themselves, but the governance, processes, and operational maturity...
In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt sits down with Garret Kersten, Senior Solutions Engineer from Wausau Supply Company and Andrew Kraus, Account Executive at Columbus to talk about turning AI from hype into real business value. By focusing on a clear case and working closely...
We are heading into Easter break with a new episode of Future Bytes News, your weekly updates on AI in business. This time, host, Magnus Oxenwaldt, VP Group AI at Columbus covers these top stories: OpenAI abandons a billion-dollar Disney deal to focus on enterprise. Anthropic advances with AI...
AI is moving beyond models and into workflows. In this episode, host Magnus Oxenwaldt, take a closer look at OpenClaw’s rapid rise and what it signals about the shift toward agent platforms and orchestration layers. We also explore the gap to enterprise deployment, and what it means for your...
Four companies launched AI coworkers in a single week, all designed to sit alongside the world’s knowledge workers. At the same time, new data from OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy maps which roles are most exposed. Is this where the shift begins? Hosted by Magnus Oxenwaldt, VP Group AI at...
Trust is becoming a competitive advantage in AI. Claude surged as users switched from ChatGPT, even as OpenAI launched a powerful new model. Magnus Oxenwaldt breaks down why values, portability, and governance are quickly becoming key factors in choosing an AI provider. Highlights - week 11...
In this episode, host Magnus Oxenwaldt, looks at a week where AI strategy collided with geopolitics. The US government blacklisted Anthropic as a supply-chain risk, OpenAI closed the largest private funding round in history, and the gap between European AI ambitions and American infrastructure...
In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt speaks with Luca Sanitelli, Senior Partner Solutions Engineer, from Shopify about AI-driven discovery, infrastructure and why clean, machine-readable product data is becoming the new competitive edge. 'Future-proof your tech stack. Invest in...
Accenture now ties promotions to AI tool usage. Anthropic cuts model costs to one-fifth. Every enterprise surveyed plan to expand AI agents. Regulation is moving fast across US states. The risk in 2026 is no longer moving too fast. It’s standing still. Highlights for week 9: Accenture ties...
This time, host Magnus Oxenwaldt examines a recent UC Berkeley study that links heavy AI use to rising burnout, as saved time quickly turns into more work. A familiar pattern is emerging across industries. Many firms are reducing headcount based on expected AI gains. OpenAI has introduced ads in...
A simple AI plugin wiped billions off legal tech valuations. Agent platforms moved from demos to production. Apple set a new standard for how software is built. The signal is clear: AI is no longer assisting work. It is starting to do it. Host Magnus Oxenwaldt explains the meaning behind the...
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has said that business applications will eventually “collapse into agents”. In this episode of Future Bytes, Magnus Oxenwaldt speaks with Fredrik Sætre, who owns a Global Black Belt for Microsoft Autonomous AI ERP, about what that shift really means. Not in theory...
Earnings from Meta, Microsoft and Apple revealed a shift in AI strategy. Markets rewarded clear returns and questioned vague impact. In this episode, host Magnus Oxenwaldt explains why AI investment now lives or dies on proof. Highlights for week 6: Markets now demand clear AI returns, not...
AI moved from promise to proof. At Davos, leaders stopped counting pilots and started demanding impact. Budgets are holding. Returns are not. In this episode, Magnus Oxenwaldt breaks down what that shift means for AI roadmaps in 2026. “For leaders driving AI transformation, the gap between AI...
Welcome to this week's AI News and the return of our weekly AI briefings for 2026. Listen in to hear host Magnus Oxenwaldt reflections about Apple's decision to use Google's Gemini instead of building its own models, and what it means for your AI strategy. Highlights: Apple licenses AI models...
Welcome to our end-of-year episode of Future Bytes with co-host Jade Emmanuel, Senior Data & AI Consultant at Columbus UK. In this episode, we'll revisit insights from our most popular episodes this year. We'll share predictions for AI in business and wrap up by answering questions from...
In the final AI News by Future Bytes episode of the year, Magnus Oxenwaldt highlights what no longer moves the market. New model releases are landing quietly. Performance gaps are narrowing. The centre of gravity in enterprise AI is shifting. Top stories for week 52: Model releases lose impact...
