Heroes

With Barneys closed, Lord & Taylor gone, and Macy’s and Saks Fifth Avenue closing stores, the department store industry is in turmoil. Nordstrom's strategy? Going private. Less than a year in, they say the brand has never felt more focused, and it’s growing again. In this episode of Behind the Business, Fortune’s Phil Wahba goes inside the company's Manhattan flagship store to find out how they did it, and whether the success can last.

Can Nordstrom thrive in the department store crisis? | Behind The Business

Today department stores are under siege. 2 dozen stores are now closing nationwide. Closures are part of their goal to shrink its footprint in the United States. Shoppers have moved online. Many brands have left department stores, and bankruptcies have slammed the luxury world. So in 2025, Nordstrom made a bold move, going private and returning control to the founding family. Customers don't care if you're public or private. They like to go where they like to go. And now Nordstrom is enjoying a renaissance, launching high profile brand collaborations and opening more stores. 125 years in, the department store has never felt more like a startup. Why does anybody need Nordstrom? That is the ultimate question. So what exactly is Nordstrom's playbook, and will it pay off? On West 57th Street in Midtown Manhattan, Nordstrom's flagship rises 7 stories with floor to ceiling glass cutting through the skyline. It's impossible to miss. Hey. This flagship opened in 2019, the same year Barney's filed for bankruptcy, and Henry Bendell shuddered after more than a century. Then came the pandemic. Lord and Taylor gone in 2021. Macy's closing 150 stores, and Saks Fifth Avenue closing more than half of its stores in 2026. The industry has been in turmoil for years. Faced with the broader retail disruption and mounting competitive pressure, Nordstrom made a decisive bet. Go private, take back control. What have you been able to do as a private company that might have been a bit tougher to sell to Wall Street as an idea? I would say customers don't care if you're public or private, and most of them don't know, and they don't even necessarily know what that means, but they like to go where they like to go, and I would say it's noticeably different for Eric and myself in that I think we have more clarity, more focus, and more speed, not having the other agenda of being a public company. We certainly save the time. We don't have to invest our time into. Communicating with the public markets and the time that goes into having a public board, that preparation helps us with improved focus as there's some noise that gets removed. What keeps you up at night about the business? It was all us. I mean, if it wasn't going to work, it was all us. It certainly wasn't a ramped up part of our responsibility and accountability that we took really seriously, and we still do. Nordstrom's started as a single shoe store in 1901. Today it's a multibillion dollar retail empire, and the family running it says they see an opening in the industry's upheaval. Where's the opportunity right now that you see for Nordstrom? I don't think the department store model in and of itself is something that can't work. I think it needs to evolve, and that has a lot to do with the symbiotic nature of how online and stores work together. Less than a year in, the results speak for themselves. Under co-CEOs Pete and Eric Nordstrom, the company is expanding, opening 22 new rack stores in 2025 alone, bringing them to almost 300 locations nationwide. Total sales grew to $15.9 billion in the same year, an all-time high of 7% from the prior year, says the company. There was only really one way to do business. You bought stuff from wholesalers, you brought it into the store, you, you displayed it, people came and they bought it. That was the whole recipe of how this worked in my dad's generation. All that stuff has changed in my lifetime, immensely. And so it requires some agility, and I think it requires some thoughtfulness and some curiosity to keep going. See, this all just got built up because we didn't have all the brands represented. I mean, it took a while to get this all filled in, and sunglass is a great example of people get a chance to get a luxury brand in a way that's something they can afford. It is the gateway to all of this stuff. You have an offering that goes beyond just high luxury. Can you dip your toes further into the true luxury market? The way we think about it is how a modern person dresses. And even the richest person around doesn't wear a head to toe designer outfit. People have different things for different occasions, different need states, and what we want to do is represent the best of what a modern person wants to have. Think about who the customer is, where they're going, what they're doing, and how we can be a top of mind solution for them. So what is your number one challenge? I think it's evolving. Customers define what good service is, not us. You go back to like 80s and 90s, that was all about one on one interactions, high-touch interactions in a store with people. And what's changed is the way technology and as it serves online business, the logistics of all that. It's really shown how speed and convenience can be an incredibly important factor in how people define good service. The department stores, they are evolving and going after experience. Stacy Whitlitz has spent her career tracking the retail industry. She says the rules of the game have fundamentally changed. Just like the restaurants, the beauty services, they also want self-discovery. Now the department stores that are successful are leaning into how do we reel them in and how do we keep them here, and then it's through excitement, experience, and services. Beauty is such an important part of the store, particularly as it creates traffic, and that's where customers can touch everything. They don't have to be behind a counter, and there's so much more kind of open sell here. It allows customers their own sense of discovery, but then you've got all the help too. But the experience doesn't stop at beauty. Nordstrom has woven food and beverage throughout nearly every floor of the New York City flagship, including a shoe bar tucked among the designer footwear. It's giving people just a chance to dwell and hang around, and people like drinking. When we introduced bars, it turns out people like that. That's what brings people in. And if you think about it, if a customer is shopping in a high-end experience, they may be with their partner. Great, so their partner has somewhere to sit, have a drink, have a coffee, go to a restaurant. It's all about creating and curating these experiences where you want to hang out and that create an actual destination more than this one-off experience. Nordstrom has made brand relationships a centerpiece of its comeback, cultivating partnerships that go well beyond the shop floor. You're a brands guy, so let's talk about that for a second. You also have to treat brands well. Has those difficulties a couple of your competitors have faced given you the opportunity to attract new brands that you might not have had before? The relationships are important, and we invest a lot of energy in that. What's most important to brands is that they show up. An environment that reflects their brand, whether it's the aesthetic of what they're going after, the other brands they might be around, the kind of customers we're trying to serve, how we serve them. They want to show up in a way that is value add to their brand. And then obviously there's the business part of it they want to get paid. I mean, that's, you know, who doesn't? They're looking for a trusted multi-brand partner. They're probably not going to sell everyone. Let it be us. How do you feel about generally the fleet? We are where we need to be. We do have a capital plan to keep investing in stores. We want to keep up with them. We want every store to feel like it's a Nordstrom that's representative of our brand. Could they do fewer of their larger full-line stores and have more local stores for fulfillment, which has been one of their strategies? Absolutely. I still think the business in general is overstored. There's room to right size, including for Nordstrom. And then there's Nordstrom Rack, where the same designer brands cost a fraction of the price. It's been a bumpy ride, but now the rack is back. Formula that works best for rack is when we can bring the kinds of brands you'd find in a store like this into that off-price market. So while our average price went a little higher, the value is still there because the percentage off what it is from regular price is fantastic. And then that whole ecosystem works together in a complementary way. We get more new customers coming into the rack channel than anything else we do. It introduces more people to Nordstrom and the brands that we carry, but the challenge is you don't want to flow that stuff too much down to the stores because you're competing with yourself in the full line stores, and also you are not making your vendors exactly thrilled if you're selling your stuff on discount. So there's a lot of challenges with it. That's kind of the hole in the market, filling in somewhere between resale and full line. There's also Bloomingdale's, which is stronger than it has been in a very Long time. How does Nordstrom compare now to Bloomingdale's in grabbing this market share? I think there's room for both of them. Nordstrom has two purposes in the market, and again it is about luxury, but it's also about giving the customer something at price points, whether it's giftables or something that a mid to high-end luxury person can come in and find something for them without spending thousands of dollars, and that is, I think. A space that they're really leaning into with a private label. I'm going to the shoe section. I'm going to the shoe section. I'm getting shoes. Behind the business strategy is something more personal a family name on the door and 125 years of legacy to protect. What does it mean to you for the company to be doing better again? I think we feel a lot of responsibility. It's hard for me to separate our name being on it and being part of the family from the job that we do because it's always been that way. Eric and I have been working together for so long that it doesn't feel complicated or feel different, and frankly, if he decided to leave tomorrow, I think my job would become a lot less enjoyable and a lot more stressful. You know, our dad was very much a values driven person, and one of the values that was high on his list was family and loyalty, and I can hear him saying, Support your brothers, support your brothers. I would hope our ancestors would be proud of what we're doing. I think this is a really crucial time and it was the best decision for them to be able to fix their model, whether it's right sizing or inventory issues or figuring out what the rack is going to be to the American consumer to put all that together. Repackage it and come out stronger 3 to 5 years later. It looks to me, it appears that if they get all these things right and have the right leadership, there's no reason why in several years from now we don't see them go back to the public market. It sounds like the department store of the future you're describing is very much like the department store of the past. It was the destination for everybody and a special place to go, right? In a sense, very much it's like what's old is new because we used to go to the department stores, you would go with your friends, you would go with your parents. It was a huge feeling. You remember those things in your childhood growing up. We're going to the mall, so maybe taking a hint from the past to make it that special connection day with your friends or your family, some of that needs to come back in order for the department stores to succeed.

To close out a year of great conversations with c-suite talent who may very well be the CEOs of tomorrow, Ruth speaks with one of the most interesting CEOs of today, Red Lobster’s Damola Adamolekun. Damola was only 31 when he became CEO of P.F. Chang’s. Five years later, he was tapped to turn around Red Lobster after bankruptcy. He talks to Ruth about his perspective on leadership, how his time working in private equity sharpened his skillset, and how he makes high stakes decisions.

Red Lobster’s CEO says “organizations take on the personality of their leaders” | Next to Lead

Harvey co-founder and CEO Winston Weinberg has a method for leading his legal AI company, now valued at $11 billion after just three and a half years: psychological discipline. On this episode of Term Sheet, Weinberg tells Fortune’s Allie Garfinkle how he tracks his daily to-do list against his goals six months out, what he looks for in new hires, and how he avoids the pitfalls of being trapped by his own ego.

How Winston Weinberg built his $11 billion AI Company | Term Sheet

Google DeepMind founder and CEO Sir Demis Hassabis is a master chess player, a recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and - as of 2024 - a Knight. Today, as a leader within Google’s booming AI team, Hassabis wants to make AI the “engine” driving the entire company.

In this episode of Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors of Industry, Fortune’s Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell sits down with Hassabis at the World Economic Forum in Davos to talk about how he and his companies are using AI to cure cancer, build universal agents, and move the world towards a future of “radical abundance.”

Google’s AI boss made OpenAI issue code red. Now he wants to solve disease. | Titans and Disruptors

Davos 2026 World Economic Forum

Scott Galloway joined Fortune’s Diane Brady at Davos for a frank conversation on how the mood of the World Economic Forum—and the global climate—has shifted since his last visit in 1999, reflecting a move away from optimism and cooperation toward uncertainty around America’s credibility and leadership.

Scott Galloway on America’s Credibility and Global Leadership

So let me bring up our guest tonight to set us all off. Scott Galloway, who has not been here in, I believe, 1999, was the last time he was here, and Scott and I met, um, I believe we were mentoring young people with Dick Fold, who knows the Dick Fold, the former Lehman Brothers, uh, at the stock exchange. With a very confident kid named Encore Jay, who now is a billionaire, and I don't know where Dick Fold is. Do you know where Dick Fold is? I have not seen Dick. OK, so there we've lost track of Dick, but, um, here we are today. What brings you to Davos, sir? Let's start with that. Uh, Larry Finn called me and said, I want you to come, and that's enough. That's all it takes. That's way more than enough. OK, very good. Well, give us your impressions. I know you've been doing some video. Let's start with that. It's been a while, 26 years, yeah, 27 years. So when I was here 27 years ago, I would describe it as, so Bill Clinton gave the speech of the day. That was what everyone was excited about, slightly different speech than the one we heard yesterday, uh. I would say the American brand or as I was an American entrepreneur. I was one of these guys, you know how you can't run into, can't go 10 ft without meeting someone who has an AI startup they're dying to tell you about. I was one of those guys pitching e-commerce startups back in '99. The biggest shift, so is the internet. The brand of America though, I sort of feel like this is a gathering to basically let Americans just boast and Europeans just politely listen. Um, the, Call sign of America back then was kind of consumerism. It's very consumption oriented. It was it was more cooperation, I would say alliances. And now transition 27 years later. My impression is now it's not the internet, it's AI. It's all AI, and the American brand is sort of Chaos, corruption, and. Coercion. Uh, I'm just incredibly fucking embarrassed as an American. Um, there's no getting around it, and. I feel as if, You know, we begin the week with this language around annexing a sovereign nation, an ally, which is Latin for invade. And tariffs And the market crashes, and then by the end of the week, invasion is taken off the table and the tariffs go away. And my question is, if you're running the largest economy in the world, and in 96 hours, you reverse decisions like that. What what does that do other than erode trust? And credibility just around the world and as someone who loves statistics and math. We're under the impression. Two of the four most valuable companies in the world, most valuable companies in '99 were Microsoft, Exxon General Electric, and Walmart. Now it's Saudi Aramco's in there. They're still an energy company, number 3. it is, um, Apple, Nvidia, Saudi Aramco, and Alphabet. So two of the four companies have an operating system. If you have the operating system the world lives on. You can just figure out all sorts of ways to monetize different applications that have to comply with your code. Essentially, America's been the operating system for the world since 1945, kind of our laws, our means of going about business. Has it changed, do you think? I mean, you were complimentary of Carney, for example, and taking a stance. Yeah, so we're 33% of the world's GDP and we were the operating system for 60 or 70%. And somehow we've decided that we can go at it alone with 33%, which just to me is nothing but. A pure self-inflicted injury of diminishing our own power. It's like it's, it's as if Android decided to kick 80% of their handsets off of the Android operating system. So I find the whole thing, and there's also the, I don't know if I'm getting older and more depressed, but it feels that there's just a sense of unease where in '99 we were like, we want more, whereas now it feels like we just hope things don't get worse. There's just a really unsettled feeling here and someone called me and said, what would you have done differently, someone from the European Union? And I said, someone should have got a hold of Mark Carney's speech, realized it was the best speech any of you were giving. And all 27 EU member states should have been sitting behind him. And you should have had a list of to do's. We're going to start selling treasuries as a unified group. We're going to have our own trade zone and just lay out these things sequentially, calmly and carefully. Right now, the EU, I mean, the reality is they're leaderless as a, as a result of pushing back on Trump. Who, who, who on earth represents the EU right now? I mean, raise your hand. Yeah, no, nobody in here. That's all good. It's like, you know, Germany and the 26 dwarves. It's just sort of and also the reality is. The reality is the economy here is just a wet blanket. Um, I was, I was at the Black Rock dinner last night, and one of the gentlemen there pointed out correctly, there was someone there who'd started a company 5 years ago that would be one of the 7 most valuable companies in Europe right now, anthropic. So, it, it's, It's just, um, I find it very, I leave here exceptionally unsettled is, and I, I, you wanna be optimistic, but I find all of this very, um, quite frankly embarrassing as an American and unsettling as someone who thinks about their kids and stability and. And taking for granted how much peace and prosperity we've had the last 80 years. So what advice do you have? I don't know if you caught Elon Musk's speech. What do you say better to be an optimist and wrong than a pessimist and right, which I disagree with, but What advice do you have? I mean, obviously I know you've just for this room full of leaders. I know you talk a lot about AI, and we've talked a lot, you know, the whole Lost Generation Gen Z. There's been a lot of attention on that here at Davos, right? So I'll come back and you feel like a woman too. You mentioned that in your video, so thank you for that. Yeah, I won't say why because it was crude. Um, everyone, everyone, when, whenever a bunch of mammals get together, there's a hierarchy. I don't care if you're sniffing each other's butts or looking at your badge, but I feel like a woman, and that is people look at my eyes and then they look at my chest to see my badge, um. That's why I'm not wearing my badge, I guess, yeah. Yeah. I, I thought that'd be fun. It is on the record. There you go. Sorry, yeah, go ahead. So look, uh. If I were a business leader, I feel like, I feel like the EU is leaderless and pushing back on some of these uh ideas breaking apart, the greatest alliance in history, and I feel like US leaders, US corporations are leaderless. If you go back to the early 30s in Germany. The darkness all started with Hitler creating informal alliances with corporations and basically said, if you support me or stay quiet, I'll get rid of the unionists. And the corporations decided that shareholder value is why we're here, and they made these deals with Hitler. And I feel like the silence, I'm going to list, so the Fortune 500. There are a lot of great Americans, a lot of people who wake up in the morning and say, hello, Mr. President, when they look in the mirror who think they should be leaders, and I'm, I'm on to do list of Fortune 500 leaders who have, who have pushed back on what is an irrational and sometimes weird and cruel policy of the administration. OK, done. So, uh, the problem is if anyone, if anyone goes first, they're punished. So it strikes me that we need a leader, a corporate leader in the United States who calls people on the lowdown and says, unless 50 of us come out at the same time. We can't do it, so I feel like people who consider themselves leaders are showing a striking lack of leadership and aren't familiar with the history in Europe around the role that corporations played in the lead up to an incredibly dark period in Europe. AI, the thing I'm worried about, we were talking about this before. I'm an AI optimist. I think it's going to create more jobs than it destroys. I've never bought into the notion. If you look at every technology in history, short term job destruction, but over the medium and the long term, it creates jobs. I don't see any reason why this would be any different. The V might be deeper this time, but I find a lot of my colleagues, we sound smarter when we catastrophize. So, you know, 90% unemployment. I, I just don't think that's true. And so far we haven't really seen it. There'll be certain pockets that are hurt more than others. I was an investment banking analyst. I imagine that job's going to get, we won't need as many of them. But The thing I'm most worried about is um synthetic relationships, and that is character AI. And uh I'm sort of a hammer. I, my focus is, or my big issue is, uh, young men in America and the West. No cohort has fallen further faster than young men. They're 4 times as likely to be addicted, 3 times as likely, excuse me, 3 times as likely to be addicted, 4 times as likely to kill themselves. If you go into a morgue in the United States and there's 5 people died by suicide, 4 men. Um, 12 times more likely to be incarcerated. 1 in 3 men under the age of 25 are still living at home. 1 in 3 men at the age of 30 are still living at home. Only 1 in 3 men are in a relationship, whereas 2 in 3 women under the age of 30 are in a relationship, you think, well, that's mathematically impossible. It's not because women are dating older because they want more economically and emotionally viable men. Trus, it's true. That's, and on a note of hope in the last, no, I'm just kidding, um, but it's got about a minute, in a minute, and limerick, whatever you want. Well, how do you, what anything else you want to lead this group with? Uh, what gives you hope? What gives you joy, Scott Galloway? How about that? What gives you joy? I hate my life less and less every day. No, but you're, I mean, you like your, you love your job. There's, what gives me joy? Do. OK, good. Oh, OK, you want, you want to end on a cheery note here? No, I do not want. I want to end on a you note. I don't know there's you. Well, first off, in terms of the markets, let's be clear, the, uh, the optimists have won. Right? I said Tesla was vastly overvalued 10 years ago or 8 years ago. Elon started calling me names on the internet, and he won. His stock's up 700%. By the way, the most overvalued company in the world right now, with the exception of Palantir. Um, but the optimists have won the last 10 years. That's the bottom line. So I think it's always healthy to ask what could go right. I always ask myself what could go right because I tend to see the glass is half full, but the most encouraging statistic or piece of data in the world right now is they've begun tracking the amount of time that people spend. Helping people either through volunteer work or financial contributions that they will never meet, right? That number is at an all-time high. So there's more people globally planting trees the shade of which they'll never sit under. So that's a reason to be optimistic. Um-hum. Great. Please join me in thanking Scott Galloway. Thank you.

Brainstorm AI San Francisco 2025

Joseph Gordon-Levitt has suggested that Hollywood may be the canary in the coal mine for the disruption AI is bringing across industries. The entrepreneur behind the Emmy-winning creative collaboration platform HITRECORD has become one of the leading voices calling for fair compensation when human creativity is used to train machine intelligence. As he directs a new AI-focused thriller for Netflix, Gordon-Levitt reflects on how generative technology is reshaping art, authorship, and the meaning of originality.