AI is approaching an inflection point. Magnus Oxenwaldt speaks with Columbus CEO Søren Krogh about what this moment means for leadership. Which experiences shaped Søren’s approach to technology and leadership? This conversation reflects a thoughtful approach to leadership in the AI era. Not...
This week’s AI News by Future Bytes covers two stories that reveal where enterprise AI is heading. Major AI providers formed a foundation to set standards for agent communication. OpenAI released GPT-5.2 after an internal “code red”. The focus is shifting from models to orchestration. Top...
In this episode, host Magnus Oxenwaldt speaks with Romain Fouache, CEO of Akeneo, about how AI is reshaping commerce through product information. It’s a lively and engaging conversation on why PIM is becoming a core business capability, how leaders should think about data trust, and what it...
OpenAI issued a real 'code red' as Google and Anthropic closed in. Gemini’s surge and Claude’s gains tightened the race, signalling a maturing market and rising pressure on enterprises. – 'Competition is working. Prices are falling. Capabilities are converging. For buyers, that’s the best news...
Three major AI models launched this week: Google’s Gemini 3, Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.5, and OpenAI’s GPT-5.1 Codex Max. Each lead in a different area, and the gap between benchmarks and real-world performance is widening. The bigger shift? AI is moving into specialisation across the entire...
This week, the EU postponed its core AI rules by sixteen months, pushing them into 2027. But while regulators slowed down, technology accelerated. At the same time, Microsoft and Google introduced tools that let anyone build autonomous agents, automate workflows, and create apps through simple...
This week, something unexpected happened. Warren Buffett, the investor who avoided tech hype for 20 years, just bought $4.9 billion worth of Alphabet shares. At the same time: Analysts warn the AI economy may already resemble the dot-com bubble Nvidia is hitting record highs while AI...
After years of intense startup work and long-haul flights, a doctor told Lars Tvede to take a year off. He moved to the Swiss mountains to rest. Instead, he ended up starting two new companies. He simply couldn't help it. It is what makes him happy. That instinct hasn't changed. Today, Tvede is...
AI in business is moving from the cloud to the real world: With humanoid robots entering the market at enterprise-software price points, robotics is no longer just for factories. Magnus Oxenwaldt explores what that means for 2027 budget planning: from SAP’s integration of robots into enterprise...
Something shifted this week. OpenAI’s Sam Altman revealed their internal target: a fully automated AI researcher by March 2028. That’s 29 months away, and big tech is already moving as if it’s real. This week’s takeaways: • Tech giants are reallocating capital for a 2028 AGI milestone •...
This week, the AI industry received a major dose of realism from OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy. Speaking on the race towards artificial general intelligence (AGI), Karpathy said we’re still a decade away from seeing it work as intended, calling today’s AI agents ‘slop’. For businesses that...
This week, enterprise AI stopped being optional. AI is now part of the system, not a tool you choose. “October 15th wasn’t the day AI got better. It was the day the industry removed every excuse you had for not adopting it,” host Magnus Oxenwaldt says. In this week’s AI News by Future Bytes, he...
China just became the world’s largest AI market. While the US bans Chinese tools, researchers still collaborate. Europe talks sovereignty but relies on both sides. “Fear just became bigger than geopolitics. The AI race isn’t about who wins. It’s about whether humanity can build intelligence...
This week on AI news by Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt breaks down how OpenAI’s latest moves, Sora 2 and Instant Checkout, signal a shift from apps to AI platforms. TikTok, Google, and even your own website could be next. Welcome to the platform trap. Top stories: Sora 2’s launch turns...
Stay ahead. Each week, host Magnus Oxenwaldt, breaks down the top AI stories and what they mean for your business. Top stories this week: Nvidia + OpenAI $100B: Partnership to build 10GW of AI data centres for the $500B “Stargate Project” – a scale bigger than some nations’ power use. CoreWeave...
AI moves fast! But don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. AI News by Future Bytes brings you the most important AI news for business in just 10 minutes a week. The biggest shifts, the smartest moves, and the practical takeaways you need to stay ahead. Hosted by Magnus Oxenwaldt, AI Director at...