The Artist and the Algorithm

Thank you for being here. All right, good morning everybody. I know, right? Can you feel the caffeine flowing? Um, so you were giving an interview last month, um, and you said, I love new technology. Are you a tech optimist, tech pessimist, a tech skeptic? Well, I, I do hold quite a lot of optimism for AI. I think it could be so great in so many ways, uh, but I also think there are probably potential pitfalls, and we're running right towards them in many ways. And, and I think that if we let this technology unfold driven purely by business incentives and there's no guard rails that are put there for the public good, we could see some really dark outcomes. That's what we've seen with a lot of tech over the last 20 years. We've seen it with social media, which was so good in so many ways and like it'd be hard for you to find someone who is more positive and optimistic about social media than me. I did this online community for creativity and using social media tech called Hit Record. But obviously we've also seen all these sort of damaging side effects and maybe we could have avoided some of those with some proper guard rails and let's hope we don't make those same mistakes again. Yeah, indeed, so you have been quite out there about these guard rails, this need for policy change. I mean, there's there's a whole litany of things that we can do to solve for this, and hopefully, hopefully we'll talk about it today. Um, you signed a petition for safer super intelligence as we're calling it now. Um, you've been rather well, supportive of one and more critical of another AI bills here in the state of California, um, and you have definitely been critical of the chatbots by Meta and other companies that have merged into, um, shall we say, erotic content. Yes, for kids, for erotic content for eight year olds. Are you in favor of erotic content for 8 year olds? Yeah, exactly, because that is what the chief ethicist of Meta approved. In their AI companions on their platforms, so you know we're in a moment right now where it feels like all of the wins from the White House, from the states, from certainly from the tech companies, everybody's just trying to, well, it's framed in a sort of global competitive way, right? It's it's, it's no one's saying well we're To make more money. It's more just like we have to get there first, but of course all of the concerns that you're, you know, you have are being kind of pushed to the side in that. So what do we need to do? We should talk head on about that key argument that they make like, oh we have to get there first. We have to, I mean, it turns very quickly into this geopolitical thing, correct? We have to beat China. That's right. OK, so what, what do we do about that because clearly, uh. That's where the winds are blowing. So this is a uh. A very powerful stroke of what I would call storytelling. This is what I've, you know, I'm a spent my life working on is storytelling, and there's, you got to unpack the layers of the story when they say we got to beat China. The implicit and actually sometimes explicit comparison there is to the race to nuclear weapons during World War II. Indeed there was this moment in history where the US mounted the Manhattan. And the US was racing against the Nazis to take Einstein's theory and build a bomb within it. Whoever would get there first and push that button was going to win the war and kind of decide whether the world was going to become fascist or liberal, not liberal in today's sense. And that story is told today. As if the same thing is gonna happen, as if there's this thing they, they use terms like super intelligence, you just said they also use a term called AGI. There are no definitions for these terms. You can ask the most informed engineer or policy person in AI, and I have, and they're like, yeah, there's, there's not really a definition for this. Because it's all a story, it's hand waving. It's a sleight of hand. There is not going to be a moment where they push a button and all of a sudden win the war and decide that America is going to dominate instead of China. That's actually not coming. But if you try to say, hey, maybe we need to put some guard rails in place, maybe instead of just accelerating towards your maximum profits, we need to steer and we can still go fast, but let's build stuff that's going to also be good for everybody, not just for profits. The first thing they say is, yeah, but then we'll lose to China. Yeah, but it's, it's sort of a paper thin story that doesn't really make sense. Do you, this is an unfair question, but do you feel that Artificial intelligence as it is. Framed today is more dangerous or less dangerous than nuclear weapons in the in the middle of the century. Oh, obviously the dangers are very different, but yeah, look. I, I've spent the last because you mentioned I'm about to direct a movie about this stuff and so I've spent the last several years talking to all kinds of experts and, uh, you know, engineers and policy people and people who work in the big tech companies and people who work in academia and everyone in between governments. And there's no agreement on this, so I, I don't know. I don't know the answer. There definitely are a lot of people, a lot of experts. There's, there's like a survey that I think half of published AI researchers give it a 1 in 10 chance that like something extremely catastrophic happens with AI along the lines of, you know, nuclear warfare or whatever. I, I don't know. I certainly don't know, but if these experts are giving it a 1 in 10 chance. And it's not just a few of these experts, it's like half of the experts. That sounds pretty bad to me. Like, you know, they make the analogy like if, if, if half the avionics engineers said like I'd give that plane a 1 in 10 chance of crashing, would you get on the plane? No, you probably wouldn't get on the plane. So I don't know. I mean, I, I think those concerns are real. I think there are also a lot of other related but important concerns that might not be. So catastrophic is that, but get really dark and dystopian if you take them down the road a few steps into the future, and those are important to talk about. Sure, sure, sure. I've seen enough sci-fi movies and television shows to know that it can get pretty dark and dystopian. It's a funny thing, right? And speaking of movies, this is, this is one of the things that the folks who don't want any laws will say, your concerns are science fiction. But the real people now, the real ones making this stuff are saying this isn't science fiction, this is really happening. So again, there's all these sort of evasive tactics that I think are thinly veiled attempts to just protect their bottom line. Sure, sure, and I will just say I don't buy that argument either because let's face it, most of what we saw in Minority Report all those years ago. It's kind of real now. I'm right. It's remarkable to me that every with every passing year we managed to knock off one more of those technologies that was seemed so futuristic at the time. All right, so. You know, there have been attempts. One of the other things that you've come out against this, is, um, the, the notion because right now it's just a notion of, of, um, a federal suppression of state's ability to regulate AI um. The White House has made itself, you know, its position clear on that, how it goes about doing that. That's a matter of debate. It's tried to slip in a couple of passages in what, 2 bills? It tried in the big beautiful bill, correct. And then the other one, then it just tried in the what do they call it, the National Defense Authorization Act. Or whatever, like the yearly procedural budget passage for the military, they tried to sneak it in there exactly and so that's not happened, but the latest is that Trump wants to just, as he is want to do, put through an executive order kind of doing that. Now setting aside the legal, you know, support of that. You're not a lawyer and neither am I. What's your take on this because obviously you're against, you know, kind of clearing the path for AI. You want some of those speed bumps, but, uh, here we are finding a Republican White House in tension with Republican states even. Yeah, I was just in Utah. Yes, we have a wonderful brainstorm tech conference there, uh. I was sitting at a dinner with a whole bunch of Republicans and just agreeing left and right about how important it is to make laws that govern this technology and in fact that for many of them it's it's around kids, right? It's supporting a lot of kids that's definitely an alignment on that yeah but it's about kids, but. Also for Republicans who are in favor of things like competition, sometimes you need laws to make sure that there is a fair playing ground for business and competition to flourish, so that there was a lot of talk about that too, and Utah has actually done more than just about any other state to regulate AI and besides right wing and left wing lawmakers, I think the public, yeah, left, right and center, and I've, you know, looked at polls about this. They want regulation on AI. They don't trust these big businesses to do what's in the best interests of normal people. They know that that's, they, they know that these businesses can't do that. And it's not because the businesses are full of bad people, not at all. It's because if you're a business. And everyone here at the Fortune event probably knows this better than I do. Like if you're a business, you have to try to do good business. If you try to prioritize the public good, if you try to take the high road, you're just going to get beat by a competitor who's taking the low road. You can't really prioritize the public good if you're a business. That's why there needs to be an interplay between the private sector and, you know, laws and, and. Every other sector that impacts people's lives have laws. They, you know, whether it's the companies building cars or the companies who have banks or the companies making medicine, whatever, everybody has to follow some laws. Why should, why should the companies building this technology not have to follow any laws? It doesn't really make any sense. Indeed, we even have international laws about the use of nuclear force, so you know, cheers. Um, you posted on your social media recently something that resonated with me quite a lot as the father of two boys. Now my boys are young. I have a 5 year old and a 3 month old, as quite a few. Thank you, as quite a few of you know because he was born in the middle of the last brainstorm that we had. Um, it was about artificial intelligence in toys, um. You have 3 kids. I can already feel the dad energy coming off of off of you on that subject, but tell me a little bit more about that again as a dad, uh, that, uh, the AI is seeping into, I mean, we usually talk about AI in the sense of the LLMs and chatbots and interactions that way, but toys is a whole another ball game. Yeah, well, so. We're not against our kids using technology and, and my kids do use computers quite a bit. Um, I think there's lots of great stuff you can do, um, like shout out to Beast Academy and the Art of problem solving. It's like that's that's the one we found, uh, that teaches math so super well. um, one of my sons is really new at music and makes music with the computer amazingly, uh, and we let them spend a lot of time doing that. But these kinds of tools are different than addictive algorithms that are designed to prey on your human weakness and suck up as much of your time and attention as possible and make sure that you keep coming back. Um, that's the same technique is like a slot machine really. There's reasons why there's laws that don't let kids go into casinos and play slot machines and the psychological technique. Used to get gambling addicts hooked to slot machines are the same exact psychological techniques studied at Stanford and other places in Silicon Valley that make their products addictive. For sure. It doesn't make sense to have kids using these things. It's just it's bad for their brain and then when you get into AI companions. Yeah, yeah, that's, I mean, even deeper when you're a kid. There's, as far as I understand, um, I was talking to the, the psychologist Jonathan Haidt about this and any parent out there, I highly recommend his book, The Anxious Generation. Um, and he was saying there's a, there's quite a bit of scientific evidence that shows that when, when young brains are developing. It's human interactions that really help develop those neural pathways, and an AI toy or whatever chatbot you want will imitate those human interactions, but they don't develop those neural pathways in the same way because it's fake because you're not talking to a human, you're talking to an algorithm that's designed to hook you and keep you and ultimately serve you ads. It's very different than speaking to another person. And you know whether we're talking neurologically, you should use your common sense as a parent and you're trying to raise a kid who's going to be a strong and compassionate and smart feeling person. To me it's pretty obvious that you're going down a very bad path if you're subjecting them to this synthetic. intimacy that these companies are selling. Who knew that the 90s chat rooms would be the, the good thing, you know, because it was other humans, you know, think of that, think of that. Um, anyway, um, alright, let's, let's change gears a little bit and talk about you as a creator, OK, um, because I mean you just said, you know, one of your kids plays music. I do too. There are AI music tools. How do you feel about that? So, um. You know, you have definitely strong opinions working in Hollywood in terms of the impact of AI on creativity. Um, have you The dangers are clear. Do you feel, do you find any hope in what you can use as a person who Acts, produces, writes, you know, any, any creative goodness in all that. Well sure, the idea that, you know, uh, like I used to make so many videos when I was a little kid, and the idea that, you know, a couple of 10 year olds or something could use these tools to make a movie and have it look as good as, you know, the Hollywood big shots can make their movies look bad. Great, that's unequivocally great. My only concern is where's the economics because right now the way the companies are positioning it is they've built their models out of stolen content and data, didn't ask permission. They aren't offering compensation or they are kind of offering compensation, uh, here and there, but mostly they're claiming, no, this is fair use, we don't have to offer compensation, which sort of turns them into hypocrites, the fact that. They they've paid a few companies or maybe I guess they're just covering their bets or maybe it shows that they don't actually have a moral stance here, they're just trying to make money, um, but they've built their models out of stolen stuff. And their claim is that OK, whenever these tools are used 100% of the economic upside should go to the tech companies and 0% of the economic upside should go to all the people whose writing and voices and art and creativity and labor and time and skill and perspective went into making these products valuable. These products would have zero value, would be able to do zero things without all of that human input. So why shouldn't some of those humans get paid? I think it's actually a principle that applies far beyond entertainment. This is something that if we're going to have a functioning economy moving into the future as this tech gets more and more common. We need to establish the principle that if someone does some good work, has a good idea, makes that idea happen, puts it out into the world, they're allowed to gain economic value from it. But if an AI company is allowed to just take it for free and monetize it without paying that person, how is capitalism going to work anymore? Right, right. So I, I, I see it going down a pretty dystopian road unless we can establish. this principle that your digital self, your thoughts, your ideas, your work belongs to you and any economic upside from that should be shared with you totally, totally. I, I wanna come to the audience for one question before we wrap, uh, but I, I wanna ask you a very simple one before that which is just, um, if some of these things were worked out, you as a, I will just call you a Hollywood creative to take all the roles and wrap them into one. Um, would you in fact use AI tools for your work? I'm not against the technology. Yeah, if, if it were set up ethically and people were getting fairly compensated and we had all the proper upgrades to our systems to make this work fairly, absolutely, yeah, this could propel a great. Leap forward in our creativity, but I think if we, if we leave it as it is, it will only just serve to concentrate power in the hands of a few enormous companies, and that's not really good for anybody. Understood. All right, one question, please. Yes, right over here. Forgive me, the lights are very bright. Your name and who you're with, please. Yes, OK. 00, that's on. Hi, my name is Steven Messer from Collective I. Thank you for being here. Um, uh, you're obviously a great storyteller, and we've appreciated listening this morning. The hard part is it's the whole room full of AI people, and the story falls apart pretty quickly about how this won't hurt our race for winning. For anyone who watched the destruction of facial recognition, which was a key US industry where we dominated. Where a lot of the other countries were years behind us, privacy advocates stood up and told all the horrible things that could go wrong, that destroyed the ability to get funding. We watched that industry in 6 months go to China. Thankfully, we now have China who's doing the greatest things with facial recognition because the US has no companies left that's there. How is it possible to make the argument that there's no risk at all for the frontier models. Um, when we actually have a live real example. That destroyed an entire key critical industry that is now to potential adversary. Yeah, sure, and, and I'm not saying that we shouldn't protect intellectual property, quite the opposite. And, and I'm not saying that it's OK if China steals somebody's tech like that. stolen. All the different states created so many regulations that nobody was able to get funding and the industry was lost because of that. The slowing it down was enough to make a country that was so far behind us in 6 months the dominant player. That, that is a really good point then, and, and thank you for that context. Look, I would say this stuff isn't simple and we, when we get up on a stage, you have to speak for 20 minutes and you have to speak in pretty broad terms. I think that if we're talking about the basic principle that there should be laws as opposed to no laws, I think that. Logic holds. I think for sure it gets more complicated once you get into the art and craft of good regulation and less than good regulation, and I'm not a lawmaker and I'm not going to lecture us on like what makes effective regulation. I certainly wouldn't say that 100% of laws are good. Uh, and I probably would imagine that any even good piece of regulation probably has drawbacks that you could point to, and anti-regulation arguments often cherry pick those drawbacks and say, therefore we shouldn't have any regulation. I'm saying we have to find a good middle ground. Probably we need some regulation and for sure, to your point, we have to do it in a smart way. Thank you for your question, Joe, thank you for joining us. Yeah, thank you very much. Thank you.

Brainstorm Design 2025

Companies everywhere are racing to turbocharge their products and services with AI. How can we harness the power of this new technology in a way that enhances our humanity rather than eclipses it?  Mauro Porcini argues that the next era of brand leadership depends on a straightforward equation: AI multiplied by emotional intelligence and human warmth. AI × (EI + HI). He explains how design can be used to restore narrative and meaning to products built on advanced computation, how leaders can craft a voice that stands out in an age of automated sameness, and why even the most technologically driven companies must double down on humanity.

Amplifying Humanity: Design and Brand Vision in the Age of AI

Fortune Innovation Forum 2025

The defining quandary for today’s Fortune 500 CEOs: how do you lead a global business in an anti-global age? In an era of rising protectionism, fractured supply chains, and deepening geopolitical rivalries, the old CEO playbook–emphasizing scale, efficiency, and integration—is being rewritten. The new imperatives: resilience, localization, and national interest. How can CEOs lead organizations with operations in multiple markets when the world is turning inward? And should they even try?

Competing in a 'Post-Global' World

Fortune Global Forum 2025

Hosted by H.E. Fahd bin Abdulmohsan Al-Rasheed, Anastasia Nyrkovskaya, & Diane Brady.

Fortune Global Forum 2025: Opening Ceremony and Welcome

That I. Ma. What if I yeah. I did yeah. Mo. I still fuck. I. Yeah I. I. God bless you. What. Oh. More. one more time. Fortune guests, please now welcome to the stage. Fortune Chief Executive Officer Anastasia Nukovskaya. Anastasia Norkovskaya. Good morning. It's an immense pleasure to be here today. And um the journey for me to be here today started almost 2 years ago when we made the promise that we will bring business fortune events to Riyadh. Earlier this year, we did Most Powerful Women International event here in Riyadh. It was in May, and today we're bringing our global forum, which is our signature fortune event. Fortunately has been around for almost 100 years. I brought a copy of the magazine. This is how it all started back in 1929 with the magazine, and it's still being printed today. We have the website. We have our iconic list such as Fortune 500, most admired companies, most innovative companies, all sorts of other things, and also our live media and events. Again, this journey is a long journey, and why are we here is the big question. Fortune's mission is to make business better, and we're doing doing it through our excellent reporting and journalism. Saudi Arabia is the frontiers of the business world today and that's why we wanted to be here and that's why we're here now again, everybody needs a good partner to get things started. So I wanted to talk for a second about our partner here as well. His Excellency Fahad Al-Rashid is our partner. He's the advisor in the general secretariat of the Council of Ministers and the chairman of SEGA. For those of you who know him, he does many things transforms cities, thinks about human capital growth companies transforms he left two cities, build the port, build the metro, and help, help us to to be here as well. So I wanted to say a huge thank you. Enjoy the next two days, and I hope to speak with you and see you around. Thank you. Since 1995, the Fortune Global Forum has convened in great cities on the dynamic frontiers of business. Singapore, New York, Beijing, Paris, Cape Town, New Delhi, Abu Dhabi, Toronto, and Rome. Now, nearly 30 years on, this well-established gathering returns for the second time to the Middle East. Today, the world turns its attention to Riyadh, a vital and expanding hub for global trade, technology, and economic transformation, guided by its ambitious Vision 2030 plan. Saudi Arabia is embracing creative solutions to the forces reshaping global business on a monumental scale. At this pivotal moment when leaders everywhere are navigating artificial intelligence, new economic pressures, and opportunities for growth, the Fortune Global Forum provides a unique stage for dialogue that defines the future. Here in Riyadh, we unite the world's foremost business and thought leaders, Fortune Global 500 CEOs, policymakers, and innovators. Together, they will set the agenda for business in a rapidly changing world. Welcome to the Fortune Global Forum. Where the future of business begins. Fortune guests, please welcome to the stage advisor, General Secretariat of the Council of Ministers, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and Chairman of the Saudi Conventions and Exhibitions General Authority, His Excellency Fahad bin Abdul Mohsen al Rashid. Behar and I mean this bit so or is me marat Mahaliata had been Abdel messen a rushid. Of hasmu Mali wasada Sara Malekomoramaullahi Oakata. Your Highnesses, Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Riyadh and welcome to Saudi Arabia. Welcome to the Fortune Global Forum 2025. We are honored to have you all here at this great moment. So many things happening in the world, so many challenges, and so many opportunities. But you've come to the right place because this is the land of opportunity. Saudi Arabia, with Vision 2030 has made major strides, not only economic, but social. Female participation in the workforce. Has hit 37%. Ahead of our 2030 targets. We started with the tourism sector, targeting 100 million visitors. Last year, we did 120 million visitors. But we have so much more to do. Because our leadership pushes us because we as people are ambitious. We want to do more. We want to do more because we are people of the desert. And think about what you have to do to survive and build a city the size of Riyadh in the desert. Riyadh is 100. 1200 kilometers in terms of size, double the size of Singapore. We have 8 million people living in Riyadh. It's the 44th largest city economy in the world. What does it take to do all of this? Ambition Patience And unlimited boundless. Optimism. And this is Saudi Arabia. This is the Saudi people. But how does Vision 2030 mechanically work? We have KPIs set for all sectors of the economy. Just like business do. But then to achieve them, we've launched initiatives. Actually we've launched 1,052 initiatives across the board. And 85% of them are on track. How can we do it? We're doing it together, men and women. Across the country. We're doing it with great talent that we've attracted from all over the world. And most importantly, we are doing it through the power of partnerships. We have partnership partnered with our friends from all around the world like you. To do this, these partnerships have allowed us to scale, scale our capability and scale the depth of our knowledge. And we've achieved, like I said, so much. Just a few months ago we've launched Humane in artificial intelligence. And signed $23 billion of partnerships just right after that. So we are here, we are ready, we are opening our arms and extending our hands to you. Thank you for being with us and enjoy the next 2 days. Thank you very much.

Most Powerful Women Summit 2025

It’s been said Kristalina Georgieva can make or break a nation’s finances. As head of the International Monetary Fund, she is leading the 191-member organization through a turbulent era. From tariffs and geopolitics to inflation and uncertainty, Georgieva joins us to discuss how the IMF navigates times of crisis and fundamental shifts in the world economy.  

The Pursuit of Global Economic Security

Managing director at Geva, I have to say that you said good music walking on. It makes me wonder, do you have a favorite walk-on song for IMF meetings? Yes, I do. Oh, really? What is it? We will, we will. OK, I think that sets the tone right there. This must be the most wonderful time of the year for you. You've got the annual meeting of the World Bank, IMF. You've got 191 member countries coming in. Give us a sense. This is day one. Thank you for joining us. Um, what have you been hearing so far? Give us a bit of a highlight. Well, the world is in a Very interesting place. Uh, so what I hear is mostly questions. Hey, how is it going to be? What would the world economy look like? Are we going to survive the trade war? And what about my country? What advice do you have for us? I actually started the day with The delegation of Tajikistan. Tiny country in Central Asia. Used to be a basket case. They had the Civil War. And then they lucked with leadership. I was delighted to have them as my first meeting because their growth is strong. Inflation is Below 3%. Their public debt is coming down, uh, and how are they doing that? Strong fundamentals, they pay attention to their policies, strong institutions, and hey, the IMF is there for them. So my message to my membership. If you come here so we can see better through the fog of uncertainty lying over our heads together. And what I'm asking you is leave your trade wars, your cold wars, your hot wars outside of my room. You can why mothers should be in charge, right? Yes, we keep it outside. Keep it outside. Well, you talked about what's heartening, what's disheartening to you right now. Uh, what is most disheartening is the risk we face for many countries. To lose hope for converging with those that are better off. What we have experienced over the last years, shock upon shock, upon shock. has pushed the fate of many poor countries into a more desperate place. And why should we care? We should care for two reasons one, Because when part of the world is falling behind, that means more insecurity for you guys, those who have global companies, shrinking market, and 2, because it is morally wrong. You know, I'm struck you, you led the World Bank. You're now in your 2nd term, you know, at the IMF. These are two organizations that really grew out of Bretton Woods in a spirit of globalization. Let's start with how do you lead an organization of people that is devoted to globalization in this fragmented environment? Well, the IMF is devoted. To help countries do better for their people. It happens that a more integrated world economy works better for the majority of people, but not for all. And one thing we have been saying now for some time is pay attention to those who are left out or left behind. Uh, and if we don't, then we risk more trouble. But let me deliver two messages to you. The first one is that despite the fragmentation in the world economy, we are still seeing. Countries reaching out to each other. And if globally we have more difficulty then at the regional level, subregional level, we seek compensation. Gulf Cooperation Council, ASEAN regions countries are looking for ways in which they can trade more with each other. And second, frankly, this thing that trade is dead is completely overstated, um. Trade is like water. You put obstacle, it goes around it. What we are seeing, and this has been like this for thousands of years, um, when we came to assess where is the world economy these days, we look at what is happening with trade and actually the impact of trade tensions is more muted for three reasons. One, Because the tariffs that were announced in the United States in April that shocked the world at that time 23%, now nominally they are still high, 17.5% but less, and when you look at collection, how much is collected, it is more around 10%, still much more than the under 3% before, but Not as dramatic impact as initially we anticipated. 2. The rest of the world has chosen not to retaliate. 188 of our 191 countries said. We're good. We actually like to continue to trade on most favored nation rule. And 3, and the tree is very, very interesting. When we look at the upswing in regional engagements, it's actually amazing and frankly these guys should have been trading more with each other. They're right next to each other and they have been kind of obsessed with shipping all the way to the to the United States rather than say ASEAN trading among themselves. So I think I'm, I full disclosure, I'm an optimist. I believe in the good of people and I think that ultimately we actually find the high road to do better and I see that this world, we are a more fragmented world, a more uncertain world. It is also getting people to recognize that. We are in this one big boat. It is a rough sea. We better row together. Well, let me go back to 2 a second when you talk about this resilience in the economy and the fact that people are not retaliating, that sounds like a bit of a fragile piece to me. Do you think that's going to last? Give us some message to the US and those of us here who are US based leaders. Uh, the Most important factor that determines how we look at the economy today is uncertainty, and my message to business leaders is very simple, buckle up. Uncertainty is here to stay. And uncertainty is driven by just far too many very powerful factors. You have technology, you have geopolitics, you have policymakers being less predictable. You have demography, some countries aging, some countries exploding. All of this is creating a foggy world. I was actually talking to Diane before we came here. We know the world we lived until recently, that we know. We don't know where we are going to land in this period of transition. That is the saying, the king is dead. Long live the what? And in this week we will see many of our members actually concentrating on how can we provide more anchors of certainty. So what we do, we do work on two of these anchors. First one is policies and institutions and we are telling. Loudly to everybody. You need good policies, you need Good institutions and you need independent institutions in some anchors of policymaking protected to private sector. I understand that the majority of you here are business people. Well, good news for the world. Private sector is more agile, more adaptable. Over the last years we have seen in many countries where there was big state presence in the economy. Including because of IMF urging them to pull back more private sector initiatives and in this time. of strong winds. You guys are an anchor of stability because you adopt, you just keep doing it. You know, I think about another quote from one of your favorites, John Maynard Keynes. In the long run we're all dead, which is another that's either optimistic or pessimistic, but I do think about that essay which I know you've quoted from the economic possibilities for our grand. Children and just the arc of the last 100 years, the progress we've seen, we're very much in a short game right now. Talk a bit about the long game from where you sit. I love John Maynard Keyne's little essay Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren. Basically, he says there. In 100 years we are going to be about 8 times better off. 100 years later we are about 8-9 times better off, so he nailed this one in parenthesis, what he got wrong, he was saying we would be so productive that we don't have to work 5 days, 6 days a week. We would be working only 3 days a week. And we would be writing poems in the rest of the time. Why did he get that wrong? Totally. And actually I love when I read the AI enthusiasts that say now AI is going to deliver a lot of free time and we would be having only 3 days to work. The rest we would write poems. I think, I think it is in human nature we actually are keen to deploy ourselves. We like to, I mean, we like to work. Um, let me ask you actually this, how many of you like to work? So that's the, so when I look forward, I do believe that we will be much better off as humanity. In 100 years' time. And if medicine decides to advance faster than it is doing right now, we will be there to see it, right? You know, one of the things I find So in addition to being the 2nd woman to lead the IMF, I should ask you, do you hang out with Christine Lagarde? Do you guys? We do, yes. Christine was, as you probably remember, she was the managing director of the IMF before me, first woman, so Christine came, broke the glass ceiling. I came after her. No scratchy. Well, you're the first woman. You're the first, you're the first leader from an emerging market economy, so you've got your own first. You're also somebody who did your PhD in environmental protection policy and growth in the USA. Now climate change, environmental policy, that is not something that is Very high on the radar right now in some countries. Uh, how are you feeling about that as a factor in growth? So we at the IMF, we work on macroeconomic and financial stability for growth and employment. Anything that is a risk to macroeconomic and financial stability, we have to take into account. Some of my members, some of our members say Caribbean states. Uh, they can get 100 to 100% of GDP wiped out just by one hurricane. So obviously we have to integrate this in the way we think about supporting countries. We want to help them help countries have good insurance policies. Uh, we want them to have good thinking about how at low cost they can be more resilient to climate, and I want to give you just one example why it matters. Um, Bangladesh, Bangladesh is a country that gets flooded on a regular basis, and so they were thinking how they can have resilience policies that are affordable. They worked at that time I was with the World Bank. We worked with them on investing in dual purpose infrastructure. So you build the school, the school is a school. If there is a flood, it's lifted, people with their animals go there for shelter. One of the measures that we came up, they came up and we reinforced was they used to have lots of chicken. And they switch from chicken to ducks. When the flood comes, chicken die, ducks swim. I love that the index. It doesn't have to be expensive, but you have to put some thinking and then translate it into economic activity. That's very smart. You know, um. I notice you, you bring your granddaughter occasionally to events, and you are the great granddaughter of a revolutionary Ivan Karshovski, who was a great revolutionary in Bulgaria and also a journalist. I think you started out wanting to be a journalist. I dodged a bullet. No, I'm just kidding, but, but I'd love to talk a little bit about what is your message to her? I mean, she's now studying in the US you came. An Alexander Hamilton scholarship here, give me some sense of of the legacy and how you think about, you know, leadership in your own family and what you tell her. So what I'm telling her is one change is unstoppable, unstoppable. So lean forward because that's going to be in front of you. This is going to be your life. 2, do the right thing. Even if it is not popular, even if it is not politically correct, do the right thing. This is what my father taught me. This is not what my great grandfather left for us. And 3, the world is fabulous. We have to protect our ability. To work with each other, we need to protect that, uh, making the world a really small place and you, your generation has a role to play. By the way, fun fact, imagine communist Bulgaria, we are just coming out of it. There is a Alexander Hamilton scholarship I can apply for. I did. I'm going for the interview. Now, as you can imagine in communist Bulgaria, they didn't teach us more about much about the founding fathers here. So The main question the journalists are asking, sorry, the interviewers are asking is, who is Alexander Hamilton? No Google, no phones, and I'm saying, I saw, I saw him recently. Where did I see him? And then The good of being dollarized at that time, I saw him on a $10 note. So I walk in the interview room. They asked me who is Alexander Hamilton, and I said, Who the guy on the $10 note? They didn't know. They started, there you go. This is my, my message is create, you know, never lose your cool, whatever the situation, come through it, come out of it victorious. I love that. This is also what I teach. I teach my granddaughter. I love that. Well, well. Have you seen the play, by the way? Hamilton? Of course, the first thing I did when she came to the United States, I took her to see Alexander Hamilton, and she loved it. So, so let's end on a note around back to the global economy. You've got a lot of anxious people, I'm sure, who are in town this week. What is your message to them in terms of these 191 member countries, excuse me, you've got finance ministers, central bankers, leaders. First of all, that's a Tough group to manage, but what is, what does success look like right now? So what we, what we provide to our membership is to see the world from the same vantage point. We produce global economic world economic outlook. Financial stability report and fiscal report and then we say, look at this, what strikes you the most? Three things. One, Better than feared, worse than we need. We touched, we, you know, ditched the bullet. But It's not over, so please you guys cooperate. Don't get out of this meeting. In the lunacy of economic wars. 2 Look at your finances. You're in trouble. Your debt levels have shot up during the pandemic, everybody had to borrow to support households and businesses. But nobody is pulling this support out. Why? Because people like it. What is not to like? Have the guts. To come to fiscal consolidation because if you don't, when the next shot shot shock comes and it will. You're in a very bad place. And 3, there are imbalances. Across countries, let's figure out a way to reduce them because they're an obstacle to a better global economy. Great woman leader, we have 18 seconds left. What is your message to this room of women leaders? But my message is think of the unthinkable. So you're ready when the Anticable comes because we know from COVID, we know from the war in Europe, it will come, and we women, we women are so strong and resilient we can face it. I love that. Please join me in thanking managing director Georgieva. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Brainstorm Tech 2025

Delivery robots, drone drops, new business lines, and global expansion: DoorDash has transformed into a full-stack commerce platform for local businesses. CEO and Co-founder Tony Xu joins us to explore how DoorDash is approaching automation, international expansion, and a broader push into hospitality and retail.

Tony Xu
Cofounder and CEO, Doordash 

Jason Del Rey
Tech Correspondent; Cochair, Fortune Brainstorm 

Now Serving: Global Ambition

Brainstorm AI Singapore 2025

The AI race is no longer just about scale—it’s about standards, trust, and strategic agility. As major powers build ever-larger models, Singapore is charting a different course: investing in global assurance frameworks, cross border digital integration, and a radically expanded pipeline of AI-skilled talent. Its approach is systems-first and credibility-focused—offering a model for how small states can lead by shaping norms rather than dominating infrastructure. But in an increasingly fractured landscape shaped by open-source disruption and deepening U.S.–China tensions, can neutrality still deliver influence? We'll discuss what makes Singapore’s AI strategy distinctive—and consider what other countries might learn from the Singapore model in crafting their own AI strategies. 

Beyond Scale: How Small Nations Can Lead In The Age Of AI

Now, to kick this off, I'm thrilled to introduce our opening conversation led by Fortune's executive editor for Asia and Brainstorm AI co-chair, Clay Chandler in conversation with our first guest, Singapore's Minister for Digital Development and Information, Josephine Teo. When we talk about global leadership in AI, it's easy to focus on the big players, but Singapore continues to prove that small nations can lead in big ways. This isn't just a story about scale. It's about strategy, standards, and Singapore's bet that credibility can compete with compute. Please now join me in welcoming Clay Chandler and Minister Teo. Thank you. Thank you, Jeremy, and welcome everyone and especially welcome Mr. Chou. It is such a delight to have you back. Uh, you were our kickoff speaker last year when we first launched this franchise in Singapore. We had a great discussion. Uh, that explored the ways in which Singapore was really pioneering how small and medium sized economies could punch above their weight when it came to artificial intelligence, and I'm really quite eager to have a kind of catch up conversation with you about that because so much has changed just in the last year since you were last here. Um, I wonder if we could start maybe by just a reference to the um. The AI action summit in Paris this year, which is a big event that got a lot of people's attention. Singapore there launched a global AI assurance pilot. And more recently, it's established a thing called the AI Verify Foundation. Can you tell us about these initiatives and and what they are and how they evolved? Well, it's great to be back and I'm also very happy that you've returned to Singapore for AI event. Um, you. Referenced what we were doing at the AI action summit. Uh, perhaps for context for the audience in the room today, uh, the AI action summit that took place in Paris is a 3rd edition of what started out in Bletchley as the AI safety summit. And then in between, there was a summit that was held in Korea. And by the time it got to Paris, our French colleagues decided that They didn't want to focus so much on safety, they wanted to focus on action. But if we ask what we really want to see in AI development, the way Singapore thinks about it is that this being general purpose technologies, you do want um it to be very widely adopted across many industry settings as well as across a whole range of organizations. So when we updated our national AI strategy, we thought that we needed to ensure that um uh people understood what this was going to be for. So we said that the vision for Singapore was AI for the public good, for Singapore and the world. And why we decided to focus on public good was that The incentives would naturally create many commercial applications of AI, but for the whole of society to benefit, for people to appreciate its value, and this being general purpose technology, you also want AI to be applied towards public healthcare, public transportation, uh, public safety in policing, for example. So that's one dimension of AI development that we wanted to see in Singapore. The other dimension is equally important. In many of these commercial settings, you would want AI to be implemented, deployed in a responsible way. So the question, however, is what does responsible AI look like? Well, it really depends on the application and at which layer of AI development you're talking about. Are you talking about the infrastructure, you're talking about the models, or you're talking about the applications? And Apart from being able to articulate what responsible AI looks like, you also need to answer the question of, well, how do you get that? And if you say that you are implementing responsible AI, how do you test for it? How do you assure people that in fact this is happening? So, As we were also promoting AI adoption, we decided at the same time that these questions deserved investigation. You need to put aside resources to research, but at the same time, it's useful for us to start developing practical tools. To answer the question of what responsible AI looks like. That's how the global AI assurance pilot came about. It was to create uh a number of methods by which AI developers as well as deployers were able to assure their stakeholders that they were implementing in a responsible way. And the idea was also to learn from it, accepting the fact that at this early stage, there are no interoperable standards that apply across the globe. We don't know when we will get there. And so Singapore's modest hope is to contribute to this conversation and to bring about international collaboration so that we can all develop best practices in AI development. There is a lot to think about there. Um, I want to come back and maybe talk a little bit more about how Uh, assurances, the strategy aligns with the kind of commercial competitiveness objectives of Singapore, but I want to, before we get to that, uh, ask you about one of the other big developments that's happened in the last year, which happened just about the time. Uh, a lot of people were in Davos, uh, and, uh, I remember being in Davos and hearing people at the beginning of Davos sort of pooh poohing China's ability to catch up to the United States. Oh, Silicon Valley is so far out in front in these foundational AI models that China can't play the same game. And then, uh, right in the middle of Davos there was this kind of announcement that emerged that there was this thing called Deep Seek. There was a Chinese hedge fund that had, uh. Sort of issued this new platform in AI that was produced with a fraction of the resources of OpenAI or Gemini, but seemed to be pretty close on all the significant benchmarks of performance. Last year we talked about, you know, the age of. Uh, you know, big data and, and AI superpowers and whether that created daunting obstacles for smaller states like Singapore. So I'm curious to hear your thoughts about the implications for countries like Singapore. For the deep sea breakthrough, we've had a couple of these other really kind of fast follower platforms come through in China recently. Um, is this something that even Singapore can now compete, you know, by following those kinds of examples? How does it open up and democratize the the the AI game for a country like Singapore? Well, the thing that we ask ourselves is what are the impediments of using any sort of technology for innovative purposes. And inevitably cost becomes an issue because for a company that is uh deploying technology already in a certain way to use AI as an alternative or as an addition, the question of cost must come up and it has to be weighed against the benefits. So when the cost comes down, then whatever benefits you were able to get from it may look more attractive. So from the perspective of bringing down costs. Innovation such as Deepeek are very much welcome. But I would also say that um this whole dynamic is not necessarily only a competitive one. It is also mutually reinforcing. Let me give you an example. We don't use deep per se to develop our own large language model, but within the context of Southeast Asia, we know that large language models that are trained primarily on the Western corpus, primarily on perhaps English as the language, um, they will have difficulties being applied in the Southeast Asian context. Um In our case, there are already probably more than 1000 local languages and if you build AI tools on top of these large language models that didn't incorporate the kind of data that could be found in our part of the world, then naturally the quality, the way it performs, the way it responds to prompts will perhaps not meet. The requirements of Singapore, as well as our neighboring countries. What we did was to therefore develop our own large language model, not necessarily the biggest, but certainly trained on languages that we find commonly in our part of the world. You know, um, Malay language, Tamil, Indonesia. This is sea lion, you are very familiar with it. So I think there is room for both, uh, and indeed, many companies, when they are thinking about how they can develop, for example, chat assistance that could be useful in our context, they would use a combination of both. And so that's how I think about it. I think that in an innovation ecosystem. Um, ways in which we can bring down the cost, ways in which we can complement one another in terms of the models that are available. I think they just open up the space for innovation to a larger extent. And in the Singapore context, um, when we think about AI governance and in AI innovation, The two are not necessarily at odds with each other, being able to assure ourselves of the safety and proper governance actually, I think can enable innovations to go further, because then the developers and deployers know where are the markets that they should work with. It's very interesting because it's a very, it's a much more kind of neutral approach to evaluating technology and And AI platforms in the US right now, a lot of this stuff is very politicized, so we thought that TikTok was a terrible national security risk until we realized that it was so popular that we couldn't really stop it and you know certain political leaders realized it was to their advantage to embrace it, but deep. See there's still a lot of ambivalence about deep seek in the US. The US government is prohibiting, uh, government agencies from, from using it, uh, uh, and trying to discourage companies from using it, whereas I gather in Singapore there's none of that. There's, well, let's look at it and is it useful or not? Or perhaps I would put it another way. I think when Companies, developers, deployers, they think about what model they want to use. There is always an assessment of a couple of things. One of the things would be, of course, performance. The other thing that they, they would take into consideration is security and resilience. And it's up to every organization to evaluate all three and draw their own conclusions about what can be used and what cannot be used, although they do not wish to use. And I would imagine that there will still be concerns about deep sea and other models that would cause companies. needs to take a pause and say that maybe this is something that we are still not very comfortable with. I wouldn't be surprised at all. This is a very natural consequence of organizations having to weigh the cost and benefits as well as the many dimensions of what makes an innovation worth the effort. So the other thing that's related to this and that that's new over the past year is that you know we in the US we have a new president now. And relations between the US and China have gotten, uh, safe to say much more tense and in many ways more acrimonious. President Trump is imposing very large tariffs on China. China has been retaliating in kind. The US has tightened restrictions on selling chips and other technologies to China. I wonder whether you know and we talked last year about Singapore's strategy of being sort of non-aligned, uh, being a kind of a Switzerland of Asia, a space where both Chinese and and uh uh US companies and tech players could could operate together. And so my question is can Singapore still do that? And this also sort of applies to the rest of ASEAN. Can it remain strategically unaligned, or are the two giants trying to force small and medium sized economies like this one to pick a side. I think Singapore's consistent approach is to act. In a way that meets our own interests. And that is the starting point that has to be our guiding principle. Now We would certainly hope that relationships between the two giants can warm up to a much greater extent, but it's not something that we can wish to happen and it will happen. I wish that was, um, you know, something that uh we didn't have to deal with, but it's a reality. Um, the way in which we go about it is to engage, you know, uh, all countries, not just China and US. Um, and Build upon our bilateral foundations. And to try and make headway in new technology areas too. So with the US, we have a dialogue on continuing and contin critical and emerging technologies. Similarly with China, we have a digital policy dialogue. They cover different areas of interest um that um we mutually believe are important for our own countries. But, you know, it doesn't prevent us from seeking to understand each other's concerns better and then continuing to find ways to move forward. So in AI Assurance in AI governance, for example, with our US colleagues, we did a mapping of our own risk assessment model against us, and this serves as a basis for us to engage with colleagues elsewhere around the world, particularly those that are involved in the AI safety network. Um, with our Chinese colleagues, we noticed that um there are industrial Uh, foundation is so broad and deep that the application of AI would be very interesting to watch and learn from. So there are different ways in which we engage with our ASEAN countries, we say, for example, that um even if we are not ready to move into the era of standards in AI governance, there's nothing to prevent us from agreeing on what the ethical principles could look like first. And then with other countries um that are like us, small, um, we created a digital pillar in the forum of small states, which Singapore is the convener of. And with countries like Rwanda, for example, we created an AI playbook for small states. So these are the ways in which we are coming together for conversations around different aspects of AI hoping to meet, make progress. Interesting and, and, and thoughtful. Um, I wanna ask quickly if I can about um. Scaling the digital workforce to kind of support a lot of these initiatives. The last time we spoke, you described for us, the government's plan had a goal for training 5000 AI practitioners in Singapore, and you have since tripled that, as I understand it, to 15,000. Why the increase and how will you achieve it and what will be the background of these practitioners? Well, number one, I think there's a lot of interest, um. So many people in, in, in Singapore are aware of the potential benefits of AI and they are themselves finding ways to acquire the skills. Uh, I would say that, um, whether it is AI creators or AI practitioners, Uh, I'm overall optimistic about what can be achieved through our workforce if each and every one, were enabled to acquire some AI related skills. And you imagine that um certain basic AI skills will become as ubiquitous as you and I being very familiar with using emails, um, and perhaps in the earlier stages, Maybe it was not so common for people to be able to use um digital tools, you know, whether for word processing or making slides and so on. But over time, we all acquire a certain level of competence. But we think that it's not enough just to have basic level of competence. So what you described, the 5000 and 15,000 are what we call AI practitioners, we are hoping also to grow another pool to complement the data scientists and machine learning engineers. We're talking about people who who are in the professions, lawyers, accountants, doctors, who will become the early adopters of AI and then they show their peers how to make better use of it. We're also talking about people in different sectors, whether it's manufacturing, whether it is, um, you know, in healthcare or um in financial services. They themselves also acquire this facility with using AI and then they demonstrate how it can create more value for their organizations. This group of AI practitioners will have to exceed the 15,000 that I talked about to a much greater extent. So in the Singapore context, our workforce is maybe 3.5 million. I think. At the level of AI users that are AI, they are competent, you, you will need to get to a much larger number than what we were talking about last year. So watch this space, we will have more to say about this. We, we will watch it with great interest. We've got just a couple of minutes here. I wonder if we can come back to this initial point about assurance. Uh, it's very interesting to me because it seems that what Singapore is doing is it's trying to become a kind of a test bed for safety and responsible AI and And to create a kind of haven. And build a brand around that in much the way that Singapore has done with FinTech regulation and cybersecurity services. Is that, is that the idea and Maybe you could say a little bit more about the philosophy behind the emphasis on insurance. The broad idea is that this technology um can have many applications and you don't want to overly restrict its growth and development. On the other hand, for a technology that can be used in so many different contexts. You've got to watch that it doesn't cause harm because the moment it does, and people become very wary of seeing it being used in even more ways, then it's much harder to recover from that sort of loss of momentum. So the way in which we'd like to go about it is to set out the broad directions and also to set out what are the principles that we should be working along. And then to uh say to industry as well as organizations that are using AI, let's try and find a way to define the risks and also then to find ways of mitigating those risks. That's generally the approach that we take. Small steps, um, not necessarily always big bang, but when we're ready to move, then move quickly. It's always fascinating for us to kind of watch those small steps and to try to observe them and analyze them. I think that many of them are of great relevance and and benefit to other kind of medium sized states as to how they can navigate in. This really rapidly changing technology environment. We look forward to tuning in again and coming back for the next installment of this conversation we hope in years to come. Thank you so much, Minister, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you.