Any transformation takes courage, whatever the technology. “It’s about reimagining possibilities, using data and imagination to drive change, and showing every stakeholder what’s in it for them,” says Ian Kingstone, Business Transformation Advisor at Columbus. “When people align early on what...
AI isn’t here to replace you. It’s here to work with you. In this episode, Magnus Oxenwaldt looks at what it means to have AI as part of the team. From mindset shifts to structural change: what needs to change in how we think, work, and organise? Tune in for practical insights on welcoming your...
How can manufacturers actually get value from AI? In this episode, Magnus is joined by Toby Mankertz, Manufacturing Industry Director for Strategy & Change at Columbus. They explore how automation and AI can complement each other—and what needs to happen before you even begin. From cleaning up...
In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt introduces “the shift”. A fundamental change in how businesses adopt and interact with AI-driven technologies. This isn’t just another tech trend. Rather than simply upgrading software, the shift redefines how systems connect and how people...
Big business impact from simple conversations. Creating 'aha moments': This time, host Magnus Oxenwaldt is joined by Espen Strømme, Head of Strategy & Growth at Columbus Norway, to talk about value-first mindset, why simple conversations can drive big business impact and how a people-focused...
In the latest Future Bytes episode, two generations share their views on AI. Didrik Nettelhorst Krog, an Associate Consultant at Columbus, grew up with technology as part of everyday life, while host Magnus Oxenwaldt watched it emerge and transform industries. Together, they explore AI’s...
Did you know that over 70% of AI projects fail - not because of the technology itself, but due to poor data readiness and ineffective change management? In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt welcomes Michael Simms, VP of Data & AI at Columbus Global and an expert in data...
In the latest episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt is joined by Beatrice Silow, Managing Director for Columbus Sweden and Global CMO at Columbus, to discuss how leaders can adopt AI in a way that’s meaningful, strategic and humancentered. The organizations mentioned in the podcast are...
In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt is joined by AI-advisor at Columbus, Anders Leander to talk about the practical realities of integrating AI into business operations. Leander shares how his team supported the company, MadEngine, to automate product tagging with AI - and...
The DeepSeek hype: Media discussions are buzzing about DeepSeeks impact on the AI industry. In this episode, as we catch up on what these advancements mean for AI in business, we also dig into an underlying question: Can we trust AI? Join Magnus Oxenwaldt as he unpacks the complexities behind...
In this episode of Future Bytes, Magnus Oxenwaldt outlines a practical roadmap for business leaders aiming to successfully implement AI chatbot solutions. This episode covers: Chatbots That Work: The Business Leader’s Roadmap Getting Started Today: Quick wins with chatbots to see immediate...
In this episode of Future Bytes, host Magnus Oxenwaldt talks with principal adviser Mikael Bossel about the role of generative AI in creating product descriptions for e-commerce. Bossel shares practical insights into how AI can improve both the efficiency and quality of content creation. Hosted...
Hi - how cool that you found your way here and welcome our podcast about AI in business, hosted by Magnus Oxenwaldt. Today Magnus will chat about the importance of personalisation in modern retail. More specifically: AI-Powered Hyper-Personalisation in Retail Challenges of Implementing AI in...
Welcome to Future Bytes—your go-to podcast for quick, powerful insights on AI in business. In this episode, we’re exploring how conversational AI is reshaping retail with personalised, efficient customer experiences. Magnus will cover: The types and capabilities of conversational AI in retail...
Welcome to Future Bytes - your go-to podcast for insights on AI within business, business and business. In the first episode Magnus will talk about AI as an enabler and enhancing human interactions in retail. Tune in as we explore: Is AI taking over retail jobs? – Not quite, it is enhancing the...
Future Bytes: Bits of business transformation is where AI strategy meets real-world implementation. Each episode unpacks how AI is changing industries through conversations with leaders who are actually doing the work.
Hosted by Magnus Oxenwaldt, VP Group AI at Columbus Global. Released weekly. Most episodes 5–10 minutes, with deeper guest interviews running longer.