Fuel up with Fortune, Cannes 2025

Elite leadership isn’t just about vision—it’s about action, resilience, and the relentless pursuit of growth. At Fortune’s exclusive Fuel Up With Fortune panel in Cannes, Snap Inc. EMEA President Ronan Harris and Mars Wrigley North America President Anton Vincent share their top leadership learnings and what truly sets outperformers apart.

Elite Leadership: Unlocking Growth at the Top

Elite Leadership: Unlocking Growth at the Top Pannel at Cannes

At the Fuel Up With Fortune panel in Cannes, Snap Inc. EMEA President Ronan Harris and Mars Wrigley North America President Anton Vincent share their top leadership learnings.

Fortune COO Summit

How are the companies pioneering artificial intelligence technology actually using it internally? These two preeminent operational leaders at the forefront of the AI revolution will share the strategies they are using to deploy the very technologies they're developing—while writing the future of AI for the world. We’ll hear how they are leveraging AI to optimize operations, fuel growth and share specific advice for corporate leaders about how best to implement today’s most cutting-edge innovations in their own organizations.

ARCHITECTS OF AI: DRIVING TECHNOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATION FROM WITHIN 

Fortune MPW International Summit 2025

Hosted by ROSHN Group  
Around the world, significant strides have been made to increase the number of women in corporate leadership positions. In the U.S., women make up 29% of C-Suite level roles and hold approximately 30% of board seats. And here in Saudi Arabia, nearly 10% of board positions are held by women, a new reality made possible by the Kingdom’s ambitious Vision 2030 strategy and other significant government-led reforms. Even with such progress, untapped opportunities remain in industries where women have traditionally been underrepresented – from construction and engineering to technology and energy. In this special lunch program, we’ll explore the strategies needed to advance women into C-suite positions, create more inclusive workplaces, foster untapped talent, and create a path to parity – not just progress – for women at all levels of business.
Panelists:
Dr. Maryam Ali Ficociello, Group Chief Governance Officer, Red Sea Global
Giovanna Carnevali,	 Executive Director, Master Planning, ROSHN Group
Dr. Saeeda Jaffar, Senior Vice President and Group Country Manager – GCC, Visa
Jena Ladhani, Chief Executive Officer, Global Workplace Solutions, KSA, CBRE
Renée McGowan, Chief Executive Officer, India, Middle East, and Africa, Marsh McLennan
Moderator: Michal Lev-Ram, Contributing Editor, Fortune

WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP LUNCH PROGRAM: ADVANCING WOMEN IN THE WORKPLACE

Workplace Innovation 2025

Does DEI promote or prevent meritocracy? After a growing number of companies announced they’d be rolling back their DEI programs, some employees were left wondering if the pre-2025 DEI movement in business was wholehearted or largely performative. How will the private sector navigate external pressures while fostering inclusive and equitable environments for employees and customers? Netflix’s inaugural Vice President of Inclusion Vernā Myers joins Anson Frericks, the author of the recent New York Times opinion essay “Working at Anheuser-Bush, I Saw What Went Wrong With the D.E.I. Movement,” for a thought-provoking and multifaceted conversation about how America got here--and where DEI is headed.  

DEI IN 2025: RETREAT OR REINVENTION?

And welcome. Thank you for being with us today. We're excited to start our 2nd day of conversations and connections. We have lots to dive into today, like multi-generational workforces and how to manage them under one roof and the debate over return to office policies. We'll look at the trend of skills over degrees. We'll talk about integrating AI as your new employee. We'll hear lessons on career building from a Hollywood power player and we'll step into the world of the hit show Severance to see how corporate dystopia is brought to life. It's gonna be so much fun and we're going to get right to it all, but first, a quick reminder about what can be shared and what's off the record. What's said on stage or in our breakout sessions is on the record, including the open Q&A. Feel free to post on social media. And tag us using hashtag fortune workplace summits. What's said over the table during a meal or on breaks is private and off the record unless that's agreed upon by those involved. In just a moment, Fortune's next to lead editor, Ruth Umo, we'll kick off our conversations, but first, our partner McKinsey and Company wants to share some thoughts on getting the most out of tech. Tech has limitless potential, but how do we turn that into value? Unlock the power of AI at scale, reinvent tech delivery, build innovative products, and entirely new businesses. We rewire organizations to get the most out of tech, from strategy and talent to operating model, data and governance, capabilities, and culture. Great tech is essential, but with McKinsey, it's never just tech. Hey, good morning, everyone. Let's start with a big question. Is DEI DOA dead on arrival? Diversity, equity and inclusion in America is at a crossroads. Critics argue DEI initiatives have gone too far, creating new divisions and unfairness. Supporters say DEI strategies are necessary to address workplace inequities and can drive business success. We're gonna dive into both sides of the debate, and we have two great guests to do just that. Anton Ferris is co-founder of Strive Asset Management and a business leader who believes talent and results should take priority over diversity metrics, and Bernie Myers is founder and president of the Vernie Meyers Company, which helps organizations build effective DEI strategies. Please welcome them to the stage. Welcome, welcome, thank you both for joining us. Let's cut straight to the chase. Anson, you have argued that one of the fundamental failures of corporate DEI movement is that no one has ever clearly defined what it was trying to do. Let's do just that to level set. How do you each define DEI? What do you think it is actually trying to accomplish? something you want to take it first here, Renee, ladies first here. Thank you, thank you. So I am now start not saying DEI anymore. I'm saying diversity, equity and inclusion. When I say diversity, I mean talking about a difference and a mix, quite frankly, of culture and identity and experience when I'm talking about inclusion. It's about how do you make all of those differences work on your behalf, right, creating an environment where people of all backgrounds feel included. I often say expected, respected, and also reflected that's that's the idea of inclusion and with equity it's what you need to do the processes and. And the, the kinds of, uh, I would say tools that are necessary in order for that inclusion to actually flourish and for you to get the best out of human talent. Same question for you. Yeah, and I think, I think one of the biggest problems with diversity, equity, inclusion, it's never been well defined. If you ask everybody in this room, they're going to give you a different answer. I think that. Bernay's answer was a very plausible answer for DEI, and I think if you go back in time 5, 10 years ago, I think probably everyone in DEI wanted just to go out and find the best and the brightest. DEI was about finding a diverse group of candidates, trying to make sure they had an equitable opportunity or an equal opportunity to be able to succeed, and then we want to be inclusive of all people and walks and different backgrounds. I think there was a lot of positive in the initial DEI movement. why it's become controversial and I'll define why I think it's become controversial is DEI instead of just providing equal opportunities for people of diverse backgrounds. I think it's about now perceived in a lot of circles as forcing equitable outcomes for people as opposed to equal opportunity. So based off of your race, sex, gender, etc. the diversity piece has been about a lot of quota systems in certain. Companies we're going to hire people based on their race, sex, gender. That's become very controversial. The equitable piece is not about sort of equal opportunities, but making sure that everybody gets promoted in an equal way or an equitable way based on race, sex, gender, and then even the inclusive pieces, I think, become very challenging because the inclusive piece is very difficult to define and I actually think stifled a lot of open debate and free speech and dialogue. So I want to thank you for Having this conversation because I think it's incredibly important, but that's how I think about DEI and think about the two different definitions of what it was and I think what it's become. Well, Renee, let me turn to you then. What is your response to critics who argue that DEI, to his points, often rewards identity over performance and risks sidelining the most qualified candidate, um, in the name of representation? I'm gonna say poppycock. Right, because the whole point of DEI is to allow for merits, right? And it is much older than 5 years ago or 10 years ago. We've been doing the work of DEI since the civil rights movement. In fact, that's the birth of diversity, equity inclusion, and the idea is that it is hard to get to merit when there are obstacles, unfair. Obstacles in the way and so there is no MEI without DEI. In fact, it is impossible and and and what is so upsetting for me and I feel like it's, I would say morally unjust and bankrupt to suggest that we could just move forward as if we had somehow managed to level the playing field. You cannot get. To equality without recognizing inequality, it is impossible to do that and in no other business setting would we have an objective, not measure it, not looking at outcomes and how well the actual operation is either delivering on equality or not. And so we've got plenty of data that would suggest that it's not equal. I mean, if I look at women right now in the C-suite. We've got, uh, I, I actually brought the numbers because I am always not, I'm not always on numbers, but I know that there's 28% now women in uh the C-suite and that's up. It was 17% in 2017. So the work we did to get women to be recognized for their merit is working. In fact, I think this backlash against the EI is because we're winning, is because we are leveling the playing field and not because by identity. But by allowing people to actually share and exhibit what they're capable of, I will also say that if we look at women of color in the suite, C-suite, it's much, much lower. So let me jump in here because I do want to hear from you, Anton. Yeah, thank you. Uh, and, and I love that this is a spirited debate because Anne Sandy, you wrote, uh, a New York Times op ed, um, and you pointed to Anheuser-Busch, where you worked for some time as a cautionary tale of DI gone wrong, but was the real failure DI itself, or was it the clumsy way that DI was executed? Why is it a failing of DI overall and not just how they leveraged that business strategy potentially in a in a way that was erroneous. I think that DI there was a failure in terms of definitely how it's been implemented in companies, and I think what I think about sort of a company and why does a company exist, you have a clear mission statement that most companies have, you know, if you're a beer company, you were supposed to, our mission as a company was to create a future with more cheers. That was the mission of the company as a as a beer company, perfectly good mission. There's lots of other missions as well. Coinbase is doing crypto. Indeed is, I don't know, empowering people and finding jobs, whatever it is. Those missions are great. Then I have a view that we should find people and attract people that's going to help the company fulfill that mission. And if you're, you know, in the business of fighting fires, you want to have firefighters that are brave and resilient and all these things. If you were a beer company and the way that InBev worked and Anheuser-Busch and 3G, it was a very hard-nosed finance kind of driven company. And if you're a healthcare company, you probably have different people for that, and you should have different sort of characteristics and adjectives that you can describe to recruit people, and I think that each company needs to define those own adjectives to create. the sort of workplace they went in, but every company, I think before defining what those values were of who they wanted to recruit, they first looked at it through a DI lens, and I think that was problematic in saying that before we find people that are brave or empathetic or compassionate or hardworking or whatever adjective you want to describe for that company, first you have to look through this lens of, well, what's people's race or sex or gender or others, and I think you know there's a why is it you used the word before. Why can it all happen at the same time? This is just my experience working at Anheuser-Busch and then also running Strive Asset Management where we're investors in hundreds of different companies across the S&P 500. It just didn't. It probably can, but I think most people, they look through sort of the lens. Wells Fargo is a good example of a company that said in 2020 that we're going to have to interview 50% of all candidates have to be minority candidates for any job that's over $100,000 and then they were actually accused of literally encouraging minority candidates to apply for jobs after they'd already been filled just so they could check a box. And I think that's sort of the problem of like a lot of people just implemented DEI policies poorly and wrongly. And they became, I think, frustrating for, I think, a lot of minority candidates. They were supposed to help. And then also conversely became very frustrating, I think for non-minority candidates or even say candidates of background that were Asian or Indian or others that might have been passed over for a job because they weren't called the check the box right minority. Let's dig into it really quickly, and I think you might actually be about to touch. On this because you mentioned DI quotas, hiring quotas, and we saw a number of companies, uh, that instated the certainly post George Floyd and so if, if, if the argument is that DI initiatives result in these diversity quotas, Verne, how is that not trade in one form of exclusion for another? Let's, let's, let's get the language right. There's no such thing as quotas. Quotas are illegal. They've been illegal for a very long time. Kenji Yoshino last night yesterday explained to us it's not about quotas. That's another example of a disinformation campaign. It was about goals. And every company, if you want to achieve a change or cultural transformation, you have to have goals. How else are you knowing whether you are making a difference with what you're implementing, right? So people said unless we pay attention to this problem, the problem being the underrepresentation of groups of people over a long period of time due to exclusion, both intentional and Unintentional. This work does not get done unless you pay attention. It's attention and intention. People often think, well, just let it go. It'll just happen. It never just happens. I mean, you know, people will quote that like the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice. Thank you, MLK, my love. It doesn't bend by itself. You have to bend it. I'm a, I, I came into the legal profession. I was the first black person in my law firm, the only black lawyer, I should say, in my law firm. When I went back to my Harvard Law School, um, women in Harvard Law School, I learned that in 19. 53 when they finally let in women, they had no toilets for no bathrooms for the women. So you can say they had gender diversity maybe, but you cannot say they had gender inclusion and if you arrive in an environment and it's not set up for you, it's not conducive for you. It's insisting that you emulate the person or the group that has been there. And who have dominated for a period of time and if you don't, you can't advance because somehow we have this idea of fit and that's about our own comfort and it's a lot about our prejudice and also our biases and that is what DEI is hoping to do to create an environment where everyone can succeed versus being. Held back because of an identity, it's just the opposite of what is being perpetuated these days about the disadvantaging effects of DEI. Who has been disadvantaged? We have no data that would suggest that white men are being disadvantaged by the work of DEI. Well, let me ask you that, do you think that white men have been disadvantaged by the work of DEI? No, but I think definitely like Asians have 100%. If you take a look at Harvard versus Fair admissions, it was all the Asian students that had to essentially have twice the SAT scores, twice the whatever the scoring rubric was that that that black students have to have to get into Harvard. So I think yes, there's definitely been, and if you look at med school admissions, you look at other admissions, definitely certain races have been excluded, and I think We have to get back to the MLK's dream is that we have to get back to finding a place where we don't discriminate based off of race, sex, gender. Like any type of even reverse discrimination is discrimination. And so if we're discriminating against Asian people for advantaging black people, that's discrimination. I think we have to have an open and honest dialogue and conversation about that, and the data shows that the people are being discriminated. No, I don't think which data? Well, if you look at any admissions data for Harvard University, that's why affirmative action was overturned. And even if you go back like, you know, you're right, the Civil Rights Act that started in 1964. Hubert Humphries, who was the floor leader at the time, said this ever leads the quota systems, I'll eat my hat. Affirmative action, you're lower by background. California versus Bakke essentially said that you cannot have quota systems. When the California system literally set aside a quota of 16 positions for minority students in med school, they said that's illegal, but you can do affirmative action to take into race considerations. That was upheld in Michigan in the Supreme Court case in 2003. But even Sandra Day O'Connor at that time said at some point the affirmative action has to go away. At some point we can't just keep giving. Certain people an advantage based off race, sex, color, gender, and Sandra Day O'Connor said within 25 years. And so maybe it was 5 years earlier than she originally anticipated when Harvard versus Fair Students for admission overturned affirmative action, but it went away and at some point we have to get to the point where we're not looking at people based on race, sex, gender, sexual orientation. We're looking at them as individuals and say when do you want to do that? When do you want to do it? Do you want to do it now when we still have deep Equality and disparities not just in outcomes but just how people are being treated and in fact I feel like what we're doing what we're hearing is a way of trying to divide and distract and keep people from being connected and being unified across their differences and their commonalities and so I'm saying to you, when do we just stop doing it and. When do we start to acknowledge that there is still an enormous amount of work to do? We've been at this DEI work for a long time. It's not time to stop it. It's time to continue to evolve it. So let's talk about that evolution because we are running up on time. If we strip away all of the buzzwords, is there a version of diversity, equity and inclusion that both skeptics and supporters could agree on? What does that look like? And let's try and make it quick. OK, I think that what it looks like is, uh, I'm going with the, I'm going with the R's. I think we have to actually reassess. We need to redefine, we need to reimagine, and we need to re-engage. We need to redefine what we mean because obviously folks have a different opinion about what DEI means and what it means to have equality, right? And I do think we need to really try to do an assessment. What are we doing that is working and what are we doing that might be holding people back or making certain people feel excluded and then how do we reimagine a new idea, a new possibility, and then how do we re-engage, which is a lot of listening and a lot of caring? Yeah, 20 seconds for you. Yeah, I think it's the most exciting time if I was in the HR world because we don't have to do DEI specifically anymore and every company essentially adopted DEI. Yes, they had a different little flavor of it, but it was very similar to DI. Every company should have their own program to hire people and as long as we have a baseline, we don't, we don't discriminate based on race, sex, gender, then come here with your own program. It could be MEI, it could be whatever program you want to come out with. But talk about what's unique about your company, the people you want to attract, the values that they have, and talk about that and extol that being unique to your company. I think that will create an amazing workforce. We'll create amazing HR, uh, business partners in this room where you guys can really define what is unique about your company and who's gonna thrive there. Well, we'll end here. Thank you both for an illuminating conversation. Although you have cons shots and viewpoints, clearly, uh, your insights underscore the importance of continued dialogue. So thank you, thank you. So that's That's this way. OK, thank you so much.

Conferences

Behind the Business

Victoria’s Secret and its iconic Angels are back, but this time with a new definition of "sexy". In an era where consumers value comfort, inclusivity, and authenticity, the brand is fighting its way back into the cultural zeitgeist — with a reimagined Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show and tapping into K-pop stardom to win over Gen Z. In this episode of Behind the Business, Fortune’s Most Powerful Women editor Emma Hinchliffe sits down with CEO Hilary Super to explore how to make a legacy intimates brand relevant once again.

How Victoria's Secret Is Redefining "Sexy" | Behind The Business

Victoria's Secret was and still is the largest intimate brand in the world. For most of the past decade, Victoria's Secret has been treated as a cautionary tale, a once dominant brand that failed to evolve as culture and consumers moved on. It was sexy, that was very narrow and defined by someone else. And yet in recent months, the story has changed again. So sometimes this is sexy, glamorous, and envelope pushing, and sometimes this is sexy because you're feeling great about yourself. Customer growth has returned. Cultural relevance has re-emerged. Everyone on TikTok is losing their minds. Victoria's Secret. This is the bra you've all been going crazy for, right? The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show is back, and for the first time in years, it's driving sales. And after a bruising period for the stock, momentum has followed. There were a lot of reasons you could have said no to this job. So why did you say yes? Because I thought it was the transformation opportunity of the industry of a lifetime. For most of its history, Victoria's Secret didn't just sell lingerie. It sold an aspirational, carefully curated definition of sexy. And for years, that formula worked, turning a mall-based intimate store into one of the most influential global retail brands. As consumer preferences shifted toward comfort, inclusivity, and authenticity, competitors moved quickly to embrace body positivity and digital first strategies. Victoria's Secret, meanwhile, amid a series of scandals, faced growing criticism that it was increasingly out of step with consumers, particularly younger women. You say Victoria's Secret represented a narrow point of view for a long time. If you had to put that into words, what was the narrow point of view? I think that point of view was sexy, and it's sexy is still at the heart of who we are and what we do, but it was sexy that was very narrow and defined by someone else. Victoria's Secret CEO Hillary Super joined the company in 2024 from a disruptive competitor and inherited a business that still generated. Billions in revenue but no longer define the conversation. I mean this brand has incredible global reach. It's the world's 1 intimates brand, #1 bra brand, world's sexiest brand in the world. There's incredible DNA, incredible reach, and cultural relevance, and it just needed to be brought into this next chapter, needed to be repolished, needed to be modernized, and the two brands needed to be made more distinct. And I just wanted to get my hands on that. Amid new competition from celebrity founded brands and digital newcomers, I can't wait for you guys to try this bra. Super's strategy is focused on a return to product expertise and building a brand that resonates with younger generations. There are 4 pillars in our strategy. It's called the path to Potential. The first one is about supercharging bras. The second is recommitting to pink. I believe that we can grow this business back and capture this. Next generation. 3rd, really maximizing beauty. The 4th pillar is really around evolving our go to market strategy. We have an opportunity to make sure that the creative DNA associated with each brand is distinct and compelling, and that we're using our full funnel and all modern marketing tools to really reach segmented groups of customers and to focus especially on customer acquisition. You've defined this new era of sexy. What is sexy? Sexy is what you want it to be. I think sexy means something for every woman, and it means something at different moments in her life. So sometimes this is sexy, glamorous, and envelope pushing, and sometimes this is sexy because you're feeling great about yourself. Over the past year, this strategy has started to pay off, and Wall Street is responding positively. In the third quarter of 2025, net sales rose more than 9% year over year. I'm on the corner of 51st Street and 5th Avenue. This is one of Victoria's Secret's flagship stores, and I'm about to chat with Elizabeth Price, the new CEO. It's a Tuesday afternoon right now and we are still surrounded by people getting their Victoria's Secret fix. There are very few times that the store is not busy at some level. Wow. So how do you get the store ready for Valentine's Day? Oh my gosh, well, the team that goes into this is pretty extraordinary. We have about 35,000 associates across all of our stores. Many of them are full time. We do have some seasonal associates as well. And just a fun fact, every single one of them is trained to be a bro fitter. So it's something we take very seriously, um, but the team is just passionate about the customer, passionate about bringing the customer and bringing that love of Victoria's Secret to life. If bras represent authority, the company's second brand, Pink, represents the future and another key pillar of the new strategy. The thing about Pink, which is a little bit different than Victoria's Secret, is that it's a much more balanced lifestyle, you know, truly a much broader range of apparel for this customer. You said you're laser focused on the 20 year old. Why her specifically? You know, we realize and acknowledge that our customer has grown up with us, and it's really time to introduce ourselves, both brands, to the next generation. Uh, and there are many ways we're doing that. Um, first and foremost with the Victoria's Secret fashion show this year we were really proud that we were able to showcase both brands and to really in real time show the, the living, breathing difference between those two brands, um, and the response was overwhelming. The Victoria's Secret fashion show reached peak cultural relevance in the 2000s as a highly anticipated annual show, but by 2019, shifting consumer expectations and falling ratings made the show feel out of step, leading to its cancellation. Its return in 2024 and evolution in 2025 marked a turning point for the brand, with returning angels and even K-pop stars reflecting the company's updated focus. It's been a few months since the fashion show. What are your biggest takeaways and what has the tangible impact been on the business so far? The tangible impact has been significant growth in customer file, growth in the business as we reported in Q3 earnings, and then buzz and just relevant. Scores, we, we owned the algorithm. We truly owned the algorithm on TikTok for weeks after the show, and I think that organic virality has, has really made a measurable impact on our business. It was really interesting to see your international business grow in your most recent earnings, and you included K-pop in the Victoria's Secret fashion show recently. Where are the biggest opportunities? You internationally and what are they? We will continue to open new stores in our existing regions. We have a few new countries that we're looking to get into and then I would add that social commerce is emerging as a big opportunity for us. It's a huge driver of our China business at the moment, and we're looking to take that learning and apply it globally. You're executing this turnaround, but at the same time facing some major headwinds like a net impact of $90 million from your tariff bill. Will tariffs impact the progress you're making here? I don't think so. I think something that we've learned over the last several years is every time a challenge comes to us, um, whether it's the challenge of COVID-19 or tariffs, we come out on the other side stronger. Has it been challenging? Has it been something we've had to really bond together as a team and figure out how to mitigate? Absolutely. Um, did it come on faster and stronger than any of us expected? Absolutely. Have we, has the team done an incredible job mitigating those impacts? Yes, they have, and I think we are really setting ourselves up to be stronger than ever as we enter 2026. Victoria's Secret has regained momentum and is on the way to a promising comeback. We are not going to be for everyone. A brand has to stand for something. Victoria's Secret stands for sexy, glamorous, accessible luxury, and that is who we are and our job is to connect those attributes to culture today. And while that may not be for everyone, it's for many, many millions of women. We have 25 million plus active customers in North America alone. We have hundreds of millions of women around the world who love Victoria's Secret, and I hope that customers who haven't engaged with. Us yet or maybe haven't engaged with us in a while, we'll give it a chance. We'll come and see what we have to offer because we really do offer a lot more than one point of view. While leadership and Wall Street are both optimistic, the real measure of success will be whether this momentum can be sustained. I think Victoria's Secret is the sexiest brand in the world, and there's, there's just a lot to love about thinking about what that looks and feels like in this next chapter.

From a single Los Angeles motel to a multi-billion-dollar global chain, Hyatt is redefining the meaning of luxury. After leading the company for almost two decades, CEO Mark Hoplamazian gives us an inside look at the hotel operator’s newest frontier: a full-scale brand reorganization designed for the next generation. By shifting from real estate ownership to high-margin luxury experiences, Hyatt is doubling down on the future of luxury travel. In this episode of Behind the Business, Fortune’s Matt Heimer explores how Hoplamazian and Hyatt are navigating transformation in a shifting travel landscape.

Hyatt Hotel’s extensive portfolio features over 1,450 hotels and resorts spread across over 80 countries, ranging from more affordable standard hotel rooms to luxury all-inclusive resorts. Now, in order to meet shifting travel trends and remain competitive among rivals many times its size, Hyatt is nearing the final stages of a full-scale brand reorganization. Here’s why Hyatt is selling real-estate and investing in luxury, experiences, and tech-backed trip planning to book the next generation of travelers.

Why Hyatt is Leaning into Luxury | Behind the Business

How do you actually deliver what the brand promises that actually requires two things. First, super clarity about what the brand stands for and why it is positioned that way to be responsive to what the guest base needs. From its modest motel beginnings, Hyatt has constructed one of the largest hotel and resort portfolios in the world. The company remains far smaller than industry leaders Hilton and Mer. It and rising operational expenses, travel uncertainty, and external shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic have made growth difficult. Hyatt's strategy sell real estate and invest in expanding its luxury brands. Instead of splitting your attention between being a great property owner, we are now really focused on brand building and investing in the brands backed by data-driven. Loyalty programs and new brand acquisitions. H Hyatt is positioning itself to expand its lead in luxury and experiential travel. Younger consumers are spending on these really specialized experiences. It's not a one size fits all anymore. Here's why Hyatt is building brands instead of hotels in order to keep the next generation of travelers checked in. In 1957, a Chicago lawyer named Jay Pritzker purchased and opened the Hyatt House, a motel near LAX. Hyatt has steadily expanded since then into one of the largest companies in the hospitality industry, built in part by veteran CEO Mark Holomasian. This is our founder. Yes, right, Jay Prisker. Yeah. Since stepping into the role in 2006, Hoelmazian has led Hyatt through an IPO, managed the company through the turbulent. COVID-19 pandemic and more than tripled the total number of branded properties in Hyatt's worldwide portfolio. Today, Halomasian is steering Hyatt through the later stages of a massive brand reorganization centered around an asset light strategy. This means selling real estate and transitioning to fee-based revenue streams. These might include earnings from managing and operating hotels or licensing properties to franchisees. In 2025, 80% of Hyatt's profits came from this kind of fee-based revenue, up from just 57% in 2019. And by the end of the year, the company had reached its goal of raising $2 billion in physical asset sales. Hyatt aims to have over 90% of its earnings be asset light by 2027. During your time as CEO, you led Hyatt through what's called an asset light transformation. Why did Choose to do that and what has been the impact of it. It really focuses one's attention. Instead of splitting your attention between being a great property owner and asset manager and a brand builder, we are now really focused on brand building and investing in the brands and the technology platform behind that. So you're really now you're much more focused on talent and marketing and public messaging without necessarily having to worry as much about plumbing, parking, maintenance. You're right. Halimasian and Hyatt's brand strategy organizes the company into 5 distinct brand groups luxury, lifestyle, inclusive, classics, and essentials. Luxury includes some of Hyatt's most upscale brands like the Park Hyatt, while essentials brands like H Hyatt Studios offer a more straightforward business hotel type experience. Marriott and Hilton, both of whose property and financial portfolios are considerably bigger than Hyatt's are also going asset light. In fact, both started their transitions to an asset light model before Hyatt. In order to differentiate itself, Hyatt is leaning into one of the fastest growing sectors in the industry, luxury travel. I think in your Q3 report, the company mentioned that it seemed like from the consumer side, the luxury and lifestyle segment was the one where the demand seemed strongest, where economic threats seemed least. Is that still the case? Do you still feel like luxury is where the growth is going to come from? Absolutely, we have the biggest representation proportionately speaking in our portfolio of luxury and lifestyle versus our competitors, so we've been advantaged during this period of time when luxury has been the strongest segment. I think 26, no matter what happens, the so-called K-shaped economy is going to persist. That doesn't make me happy, by the way. We have to recognize that that's what's happening. And so I do think that luxury will be the highest performer. And this is a very big change in psychology. Hyatt is already a leader in luxury travel. More than 70% of Hyatt's rooms are luxury or upper upscale compared to Marriott at 51% and Hilton at 28%. Since announcing its asset light strategy in 2017, Hyatt has acquired around 10 luxury and upscale hotel lines, including Mr. and Mrs. Smith and Dream Hotel Group, to add to its brand groups. It's a vibe, right? Right? Exactly. It is a vibe and it's a stunning vibe. Yes, it is happening today too, isn't it? Laurie? You're the first global executive I've ever interviewed in front of a basketball hoop. Where are we? What is this place? Yeah, isn't it great? We are in the Chicago Athletic Association. It started as a men's club in the 1890s, has been reimagined as a hotel, and came into the H Hyatt portfolio in 2019. I've got the beautiful Gothic architecture and the crazy carvings. I do not see a Hyatt logo anywhere. Is that intentional? And if it is, how come? Yeah, for this hotel, the Chicago Athletic Association, it is part of the Unbound collection. And what is special about the Unbound collection is every property is unique and historic and tells its own story. May I see the ballroomhould we go check it out? Can we see the ballroom? Let's go to the ballroom. Younger consumers are spending on experiences. This is. The White City Ballroom we're working on curating different types of collections of properties that will tailor to more romantic travel or outdoor luxury travel. It's not a one size fits all anymore. It's these really specialized experiences. I know that the past several years on the branding topic that there have been some really key acquisitions for H Hyatt, especially in the luxury space. Bringing in other brands into the portfolio where from a customer's perspective we're not necessarily going to know about the Hyatt affiliation. How does that sort of change the challenge of maintaining the focus of the company? We have over 62 million loyalty members and the program has been extremely healthy. It's been growing at a 20% compounded growth rate in the last several years straight. When we designed World of Hyatt, it was designed as an experience platform, not as a points program. A lot of loyalty programs are basically The transactional in nature and we wanted it to be something that was actually meaningful to our members. Yes, it's points. It includes points, but we view points as a means to an end that's not just a room night but an overall experience. When you talk about points being about experiences as well as loyalty, does that mean in practice that the points can also be used for things outside of just the stay? We launched a world of Hyatt find experiences also about. Two years ago now and we have experiences on properties we have experiences that we call limited time experiences. What are some travel trends that you're thinking about that are sort of specific to 2026? New things coming down the pike or things that you're going to see expanding? Experiential travel is not slowing down, whether it's for sporting events. We've got some big ones coming to the US, whether it's music or these more niche things are really. Unique one that we launched was with Reese's Book Club. We brought the authors of the month and we hosted reading retreats as part of an outdoor luxury collection experience. So something that we're seeing with travel is in not just experiences but these sort of niche experiences as the brand portfolio expands with the kind of acquisitions you've been describing, how do you make sure that the experience. The customer and that the company's values are consistent across these platforms, especially when some of these platforms to a consumer may not even be recognizable as a Hyatt. If you understand what people actually need, then you can actually appropriately care for them. So that is at the foundation and the core of every single touch point that you would experience across the Hyatt offerings across every brand, across every country, and across all the other experiences. In order to better recognize and deliver these experiences, Hyatt is investing in AI and in-depth data analytics and building personalized intent-based search tools configured around users' individual travel preferences. How do you keep a sense of brand and company identity consistent across experiences in a world where AI is playing a bigger role perhaps in connecting your customers to you? We characterize AI as an augmentation of how you can get closer to your customers, removing a bunch of the administrative tasks that our frontline colleagues are actually burdened with currently. It gives them more time to just be human, human to human interaction. There is so much new technology that helps us to deliver really personalized and tailored content, and now we can speak to you as an individual differently than the next member. The other thing it allows you to do is capture information on that individual that you would never otherwise be able to get true fidelity of information about Matt and his family so that we can better care for you in the future. You became CEO in 2006, and that means that this bare wall that we're walking towards is going to be the wall that gets the next chapter. What are the things that you most want to see on that wall? We've changed the profile of the company and now the launch point from this point forward is how we actually corralling and using the best of technology to continuously make our colleagues' lives easier, make our guests' lives better, and how we can care for more people.

Crate & Barrel is evolving from a home furnishings importer into a multi-hyphenate design, B2B and AI-assisted powerhouse, with plans on expanding its retail footprint while using new technology to change the way customers shop online. As geo-political shakeups in trade and supply chains challenge the businesses’ operations, CEO Janet Hayes says the company is focusing on offering high quality products to forge ahead.

Crate & Barrel Wants You To Know They Are Much More Than Crates & Barrels | Behind the Business

I would have never believed if someone said 5 years from now the company is going to grow over 55%. You're going to triple the bottom line. Long known for wedding registries and modern home decor, Crate and Barrel has grown into a $2.5 billion powerhouse. We've been Reinventing our retail fleet and really doubling down and investing now against a backdrop of tariff headwinds and supply chain volatility, the company is focused on new consumer touchpoints and delivering tech-driven speed under the leadership of CEO Janet Hayes. As the next generation buys fewer homes and online options multiply, how can Crate and Barrel win in the consumer wars? You can see this kind of iconic picture here of the crates and barrels and hence the name started to form. Somebody walked in and said, What's the name of the store? And they just kind of said, I think it's Crate and Barrel, and that's where the name came from. Crate and Barrel was founded in 1962 by Gordon and Carol Siegel as a way to bring Americans high quality home furnishings from around. The world. This is what we call our atrium, which I think is so beautiful. It has since expanded into a multi-hyphenate brand, offering design services, catering to kids, and curating gifts. The German retail company Auto Group bought a majority of Crate and Barrel in 1998. By 2011, Otto Group was Crate and Barrel's sole owner. Despite revenue losses for Otto Group this year, Crate and Barrel was a significant driver of the company's positive earnings. Janet Hayes took the helm in August of 2020, 1 of the most uncertain times in the company's history. In the five years since, they've dealt with three major crises a global pandemic, supply chain turbulence, and the current geopolitical pressures of tariffs. Each time we come out stronger, I would have never believed if someone said five years from now the company is going to grow over 55%. You're going to triple the bottom line. A key part of Hayes's strategy has been in diversifying the company's customer base, growing various streams of revenue while staying focused on Crate and Barrel's core brand identity. Can you walk me through each of your brands and give me a sense of which ones are your biggest revenue drivers? Uh, we'll start with the Crate and Barrel brand. That brand I think most know, and if you ask someone on the street, they'd. Probably pull up a really warm memory of oh I registered there it starts kind of at the beginning of that registry and has grown into quite a big brand and then there's CB2 which is going through in my opinion, a really beautiful evolution. It's much more kind of design focused than crate and barrel, meaning appealing to the trade. They don't have in-house design. They use designers around the world. Then there's Crate and Kids kind of fulfills a couple of rooms in the house that we weren't kidding and really has an aesthetic that matches the crate brand. We also have Hudson Grace, which is a really beautiful, entertaining, and gift brand. And then we are bringing up a couple of other new brands as we are talking, not allowed to be out yet. The company is now doubling down on these 3 pillars. Investing in new technologies, expanding its retail footprint, and broadening its customer base beyond the individual consumer. What will come up pretty big in the next couple of years is our B2B business and our franchise business expanding globally. Oh, tell me about those. So the B2B business one I'm really excited about, we're one of the few companies that can do a whole home or a whole restaurant or a whole hotel from our brands and deliver a really different aesthetic. When you start to put all the different brands together, when thinking about the retail home furnishing landscape, a lot of different players out there, of course, you know, you associate IKEA with like the affordable, accessible designs, restoration hardware, the luxury. What lane do you really want Crate and Barrel to own? We need to be known as beautiful quality, beautiful products, and reliable service, and I think that is how we will win. Oh, this is gorgeous. Yeah, so over the past few years we have been making a lot of evolutions to the brand in order to drive growth. Crate and Barrel is rethinking their retail strategy, including customer experiences like Shop and Shop, offering free in-house design services, and appealing to local markets. In the Chicago market, we love chili, we love football, we love beer, we're simple people. Obviously you're constantly seeing all this data from customers. Was there ever any insight from a customer about a specific product that really changed how you either designed it or imagined it in a store? An example I would give you is our. beds. What we heard is that there weren't enough choices. They want a custom fabric on the kids' bed too. We have a bed that we love and we brought it into a local factory and we're able to customize and put the whole custom wall against it so designers can pick from all of the fabrics that we just saw together in the design desk that came from a customer. In the next 5 years, Crate and Barrel plans to expand their retail footprint. 45 to 50 new stores will be popping up in new cities across the country. Tell me more about doubling down on the physical retail expansion. Why now? Why a time when other people are maybe shying away from it? We are in a really beautiful position of not being overs stored, but we also hadn't really dreamt of a new storm model. And in the last 5 years we have put a new storm model out into. The United States market. In fact, we just opened our 7th, and they are proving to be incredibly lucrative and efficient and giving great service and inspiration to the customer. What we did is reinvented the idea of it to be about 40% smaller, one floor, so you can really see the whole home when you walk into one floor, and the customers love it. But those ambitious plans for expansion will be happening against the backdrop of geopolitical changes which are setting up supply chain challenges once again. President Trump posted to Truth Social announcing a new round of tariff hikes targeting six additional countries. Hayes says she's well positioned, having laid the groundwork in her early days of leading the company during COVID. What it was like felt like day to day, hand to hand combat, but What we were doing was really preparing us for the future. How are you dealing with the current instability? Have tariffs affected you in the business at all? They have, I think most CEOs probably anticipated that there would be some geopolitical disruption as a new administration took place, but I think at the speed and the magnitude that it is happening with the tariffs, I don't think probably a lot. CEOs anticipated the company's workload. We've moved business back to the United States where applicable, and I'm happy with where we're moving, but it is not to be underestimated how difficult it has been. On day one that this tariff news came through. I called everyone together and said, do not make a fast move. Quality is our main objective. Crate and Barrel has also used AI to help tackle supply chain challenges. We are anticipating and executing embedding AI into the business across all of this new technology, so it will and is embedded into the supply chain now and we're already seeing efficiencies and gains and being able to coordinate orders faster and more complete for our customers. In 2023, you made this big new tech announcement. You walk me through what exactly that was and since then what you've implemented in terms of this new tech. It all started a little bit before 2023 when our growth, I said we found kind of some cracks in the foundation and so we pulled together an investment roadmap led by technology to deliver a new warehouse management system. labor management system, transportation management system. We had dreams of a new point of sale system in the stores that started to connect that data and then a website that desperately needed to be updated after years. In addition to the back-end systems, Hayes is implementing new consumer facing technology, giving a whole new meaning to online shopping. We have all different kinds of customers, and some of them are very tech savvy, don't want to go in the store, don't want to interact, but still might need help and want to shop in new and different ways. Hence the virtual store. Do you see a world on the consumer side in which a consumer could say design an entire home or a portion of their house? Using AI and never have to step foot in a store, or do you always think that we're going to need these physical spaces? I think we're going to need the physical spaces. If anything, we have to keep asking that same question to ourselves every day. What makes that physical space relevant for the customer in the future? As Hayes positions the brand for the next generation, it's her approach to both the physical and digital spaces that she hopes will set Crate and Barrel apart. Your youngest consumers Gen Z, Gen Alpha, these digital natives who I think sometimes flock to these more digital only brands, how do you plan to encapsulate this new generation of consumers who are so used to online first and, and do you have a plan for, for the next generation of Crate and Barrel users? We believe very. Much an online first and actually the large majority of our sales are online. We're very digitally dominant. I don't think that that generation wants things that are coming at them en masse. That's what they're telling us. So we've got to personalize not only their shopping experience but their marketing experience. We've got to pay attention to what they're doing in social channels and we will. We're going to develop much more. rich content if it's how to decorate, how to cook something, how to pull something together, we owe them more content than we're giving them right now and that will come. But I think at the end of the day it won't differentiate service. How they want to receive it and when they want to receive it is again something we need to listen to and anticipate and be ready to react to.

Facing brand dilution and declining wholesale sales in the 2010s, Ralph Lauren has sought to reinvent itself and win over a younger generation. Under CEO Patrice Louvet, the company pulled back from heavy discounting, doubled down on its own stores and digital platforms, and refocused on core values like authenticity and timeless design. Today Ralph Lauren is seeing renewed growth, topping $7 billion in revenue the first time in nearly a decade. Fortune's Phil Wahba sat down with Louvet to learn about the strategy behind the turnaround.

Inside Ralph Lauren’s Big Comeback — And How it Won Over Gen Z

We had lost touch with the younger generation, and a lot of the questions I got when I started was, is Ralph Lauren still relevant? For years, Ralph Lauren leaned heavily on discounts and overexpansion, eroding the exclusivity that built its name. But in recent years, the company has worked to overhaul its strategy and win over a younger generation. Now the brand is back in the cultural spotlight from the US Open. To elaborate fashion shows and even a viral Taylor Swift dress moment. So Taylor Swift's dress that she just got engaged in is on sale for Miles Lauren for under $350 right now. For the first time in nearly a decade, the company's revenue topped $7 billion and growing segments like women's apparel are taking off. percent of our shoppers and stores online are actually Whitman, and now Ralph Lauren is looking ahead, experimenting with AI. If we can figure out how to do what we do better with the aid of technology, fantastic. Here's how Ralph Lauren pulled off one of fashion's biggest turnarounds and what it takes to stay relevant in a rapidly shifting luxury market. Here on Madison Avenue sit two of Ralph Lauren's most iconic flagship stores. The sprawling retail locations carry men and women's polos, sweaters, and other preppy mainstays the brand is famous for, alongside growing segments like handbags, outerwear, and luxury home goods. Since taking the helm in 2017, CEO Patci Cove has doubled down on Ralph Lauren's roots while expanding into new categories and rethinking the retail experience. Let's talk a little bit about the branding because here we are in in the mansion, it's opulent, it's luxurious, it could seem exclusive, but in fact it is welcoming. So can you tell me a little bit about how the company manages that balance of being luxury and high-end but without being, you know, unfriendly? Well, about philosophy from the beginning has been this concept of Inspiring the dream of a better life irrespective of where you come from, what your income level is. And so our price ranges today go for, you know, a pack of tennis socks that might be $15 all the way to, we recently sold a $320,000 watch. We want to create an environment that's aspirational but engaging and inviting, right? And this notion of inclusive luxury is really important to us. You have 15 year olds coming in here. And you have billionaires, but Ralph Lauren's luxury empire didn't start this way. In 1967 from a small office in the Empire State Building, Ralph Lauren launched Polo, wide, colorful neckties that stood out in an era of thinner styles. Over the next two decades, Ralph Lauren branched into full men's and women's collections. And created cultural touch points like outfitting Team USA. By the 2010s, the company was stretched too thin. Ralph Lauren was suffering from brand dilution with excessive discounting, multiple sub-brands, and an overreliance on struggling department stores. By 2018, revenue had fallen more than 16% in just two years. The Ralph Lauren story was growing by leaps and bounds for years, and then One could argue it overextended itself. What was your feeling about how to address that? Yeah, I think it happens to a lot of companies across industries, right? Great success, high expectations of continued great success, and when there's pressure like that, there's a temptation to broaden distribution. There's a temptation to increase promotional activity. I think of it as the boiled frog phenomenon, which is you say, just do a little bit, just a little bit more. It'll be fine. It won't impact us overall. But as you do more and more of that little bit, ultimately you're damaging the brand. Our challenge was here in the US where we went too broad, we were too promotional, and um we had to pull back. And yes, it's painful, but it's mandatory. Now Louve is steering Ralph Lauren into an era built on brand elevation. In recent years, the luxury brand has sharpened its focus on core products, attracted younger customers, improved the shopping experience, and pulled back from its heavy. Reliance on discounts and wholesale. So far it appears to be working with margins rising and revenue at a 9 year high. How did you get young people on board with this brand? We did a lot of work to understand what was relevant for the younger generation, where they wanted to shop, how they wanted to engage. Which values matter most to them and what we're finding is the Ralph Lauren values of authenticity, family, optimism, quality, timelessness, those resonate with that younger generation, and they resonate with that younger generation here in New York or in Shanghai or in Milan. Ralph Lauren reinforces those brand values through experiences from in-store coffee shops designed to draw in younger shoppers to long running sports partnerships that spotlight the brand. G's partnership with the US Open started 20 years ago. Wimbledon Australian Open, the Olympics. So if you look at where we are now, what we're finding is we want to celebrate what's on the court, but actually the thing that's most interesting is showing style in the audience, or the fans and how the fans dress and and how the styles varyond sports, Ralph Lauren shows continue to lean into spectacle. The 2024 Hampton show turned equestrian stables into a runway with supermodels Christy Turlington and Naomi Campbell walking before a celebrity packed crowd. At the same time, Ralph Lauren is wrapping up marketing and sharpening its retail strategy. In 2022, it singled out 30 global cities as key markets. It's fueling that push with its largest ever marketing budget, over half a billion dollars. There are a lot of cities in the world, there are, um, and a lot of cities that have a lot of shoppers. 30 only hits obviously a very small portion of it. What's the rationale for that? I think our experience and when you look at the industry. when you overextend yourself, you end up diluting the brand, you end up diluting your resources and therefore you end up diluting your performance. So listen, we're, we're not here for another quarter. We're not here for another 3 years. We're here for another 50 years. So we have plenty of time to go hit the other cities in the world. China for me is a wonderful example. I think there's still a lot of growth to be had in Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Chengdu, Taipei, Hong Kong, right? Those are massive cities, tens of millions of inhabitants. Once we feel like we're fully established, then we'll continue to drive that business and then we'll start to open the white space. You dilute yourself. You might see the benefits short term, but, but ultimately, it impedes your ability to perform consistently. Clothing and fashion, by definition, there is the risk of misfires. Tell me a little bit about for you, where's the balance between not playing it too safe, but also not going crazy with wild stuff that could flop. So we have the benefit of decades of Presenting core items that consumers know and recognize really well. Our cable knit sweaters, our polo shirts, our Oxford shirts, right? Our tree jackets, like quintessential RA one. That's job one. Job one is how do we continue to present that, animate that, engage the new generation with these types of products, right, and this ability to leverage our core products across generations, I think has served us really well. Women's wear and handbags have also become major growth engines. Women's Wear alone now brings in about $2 billion a year, and in the last fiscal year, Ralph Lauren's bag sales jumped by a double digit percentage. 56% of our shoppers and stores online are actually Whitman. It's less than 1/3 of our business. So for us it's a massive opportunity. Within that, we realized that the handbag category was significantly underdeveloped for us. It's part of the overall lifestyle, and we've gotten some really nice traction behind some of the more recentensitization. These moves have helped Ralph Lauren sidestep the challenges facing much of the luxury market. In 2024, the luxury industry saw its first major slowdown since the Great Recession, as shoppers questioned whether high-end fashion still delivered on quality and creativity. Luxury giants like LVMH, Burberry, and Caring all missed revenue targets that year. While some companies responded by pushing prices higher, Ralph Lauren says it doubled down on its core values. What do stores need to be for you? What does a typical Ralph Lauren store have to? Do to really justify its existence. It needs to be an experience, right, because I can get the products online. It needs to be a place where, you know, you, you, you want to come, you want to discover it, you want to have an amazing engagement with sales associates. You want to discover the different dimensions of the raw For lifestyle. You might not buy the first time, but you'll come back and want to feel that. And that's the bar that we set for ourselves. Like many companies in the luxury retail space, Ralph Lauren is also experimenting with artificial intelligence. We dreamt of the day when we'd be able to do something like this. That's David Lauren, the company's chief branding and innovation officer, and the son of founder Ralph Lauren. In September, he helped launch Ask Ralph, a generative AI shopping tool that lets customers ask style questions and get product recommendations. David, tell me a little bit about Ask Ralph, the AI style assistant. I mean, how long have you been working on it? What customer did you have most in mind when this was being developed? Yeah. Well, the idea for Ask Ralph really started 25 years ago. We launched Ralph Lauren.com, which was really the first luxury fashion website. At the time, we had a sort of archaic version of Style Guide, where Ralph Lauren himself actually answered style questions and it was very popular. When you get dressed in the morning, clothes help give you a sense of confidence, a sense of identity, a sense of who you are and who you want to be, and the ability to pull out of your back pocket. You know, a companion to help give you that sensibility is Ralph. So literally our dream one day is that Ralph himself will be using this to gut check an idea. The company says that what sets this tool apart is its use of Ralph Lauren's full inventory to suggest complete brand approved outfits. Ask Ralph can answer prompts and offer curated looks pulled directly from its collections. Do you see this as a tool that in-store employees could use as they help a customer as well? I think the goal of this is to not only help our our customers, but to help our own employees. The better educated our team can be, the more consistent our voice can be all around the world, the more valuable it's going to be. In many ways. Ask Ralph is a new employee. Even as Ralph Lauren regains its cultural cachet, the wider fashion industry is battling economic headwinds. Shoppers are becoming more price conscious, especially in the US, where discount and value-focused retailers like TJ Maxx are thriving. That pressure has forced Ralph Lauren to rethink how it reaches customers. During COVID, Love leaned into his strategy to open more Ralph Lauren stores and continue exiting weak department stores. As for supply chain, it now stretches from Vietnam to Peru, and the brand is well positioned to weather global trade disruptions, including tar force. Before all the terrorist drama of 2025. Ralph Lauren had done a lot of work to not be too reliant on the same suppliers. Can you tell me a little bit about what that looks like now and what was the rationale for doing that? We were very dependent when when our team started some 89 years ago on A few geographies from the sourcing standpoint, uh, and a few suppliers. And in an environment that's uncertain and volatile, you cannot do that, right? So significant diversification. Now, there's not one market that's more than 20%. We generally have dual sourcing, if not triple sourcing. Across our entire portfolio. The other piece is agility, and I don't think people would have used the term agility to describe Ralph Lauren 10 years ago. And I think in a world that's so dynamic, the ability to be nimble, move production from market A to market B, and I'm actually really proud of the work that teams have done on this one because I think agility is a is a unique strength. Ralph Lauren Ralph Lauren also carries the weight of being a symbol of Americana at a time sentiment abroad towards the US is shifting. Despite these pressures, Ralph Lauren continues to anchor itself in the vision laid out by its founder. So I want to ask you a little bit about um your working relationship with Mr. Lauren himself. Tell us a little bit about how you work with him. Ralph and I spent a lot of time upfront, making sure we're on the same page, making sure we had a consistent ambition for the company, making sure that we valued the same things, value with a big V, and making sure that we were all, we were going to push the same direction. And we talked about what business are we in, right? Because I think that's a fundamental question for all companies is just clarity on what business are you really in. And we concluded that we were in the dreams business, not in the apparel business, not in the fashion business, we're in the dreams business.

Wayfair thrived during the pandemic, scaling to over 30 million products and rising to #217 on the Fortune 500. But after a post-COVID slump, it’s rethinking its strategy. In 2024, the company opened its first large-format retail store and rolled out new AI tools to reimagine how people shop for their homes. Here’s how Wayfair is betting on technology and in-person retail to power its next chapter in a crowded home-goods market.


How Wayfair’s Betting on AI to Future Proof its $12B Empire 

Wayfair is betting big on AI and physical retail to reconnect with shopper

Wayfair thrived during the pandemic, scaling to over 30 million products and rising to #217 on the Fortune 500. But after a post-COVID slump, it’s rethinking its strategy

How Wayfair Built a $12 Billion Home Retail Empire 

Wayfair built its multi-billion dollar business by selling home goods online, eventually scaling to more than 30 million products. Today, it's the largest online home goods retailer in the United States, but after a pandemic boom in sales, growth slumped, and so did the company's stock price. Now Wayfair is pivoting. In 2024, it stepped into physical retail with its first large format store. At the same time, it's betting on AI to streamline operations and reimagine how shoppers discover furniture. So we've been using the sort of text to image generation capability to generate an AI to be able to showcase a whole bunch of different images that our customers can then react to and say, oh, I like this. Here's how Wayfair built a $12 billion home goods empire. And how it's using AI and big box retail to fuel its next chapter. Founded in 2002 as a network of niche furniture sites, Wayfair evolved into a sprawling online marketplace. It now offers over 30 million products from around 20,000 suppliers. It also runs a lineup of lifestyle and luxury brands. The main basic difference between Wayfair and some of its other home furnishing competitors is that it is a marketplace platform, so they don't own any of their inventory. Everything is just forward position. on their site so that consumers can use it from the many vendors that they work with. Unlike many of its competitors, Wayfair doesn't manufacture or own its inventory. Instead, it connects shoppers with third party suppliers. This dropship business model allowed Wayfair to scale quickly, offering an enormous product catalog while keeping fixed costs low. Having these relationships with some of these smaller vendors is really unique in that it's a More visible way for the vendors to reach a much broader total addressable market. It helps elevate the business of small vendors while it also helps provide more choices to consumers for Wayfair. During the pandemic, that model helped the company thrive. Sales surged by 45% in 2020 as consumers redecorated during lockdowns. The next year, Wayfair shot up the Fortune 500 rankings, climbing more than 100. 30 spots to land at number 217. When we look back at COVID, that clearly accelerated e-commerce adoption across a number of categories, things like grocery and furniture. We saw the share price really rise to around $350 a share, but post-pandemic demand cooled as interest rates climbed and inflation pinched household budgets. Spending on big ticket furniture slowed. Wayfair's stock lost over 80% of its. between 2021 and early 2023, investors realized things are going to reopen. People are traveling. They're eating at restaurants again, and it wasn't idiosyncratic to Wayfair. It was across the industry, right? All of the peers really saw that phenomenon. Major home retailers like Bed Bath and Beyond filed for bankruptcy in 2023, shuttering hundreds of stores around the country. Despite declining sales post pandemic, Wayfair was. A to weather the market volatility. You know, if you look at somebody like Bed Bath and Beyond, there were liquidity issues. Interestingly, despite the fact that really Wayfair isn't generating a whole lot of profitability, the way that the capital structure works is that they don't really need that same sort of liquidity. But as the online home retail market has become more crowded, Wayfair is looking for ways to improve its e-commerce model and its customer experience. So we've been applying AI for quite some time, probably over a decade. The more recent advancements are allowing us to take that to yet another level. Fiona Tan is Wayfair's chief technology officer. Over the last few years, she has helped lead the company's investments in AI. It's a category where it's hard for our customers sometimes to describe what they're looking for. And then sometimes they don't really even know what they're looking for, so we've been using the sort of text to image generation capability to generate a AI to be able to showcase, you know, a whole bunch of different images that our customers can then react to and say, oh, I like this. I didn't know, I don't know what it's called, but it speaks to me. In 2025, Wayfair debuted a generative AI platform called Muse. The tool allows shoppers to curate AI generated home designs in certain styles. From there, the platform will recommend Wayfair products that fit the look. And then you can even tailor it a little bit more and just say, OK, well I like this, but I prefer green chairs instead of beige, and as you interact with muse, it'll generate you another image based on what you're saying. As the customers are inspired and engaged more with us, we're able to discern better what the intent and what their style preferences are, maybe what the budget preferences are, and then it allows us. And then recommend products for them. Waver says that level of personalization may help reduce return rates by giving customers more confidence in their purchases because the customers are more confident of the products that they buy or they've been able to get more information about it, ideally what you also see is there are fewer returns, right, because you're able to help them make um more. Informed decisions. Behind the scenes, Wayfair's legal, HR, and finance teams are also using AI to process data faster and streamline operations. For example, our legal teams using it to be able to look at, you know, user reviews to look for items that may have caused any kind of injury, and then you'll have examples in the technology department. Our accounting and finance team is also leveraging it. So it's really across the enterprise. While AI is helping to streamline Wayfair's digital operations, the company is also testing a more traditional strategy opening physical stores. In May 2024, Wayfair opened its first large format retail store in Wilma, Illinois, just outside of Chicago. The 150,000. A square foot store features showrooms, interior design services, and a cafe. Instead of spending marketing dollars on digital spend, you're spending your marketing dollars on physical spend. While competitors like William Sonoma benefit from built-in visibility through their retail locations, Wayfair has had to rely more heavily on advertising. every, every home. In 2024, they spent about 12% of their net revenue on advertising, while competitors like William Sonoma spent about 7% and Restoration Hardware only spent 4%. Wayfair leans into advertising a little bit more because it's hard to remain visible when you're an e-commerce only retailer, right? And so, You know, reminding consumers that you exist isn't free. Wayfair's new store location sits strategically along a major commuter highway. Since the opening of the store, Wayfair says sales in Illinois have jumped around 15%. Based on early results, Wayfair plans to open two more large format stores, one in Atlanta, Georgia and another in Yonkers, New York. Still, when it comes to home goods, Wayfair operates in a competitive and fragmented landscape. While the company holds the top spot for largest online home goods retailer in the US, it's only by a small margin, very fragmented, very hard to have a competitive advantage. We think Wayfair is one of a number of competitors that are really struggling. To avoid discounting and reinvent themselves in different ways to remain relevant to consumers. Big box retailers like Walmart, Target, and IKEA all sell home goods with the added advantage of physical stores, tight logistics, and brand familiarity. Other high-end home goods companies like RH and Pottery Barn offer in-person shopping that build a more luxury customer experience. It's a lot easier to be top of mind when you are a pottery barn in a mall or a RH that has a freestanding store and a restaurant, and it's an experience, but we. moves into brick and mortar stores and AI are helping to close that gap. So one of the capabilities again of AI and also generative AI is our ability to understand, have a deeper understanding of the products that we sell, discerning the color, the size, dimensions. Some of it's in the product details, sometimes there may be errors and it can also augment and enrich the information. That we get from our suppliers, so we're doing a lot in the customer experience. I do think AI will help young people sort of get their head around how they want to plan their smaller spaces, but also, you know, the accessible price points that is that Wayfair offers also helps bring those consumers in, and I think that a lot of that is their their main consumer.

Fortune sits down with Keurig Dr Pepper CEO Tim Cofer to explore how the $15B beverage giant is outpacing rivals like Pepsi. Cofer breaks down the company’s bold strategy—expanding in energy drinks, innovating in coffee with plastic-free K-Rounds, and navigating inflation and tariffs. Here's how KDP is rewriting the rules of the beverage business under its new leadership.

How Keurig Dr Pepper's $15B Empire Beat Out Pepsi

Fortune sits down with Keurig Dr Pepper CEO Tim Cofer to explore how the $15B beverage giant is outpacing rivals like Pepsi. 

You may not know it, but all the drinks here are owned by just one company, Keurig Dr. Pepper. We have a dawn to dusk portfolio that literally covers every demand space and every need that a consumer has in terms of beverages. KDP generated $15 billion in revenue last year. We put the consumer at the center of everything we do here at Keurig Dr Pepper with both legacy brands. Like Green Mountain and newer brands like Ghost Energy, they've invested a lot to keep up. What up y'all? I got my hands on the new Dr. Pepper BlackBerry. Let's try this. Having that relationship with the consumer, understanding what's important in their lives, understanding the cultural moments that really define that younger generation, Gen Z. and then tapping into it in a very authentic one of a kind way. Smash or pass. Classic Dr. Peppermash. And though Dr. Pepper just overtook Pepsi as the 2nd best selling soft drink in North America, their coffee business is cooling off. Can Keurig Dr. Pepper re up another wave of growth. Yeah, this is one that I really like, although I always get the bottles. The big news is that Dr. Pepper has just gone to #2 among all soft drinks. The milestone that you just referenced is one that's been really years in the making. I think it's a combination of many factors. I point to innovation. I'd point to marketing and sales excellence. This is a brand unique, one of a kind, oldest soda brand in America since 1885, but a really unique personality. In 1885, 1 year before the birth of Coca-Cola, a pharmacist in Waco, Texas famously mixed 23 soda fountain syrups in an experiment to recreate the drugstore's aroma. The blend became Dr. Pepper. Fast forward 140 years, the soda is one of the most popular in North America, and in 2018, Keurig Green Mountain and Dr. Pepper Snapple Group merged in a nearly $19 billion deal to form Keurig Dr. Pepper. All right, here's some cold beverage. Let's look at some of these. Today the Beverage Powerhouse has over 125 hot and cold drink brands, and in recent years, Dr. Pepper has seen a surge in popularity. Y'all, we can make us a dirty soda. Let's make a dirty soda just like the Mormons do. Dirty soda. It's been a thing in Utah for years where people started spiking soda with everything from cream to flavored syrup. Delish. All right, that's it. Goodbye. You have appealed to a much younger audience here. Was that an intentional strategy? How did that happen? We put the consumer at the center of everything we do here at Keurig Dr. Pepper, having that relationship with the consumer, understanding what's important in their lives. Understanding the cultural moment really defining that younger generation Gen Zennials, that was kind of the impetus of us picking up on this dirty soda trend and that allowed us to drive that great new innovation really winning marketing across the patch. Here's our ghost lineup C4, that performance brand, fitness brand, Bloom, a more female forward brand started by a young lady and then Black Rifle veteran focused. The energy drink market has exploded in recent years, fueled by a younger demographic, wellness trends, and a demand for functional beverages once dominated by. Red Bull and Monster, the category is seeing new players. Cur Dr. Pepper, historically absent from the core energy segment, is now making strategic moves to catch up. What we saw a few years ago is an opportunity to continue to shape our portfolio in a way that would be more growth accretive. We love our position in carbonated soft drinks. We knew there were other verticals like energy, like sports hydration, where we had an opportunity to participate more meaningfully. And so energy is our is our latest big bet. 3 years ago we were nonexistent in energy. Today we have over a 6 market share, and I have an ambition to be a double digit market share player here in a couple of years. One of Keurig Dr. Pepper's competitive advantages is DSD, its direct store delivery network. While many beverage companies rely on third party distributors, KDP owns and operates a vast logistics system that delivers products directly to retail shelves. In the beverage industry, DSD direct store delivery, is a scarce asset and it's a critical asset because the consumer is looking for that beverage wherever she shops and needs it right then and ideally needs it cold, right? So DSD direct store delivery is a big source of competitive advantage and it's one of the reasons why we attract so many partners, partners who might not have that critical distribution. One of the highly unusual things about the company was the combination of hot and cold. What power did you see in that combination? You know, I'd start once again at a consumer level. We have a dawn to dusk portfolio that literally covers every demand space and every need that a consumer has in terms of beverages. This is one of our newest brewers in terms of the intersection of hot and cold. This is called the K Brew and Chill. This is the first brewer that actually makes cold coffee to the touch. As COVID began, KDP used data from home coffee makers to foresee a spike in demand after a sudden shift to the stay at home economy. The then CEO ramped production and secured big shipments of cans well before rivals saw the way of building, but as more Americans returned to offices and cafes, demand for at-home coffee began to soften. We love our coffee business. We have over a $4 billion coffee business, and coffee remains today a ubiquitous category. In fact, coffee is second only to water as the most consumed beverage today. Indeed, to your point, however, of late, you've seen coffee under pressure, and so we're really playing the long game on coffee. Coffee will come back and when it does, we're going to be really well positioned to capitalize it, including a revolutionary new system that we'll be launching here in the next year or so. So this is KA Sean, the new system. This is obviously a prototype we're actually just went into beta testing in consumer homes. No plastic, no aluminum, 100% coffee you can. I mean, smell that. That's just nothing but coffee. With a plant-based coating. We're disrupting ourselves with a sustainable option that is plastic-free, aluminum free K rounds. As the beverage landscape evolves, Keurig Dr. Pepper is betting that a diversified portfolio and a powerful distribution engine will keep it competitive even as consumer tastes continue to shift. Give that a try. So it's your favorite ginger ale with a real splash of cherry juice. It's terrific.

Adobe is going all-in on AI, integrating generative and agentic tools across its Creative and Experience Clouds. As the company shifts its strategy, creative and marketing professionals—especially newcomers—face growing pressure to keep up. Here’s what Adobe’s AI push means for the future of creative and marketing work.

Adobe’s Secret Weapon in the AI Race? Trust—and Millions of Subscribers

Adobe is doubling down on AI by integrating generative and agentic tools into its platforms. 

Adobe is going all-in on AI, integrating generative and agentic tools across its Creative and Experience Clouds. As the company shifts its strategy, creative and marketing professionals—especially newcomers—face growing pressure to keep up. 

For decades, Adobe set the standard in creative software. Tools like Photoshop and Premiere helped define entire industries and shape creative careers. But in recent years, the company has been staking its claim in the fast moving world of artificial intelligence by embedding generative and now agentic AI directly into its legacy products. And creators are noticing Doby's new AI called Firefly. They've done a very good job of taking that loyal following and producing Gen AI in the format that most of those developers have been used to. And Adobe's ambitions don't stop at creative software. The company is now releasing AI tools that are transforming how global brands deliver marketing campaigns. But these transformations across the industry are raising tough questions about AI's role in creative fields and who benefits from this new era of automation. Junior creatives are being pressed by the market to react in AI timing, which is light speed. Here's a closer look at how Adobe is adapting to the AI era and how it's helping to shape the future of creativity and marketing. For years, Adobe sold box software like Photoshop, Illustrator, and Premiere for a flat fee. That changed in 2012, when it moved to a subscription-only model with Creative Cloud. Definitely a cloud. Subscriptions gave Adobe a steady predictable revenue stream and allowed it to update products continuously. They've moved from where you buy the product and then can use it essentially for free from there on out to charging on their way. That's Steven Messer, the co-founder of an AI sales company called Collective Eye. With over a decade of experience in the field, he's had a front row seat to the AI boom. The speed at which its adoption took place, the speed at which people learned to write prompts, prompt engineering was a word that no one had ever heard of, but the speed at which they did that was unfathomable. Gen AI has really changed the creative world dramatically. By 2022, Generative AI was already reshaping how creative work got done. Tools like OpenAI's Dolly and startups like Midourney let users generate high quality images in seconds. No traditional software needed. And when you ask Dolly for an image of a koala bear riding a motorcycle, it knows how to create that or anything else with a relationship to another object or action. After years of layering smaller AI features into its tools, Adobe made its biggest move in 2023 with the commercial launch of Adobe Firefly. Unlike newer AI startups, Adobe integrated generative AI into familiar tools across its Creative cloud, giving it a head start with a built-in audience. Across its Creative Cloud and acrobat applications, the company reaches over 750 million monthly active users. I think Adobe has a loyal base of customers, so a user of their products can just incorporate GenAI as part of their workflow as opposed to having to learn entirely new applications. Similar to other generative AI tools, Adobe Firefly can generate high quality images and video from text prompts, but it goes further, powering tools within creative cloud apps like Generative Fill and Expand in Photoshop. Watch. Boom, and text to vector graphics in Illustrator. Take your sketch from this to this in seconds. Adobe has a legacy of people who know how to use those products very well, which means they're already trained, they're already efficient. They know what they're doing, so if they want to create something very specific, then make it 3D, then have it do different things or be in different environments. Now you're talking about taking that creative license of a professional and just blowing it out um in a much more efficient. And the company is also taking a more cautious approach to AI training. Many AI platforms train their models by scraping content from across the web, raising copyright concerns. The New York Times suing OpenAI, the creator of Chat GPT, and Microsoft for copyright infringement. But Adobe says Firefly is different, trained only on licensed and public domain content. Unlike a lot of other software companies, they've actually chosen to build most. Their Gen AI on their own. Their argument is that it's always licensed creative that they're using, so that anything that's that's going to train their Gen AI is going to be safe from threats of copyright infringement, trademark infringement, etc. And so their real goal is to go out there and say this is a safe environment. But Adobe is far from alone in this space. In just two years, the generative AI market has exploded from a market of 191 million. In 2022 to more than 25 billion in 2024. When you see foundation models coming up at the speed they're coming up, it is all over the map. It's not just meta, which is a risk to them. It's not just runway. It's not just mid journey. It's literally a range of people coming out of nowhere, and it might be people building on top of those models. Competitors like OpenAI, Canva, Sigma, Runway, Stability AI, and Mid Journey are moving fast. With some AI first tools that can be simpler and cheaper than Adobe's offerings, the risk they run is that their loyal audience looks and says, Wait a second, this new tool actually is easier or is faster or is cheaper or is better, and if I don't use this new thing, I'm going to lose in the overall game of competition. Meanwhile, tech giants like Google, Microsoft, and Meta are flooding the space with their own generative AI models. I look at that. When they released their new Llaa model, they came out with a cartoon version of everyone, and everyone quickly flew on to Meta to make a cartoon version of themselves. Well, that is the risk to Adobe. You've never seen the speed at which people are willing to change products just to get one capability that is at the edge or really hot and exciting. But Adobe still dominates when it comes to the creative software market, commanding over 80% of market share in 2024. But the rise of generative AI like Adobe Firefly is reshaping how creative work is done and who gets to do it, especially for junior talent breaking into the industry. Junior creatives are being pressed by the market to react in AI timing, which is light speed. Bruno Lemgruber is an associate professor of design at the University of Southern California and a creative director at Tabaruba Design with over 2. Decades of experience in the industry. So things have shifted in such a dramatic way. Before, you would do something in a week or in 40 hours and now you can do it in 1/10 of the time. And if the market is pressing people to respond in AI timing, then you're being neglected the time to reflect and to use critical thinking. And for senior designers, senior creators. You have enough experience to know what you're skipping, but if you're a junior, you're actually skipping a learning curve. AI is also changing the structure of creative teams. Tasks once given to interns or junior staff can now be done instantly with generative tools. Before, I would have interns or junior designers to try things that I kind of have a vague idea that will probably not work, but I say, hey, let's try it out. Now I can quickly experiment that with AI. There are many things that before you would require junior creatives to be involved. And now you don't need them. When it comes to the creative process, AI has advantages too, like saving time and making it easier to experiment. AI gives you the time because you didn't invest like hundreds of hours. You can quickly experiment, prototype something. Do I like that? Is there where I wanted to go? No, it's not. And like. and do it again. You're not stuck on like, oh, I already spent like 200 hours. I need to keep going. Now some creative professionals say they're under pressure not just to use AI, but prove they're keeping up in design and creative direction in general, if you don't embrace AI, you're most likely going to become irrelevant. As creatives adapt to a shifting landscape, Adobe is pushing beyond generative AI into what's known as agentic AI or AI agents. While generative AI creates content based on data patterns, Agentic AI acts more like a digital assistant, automating multi-step processes. Agenic AI is generally a new concept that people are talking about, and this is where the AI does its own thing on its own, and it starts to make decisions on behalf of the end user for you. Adobe is integrating these AI agents into its creative cloud and marketing products like Gen Studio and the recently launched Agent Orchestrator. The company says these tools help marketers streamline their entire content supply chain. Adobe Gen Studio for performance marketing lets marketers create their own on-brand email, paid social ads, and display ads. The tools are built to automate tasks like asset creation and performance tracking, helping brands scale and adapt campaigns more efficiently, and that strategy appears to be driving results. In fiscal year 2024, Adobe reported record breaking revenue with joint creative and marketing enterprise deals growing by more than 100% year over year. I don't think people have been paying enough attention to Adobe's approaches to Gen AI. They are doing some pretty interesting things. They are playing with different ways to incorporate Gen AI into existing products, but I don't know if they've really gotten the attention of the world, and I think that's what people keep waiting for is what are they doing on the frontier that's really going to blow people away.

Trek CEO, John Burke, takes us inside the company’s high-stakes race to stay ahead in a rapidly shifting cycling industry. As e-bikes surge in popularity, supply chains evolve, and consumer habits change, Burke shares how Trek is adapting its strategy to lead the pack. From innovation and sustainability to manufacturing and tariff trouble, Burke sheds light on the challenges and opportunities of the billion-dollar family business.

Trek built a $2B business. Now Tariffs are jeopardizing its future.

Trek CEO, John Burke, takes us inside the company’s high-stakes race to stay ahead in a rapidly shifting cycling industry.

Bikes might just have pedals, but they're powering an industry worth over $60 billion globally. High-end cycling has seen a renaissance in the past decade, fueled by a surge in e-bike popularity and a wave of amateur road racers investing in pro-level gear. Few companies have ridden that wave more successfully than Trek. Trek has doubled in size over the past decade, taking its $1 billion revenue in 2016 to $2 billion in 2024. But now the company faces global economic headwinds. Tariffs, how have they affected track? Huge. You know, we're an international business. Put in the chat GPT, chances of a successful 49-year-old company lasting 100 years, and the answer came back 8%. And so I play against that number every day. So with the increased economic uncertainty, how will Trek maneuver to stay relevant in a volatile landscape? The bicycle has always had a boom and bust relationship with American consumers from explosive growth in the 1890s and 1970s to sharp crashes just years after those. The industry has had to recover countless times, and out of the ashes, Preck was born in 1976. My first day at Trek, the training program was one day. I graduated from school, went home, got my wisdom teeth pulled, and the next day I was at Trek, and I remember my first boss, Joel Holden, he told me, he said all the great salespeople drive on Sunday, and I lived in the Rocky Mountains. And I had like 12 states and so I would always drive on Sunday um just to get be in position for Monday morning. John Burke took over as CEO in 1997 from his father, who founded the company in 1976 in Waterloo, Wisconsin. 1982 I was in college and my dad, he wanted to go on a bike trip and so we went out to Colorado. He always loved challenges. He thought it'd be super cool if we could climb Independence Pass. and so early one morning he and I climbed up Independence Pass, and that's been a famous photo. We have a saying, a track called Think Bigger Than the Barn. Tell me about the Red Barn. Well, this is where it all started. Red Barn downtown Waterloo, Wis. 1976, I think the first year there were 6 employees and they made about 700 bikes and you know, a lot of times during the day I'll just walk down to the red barn and back and I feel something when I go down there and it keeps me focused. So I love the red barn. As you were a kid, the company was rising. The day you start, it crashes. What facilitates that crash? I think it was arrogant. I think it was not focusing on the customer. It was kind of focused Trek focused on Trek and Trek didn't take care of the customer and then they got into some product issues and it kind of went downhill from there. My father came in and he took over running the business, and he studied the business for 2 or 3 months and said we're gonna have a quality product at a competitive value and we're going to deliver it on time and that's it. And it sounds so boring today, but at that time Trek was doing none of those things. Now imagine, say theoretically you're someone like me who has not ridden a bike in a while. Where would you recommend I start? If you haven't ridden a bike and you want to get into biking? One of the things I'd really recommend is an e-bike. Can I show you my favorite e-bike? Yes, I love this bike, and the reason I love it is because I have one. And the one thing about e-bikes is anyone who rides one has a huge smile on their face every single time. I mean, you get on a bike, it's unbelievable. You can do 2 X, 3 X 4X, where you could usually do. Once considered a niche product, e-bikes are now one of the fastest growing segments in cycling, projected to top $50 billion worldwide by 2030. Trek has leaned into the electric surge, expanding its e-bike lineup across mountain, road, and city models. E-bikes have been a big part of Trek's growth. It's a big part of our sales right now, but if you take a look at racing bikes, We do really well in racing bikes. The unit volume isn't that high. The dollar volume is really high, and we have a really strong brand there. When Lance Armstrong, a trek athlete, rose to fame after multiple Tour de France wins, his celebrity status had a huge impact. Not only did the bike industry see a boost in interest, Trek specifically saw an increase in sales and cultural interest, dubbing it the Lance effect. The global racing bike market is now valued at $7 billion. Tell me a little bit about Trek's customer. Some of these bikes are thousands of dollars. Who is a Trek customer? Well, you know, just a quote that it's always stuck into my head is, you can judge the greatness of a person not at one extremity, but by their ability to touch both at the same time. We saw a lot of kids' bikes, really cool kids' bikes. But then we sell a lot of $15,000 Project one custom bikes. We touch both extremities and everything in between. Are you looking to expand in those categories, or are you still right sizing after the pandemic? Oh, we're always looking to expand. When COVID-19 hit in 2020, global supply chains ground to a halt, but bike demand exploded. With gyms closed and mass transit viewed as a health risk, people turned to bicycles and droves. For many, it was a safe solo way to stay active or simply get outside. For others, it became a critical form of urban transport. The explosion of interest made bike companies. Ramp up manufacturing. What was happening is a lot of retailers were placing just a ton of orders because they couldn't get everything they wanted, so they just kept placing orders and we're like, God, we're geniuses, and we were not geniuses. And so we kept producing more and more and then the music stopped and there were 5060 day lead times had grown to 500. lead times and so you had this massive amount of inventory. I was reading somewhere where you sort of said something to the effect of trek has to be an international business. That's part of what success looks like, but it is a very difficult time to be an international business. brutal. OK, so yeah, I love how we're we're already here. Yeah, tariffs, how have they affected trek? Huge. You know, we're an international business. We design products in the United States, we build products in the United States, we source products in Asia. We have a large factory in Europe. We do more than 50% of our business outside the United States. We're a global company. And we've got tariff policies that are changing on a constant basis. I'm just telling you, we just increased our prices last week 10%. Tariffs can have a massive impact on a company that potentially can have a huge impact on employment levels. Over 50% of Trek's business is done outside the United States. Why would it be difficult for Trek to move all of its manufacturing to the United States? Yeah, you know, we actually This goes back to the mid 90s. We actually had a manufacturing plant that built a lot of volume bikes in the US and it's really hard because the infrastructure doesn't exist. There are not frame manufacturers. There aren't parts manufacturers. Like you can't buy tires, you don't have rim suppliers. You don't have brake suppliers, you don't have crank suppliers. All that business is gone. It hasn't been in the US for 40 years. It doesn't exist. So to snap your fingers and go, let's reshore everything. By the time you resor stuff and started at that, you're 5 years down the road. And for people to think that you can just go like that, you can't. So what are we looking at here? This is one of the most famous moments in trek history. It was maybe 6 or 7 years ago somebody came back and they said, Do you really know what's going on with women's cycling? And I said, No. And they said, Well, they don't make any money. They stay in the worst hotels. They get the worst amount of support, and I was like, Oh, brutal. And I said well why don't we buy a team and we'll do it the right way. And so we started our own cycling team and there's a race called Perry Rubay and it's only for men and it is the most difficult roads in Belgium in that area and it's all cobbles and it's just really hard. They added a women's event. It was 2019 and that's Lizzie Begman and that's the year Lizzie won the first Perry Rube. What does the future of bicycling in the US look like and where does that intersect with the future of track? I think bicycling in the United States is important for a bunch of different reasons. Number one is just exercise. If you take a look at it today, 42% of Americans are obese. The government helped to bring smoking down. The government helped take care of drunk driving. I think the government can play a Bigger role with the health of the American people and the biggest aspect of that is getting people outside and getting people exercising. So I think that's one thing, you know, I just take a look at transportation, you know, a majority of car trips are 2 miles or less, and would you rather drive a car 2 miles or less, or would you rather be on a bike or would you rather be walking in the United States, if we define a car trip. And we say going to work, going to school, going to the restaurant, going to the market, 1.5% of trips are taken by bicycle. If you go to Holland, that number is 25%, and you have to say from a societal standpoint, do we want more and more people driving cars. or would it be really good if people rode their bikes or walked? And I think for physical health, mental health, healthcare costs, we need to get the country moving, and I think cycling is one way that you can do that.

American Express is winning over Gen-Z by offering curated experiences and personalized rewards that resonate with younger audiences. In 2023, Gen Z accounted for 75% of new American Express Platinum and Gold cardholders, drawn to benefits like exclusive event access and dining perks. This video explores how Amex's strategy of tapping into experiential rewards is transforming the credit card landscape and setting new standards for customer loyalty. 

How Gen-Z Made Amex Cool 

In the first quarter of 2025, Millennials and Gen Z drove over 60% of new global Amex sign-ups. 

American Express built its brand on elite travel benefits and luxury perks – but now it’s shifting to win over a younger audience: Gen Z. 

American Express built its brand on elite travel benefits and luxury perks, but now it's shifting to win over a younger audience, Gen Z. That's the powerful backing of American Express. In the first quarter of 2025, Millennials and Gen Z drove over 60% of new global Amex signups fueled in part by influencer-driven buzz. Hear me out. Get the platinum AMEX card. It's metal and it goes. Things at the heart of this growth is Amex's loyalty and rewards program. So especially as everything costs more, if you can get champagne travel on a beer budget, that's a lot of what Gen Z and millennials are trying to achieve. Here's a closer look at how this 170-year-old credit card giant is evolving to stay relevant with the next generation of cardholders. For decades, American Express was the go to card for luxury travelers and the business elite, built on prestige and premium perks. My name is Tina Fey. Oh, go right in. Really, that worked. Are you aware that you can access over 120 lounges simply by showing the platinum card? But that image. and its older customer base is shifting. In 2023 alone, Gen Z and Millennials accounted for 75% of Amex's new platinum and gold card accounts. Gen Zers are actually bigger risk takers with their money. They came of age though at a different time. It was actually around the pandemic time when money was actually flowing freely. People got all that stimulus money. A lot of Gen Z's introduction to money, at least in adulthood, was more gambling on meme stocks and crypto. We've actually seen Gen Zers proving a lot more risk takers with their money, and that includes taking on debt and also taking on riskier investments. A study from TransUnion found 84% of Gen Z consumers aged 22 to 24. Had at least one credit card by the end of 2023. That's a 23% higher rate than millennials at the same age a decade ago. Millennials were famously debt averse, very slow to get credit cards, perhaps because they have hefty student loan burdens, and many grew up around the time of the financial crisis. Gen Z spends differently too. Unlike older generations who prioritized travel upgrades in airport lounges, Gen Z is putting more of their money towards experiences. and lifestyle, and Amex is leaning in. They'll get you a free global entry or TSA PreCheck membership. They have their own special lounges at certain music festivals and sporting events. You get a little bit off your media subscriptions. You get a little bit off Uber. You get a little bit off these food delivery apps, but it is sticky and it keeps people coming back for more. Amex's business model makes it uniquely positioned to build out this rewards ecosystem. Unlike many of its competitors that just run the payment networks, Amex operates in a closed loop system. That means it handles everything in-house, functioning as the issuer, the acquirer, and the network. Amex has a unique business model in that they're both a lender and a payment processor. Visa and Mastercard dominate the network side of things, but they're not lenders. They're not extending credit. Amex is playing both sides of that. That full picture view. From both shoppers and merchants gives Amex an advantage. It knows where customers are spending and can tailor company rewards to keep them coming back. There's something about getting 4x points when paying for dinner with this card that just hits different. Gen Z and millennials use their Amex cards for dining nearly twice as much as other generations, according to the company. Amex saw an opportunity and moved fast. In 2019, the company acquired Resi, a restaurant reservation platform that Cardholders early access to in-demand tables, and in 2024 it expanded its dining ecosystem by acquiring the high-end restaurant booking service Talk, as well as Rome, a mobile payments app. When you're with Amex Gold, you can stack 4 times points on restaurants around the world. Amex has really leaned into dining as one of their key experiences. They have elevated dining rewards on a bunch of their credit cards, but Also relates to the experience aspect where they can help you book a table at a fancy restaurant. They can sometimes offer chef tutorials and meet and greets, and I'm right here in New York City for the American Express Platinum Coast dining experience. Amex also taps into brand partnerships to appeal to a younger audience. Y'all already know by now that my first job every single year at Coachella is always the Amex experience. Influencer marketing. It is a big deal. They do these activations at film festivals and concerts and music festivals and things like that. It is a way to reach young people. These rewards are designed to keep younger cardholders spending. This boosts transaction volume and in turn drives up revenue. Everybody wants a freebie, right? So especially as everything costs more, if you can get champagne travel on a beer budget, that's a lot of what Gen Z and millennials are trying to achieve. If it really keeps people loyal, keeps them spending. That loyalty has been key to Amex's growth, even with hefty annual fees, nearly $700 for premium cards like the platinum. Younger cardholders are still signing up. The annual fee thing is interesting because that shows how sticky their audience is that, you know, every so often, every few years, they introduce new features on a card and they raise the annual fee, and the renewal. Percentage is apparently very, very high. The people are loyal to these cards. They like the perks they're getting. The competition for these young and affluent spenders is fierce. The rewards race is on, and competitors like Chase, Capital One, and Mastercard are catching up. It's a copycat industry, and we're seeing a lot of that. Chase and Capital One are following the Amex playbook when it comes to luxury travel cards, getting you into the airport lounge, building out their own propriety. lounges. That was something that Amex really pioneered. Take the Chase Sapphire Reserve card. It offers premium travel perks, dining rewards, and access to lounges. Once a hallmark of Amex's platinum card. They have a lot more challengers now than they used to, and in fact, Capital One's a real up and coming competitor. They're in the process of acquiring Discover. That's going to make them an even more worthy competitor. They've been building out airport lounges. They've been in. Producing premium luxury travel cards. Chase had a big shot across the bow in 2016 when they introduced that Sapphire reserve card, and that's going toe to toe with Amex Platinum. And American Express is watching for more than just competition. It's also bracing for broader economic headwinds, including the potential impact of rising tariffs. Market volatility and investor jitters over tariffs already contributed to a dip in the company's stock price. are already worried about inflation and the high cost of living. If tariffs make that more expensive, there's a fear that we could tip into recession and that this could kind of be the straw that broke the camel's back. A recession is still bad news for any sort of payments provider. If people are spending less, that pie is shrinking. In its April 2025 earnings call, Amex CEO Steve Squareri acknowledged those risks, but pointed to the company's affluent customer base as a buffer. If you look at our card base now versus our card base in 2019, it is more premium than it was at that point with higher FICOs. And the other thing that I'll say, our millennial and Gen Zs are performing significantly better both from a FICO perspective and from a delinquency perspective than the industry. That high spending, low risk consumer base may help shield the company. From some economic turbulence, the companies that would likely fare the worst in a recession are those that cater to more of a subprime audience, those who have customers with lower incomes, lower credit scores. The Amex audience is very resilient. Delinquencies across the industry have gone up. They haven't gone up as much at Amex, and that's also reflective of the customer base and could bode at least better if there is a downturn.

Since Michelle Gass took the helm as CEO of Levi Strauss & Co. in January 2024, the company has been on a mission to reach $10 billion. Behind this vision is a fresh collection of luxury denim and streamlined go-to-market strategies designed to elevate the brand's status and reach new markets.

Inside Levi’s CEO’s growth plan: "We should be at least a $10B company"

Since Michelle Gass took the helm as CEO of Levi Strauss & Co. in January 2024, the company has been on a mission to reach $10 billion. Behind this vision is a fresh collection of luxury denim and streamlined go-to-market strategies.

Since Michelle Gass took the helm as CEO of Levi Strauss & Co. in January 2024, the company has been on a mission to reach $10 billion.

Just a few head of Levi's blue jeans and a lot of heart miles. You see, fashions may change, but quality never goes out of style. For over 170 years, Levi's has defined American Denim. The brand is now tightening its belt and cutting costs in efforts to reinvent itself and return value to shareholders. We made some tough calls. We made some really tough calls, and that was hard. The brand closed out the 2024 fiscal year with $6.4 billion in net revenue. That's 3% growth in Levi's CEO Michell. Goss's first year at the helm. Now we always have to be really tight in the DNA of the brand. Levi's stock price fluctuated throughout the year, going as high as $24 and as low as $15. The brand is up against fast fashion retailers and luxury giants that aim to rise above the competition in the denim market, but will slimming down costs and tapping into the luxury market be enough to expand its control in the denim wars? So big picture, what has been for you the biggest pleasant surprise? I think one of the most exciting things, and I'd also put it to your question, one of the most surprising things is how much of a lift this is around the culture. You know, Levi's, we've been around for 170 years now. There have been many chapters along the way, but Over the last couple of decades, we've operated largely as a product brand company selling through others, a wholesaler, and now we're saying, OK, we still are going to do that, but close to 50% of our business is GTC. And so when you have to make that level of change, and you can do all the process you want, but you've really, you've got to get the buy in of the hearts and minds of the teams and the people, and I know we have their hearts, you know, and we have their minds, but like what does that mean in practice? But hard decisions have also marked her tenure. The company exited its footwear products in Europe, parted ways with its affordable denizen catalog, and began conversations to sell off its Dockers brand. In January 2024, the denno company also announced it would slash up to 15% of its global corporate workforce, part of a larger productivity initiative. We made some. Tough calls and the responsibility, the role I have responsibility I have to all of our stakeholders, our shareholders, our communities, our board, all of our people, everyone we serve is to make sure that this company is set up to thrive over the long term, and we recognize that we had just we had. Gotten too big and so we had to slim down the organization, especially in our corporate offices around the world. In 2024 $289 million in capital was returned to shareholders. This is 45% higher than the year before. In simpler terms, the company gave back significantly more money to its investors compared to the preceding year, rewarding them for their investments. Let's go say hi to Beyonce. Another first year high for Goss was fortifying a decades-long relationship. I had to. Uh. You gave her a shout out in your most recent earnings call. How important are collaborations like that? We call it living at the center of culture, you know, the right collaborations create great brand heat for us, and they drive that relevancy again. A brand that's been around for decades and decades. How do you continue to reinvent might be too strong a word but stay relevant while always staying true to your heritage? The campaign titled Reimagine puts a spin to iconic Levi advertisements with none other than Beyonce and her song Levi's Jeans. The Levi Strauss and Company brand dates to 1853 when it opened as a San Francisco dry goods store during the gold rush. Levi Strauss, a German immigrant, partnered with Latvian tailor Jacob Davis to create a durable pair of pants for working men, and in May 1873, the pair received a US patent for their design. Today, Levi's ranks 2nd among apparel companies on the Fortune Most admired Companies list. This is 5 spots higher than the previous year. The brand has a global presence across 110 countries with about 3400 stores. Meanwhile, the global denim jeans market is expected to hit $95 billion by 2030, and the company is looking to women to carve out a larger stake in the market. Look for Levi's womenswear. Do you think you can ever get to 50/50 in the genders or even majority female? 50/50 feels about right for us. I mean, we have a great men's business. It's go way back when. It's how the company. right, so while I look to the future, and by the way we're a little over a $6 billion company today. I look forward and we should be at least a $10 billion company, and that's going to come through a few ways, but women's is going to be a key means to do that. Levi's is also looking to expand its identity well beyond its denim jeans. To get this done, the company is aiming for its direct to consumer model to account for 50% of business. The brand also looks to triple its e-commerce operations. When I talk about denim dressing, head to toe denim, you know, our consumers are really responding to fun fashion like this. Driving the shift are decisions to ensure consumers have the latest trends. The company is transitioning from a two-season model to a 4 season approach. The company also aims to slash its go. Market timeline from 16 to 12 months. We have to be a lot faster to make sure we're catching the trend. And so we're faster today than we were a year ago, and we're going even faster because you've got to hit it right when it's happening. You can't be too late. And keeping tabs on trends has already proven invaluable. Our teams who are out looking a couple of years see what's happening on the streets, and now. You know, baggy loose like it's everywhere and everybody's wearing it and I'm very pleased to say that it was Levi's who started that trend. Being attentive has also allowed Levi's to tap into the luxury goods space. The brand introduced Blue Tab for its spring 2025 collection featuring sophisticated silhouettes made with Japanese selage denim. We've had a blue tab for quite some Time and it would show up in our Japanese denim made in Japan product and you know that's been out there enough and consumers even play back to us, Oh, it's the blue tab. That must be the good stuff. While Goss is betting on attracting more women to the brand, widening product lineup, and emphasizing TTC to drive growth, her focus remains squarely on sustained expansion. It doesn't have to be heroics, you know, it shouldn't be these big swings up and down, you know, steady beat of nice growth and without risk there is no reward. Now with that in place. We got to deliver. We've got to execute, and there's still opportunities, you know, and there'll be some mistakes along the way. Not everything always goes as as perfectly as one would expect, but I feel like we are poised to deliver.

In this exclusive interview with Fortune, Nike's newly appointed CEO Elliott Hill shares his vision for the iconic sportswear brand's future. From intern to chief executive, Hill's 30+ year journey at Nike has given him unique insights into the company's DNA. He discusses his plans to refocus on Nike's core strengths, emphasizing sports and athlete partnerships while addressing recent challenges in sales and market positioning. Hill outlines strategies to balance direct-to-consumer sales with wholesale partnerships, reduce promotional pricing, and drive innovation in key categories like running and basketball. With a commitment to authenticity and a deep understanding of Nike's heritage, Hill aims to lead the company back to its roots while pushing forward into a new era of growth and innovation.

‘Nike’s Back’: How Its New CEO Plans to Reassert the Brand’s Dominance

In this exclusive interview with Fortune, Nike's newly appointed CEO Elliott Hill shares his vision for the iconic sportswear brand's future.

Is this a return to Nike's roots? No question. I think every company has a core of what makes them great, and I think sport is the core of what we are, we are about. We're about human potential and performance. Nike's back. Since started as an turn in apparel sales in 1988, Elliot Hill has spent his entire career climbing Nike's ranks. He has spearheaded some of the company's biggest sportswear launches and led headline grabbing marketing campaigns. So don't ask if your dreams are crazy. Ask if they're crazy enough. Now more than 30 years later, all eyes are on him as he steps into the company's most prominent job, CEO. It almost feels surreal like, hey, did this just happen? But Hill has taken the reins at a time when Nike is grappling with declining sales and a fall in stock price. How do you think you're performing at this point? I think we can be better. As Hill kicked off his 33rd year at Nike and 3rd month as CEO, he recounted his journey to the corner office and what's next for the sports retail giant. Nike's sprawling facilities in Beaverton, Oregon didn't exist when Hill first started as an intern. We very much wanted it to feel like a campus, and we moved here in 1990. The buildings that you can see across the way in Brown were the first buildings. At the start of 1988, the company was worth just over $700 million. Three decades later, it's valued at more than $100 billion. You are Nike's newly minted CEO. How did you get here? I took a sports marketing class and I wrote a paper around this company called Nike. I fell in love with the company and I said, you know, that's the type of company I want to work for. I can combine sport with business. And I was fortunate. There was a guy named Tim Joyce who came to speak at our university and after he finished speaking, I went up to him and said, I want to work for Nike and I bothered him for about 6 months and he finally hired me and I started at Nike June 1 of '88 as as an intern. That internship was a springboard to a lifetime career at Nike. In his early years, Hill held various sales roles selling shoes to mom and pop retailers and driving around in an old minivan. I was driving around in a used Dodge minivan, that's for sure. I drove 60,000 miles a year and I was started out in sales. I worked my way up through the sales organization, different experiences. Hill steadily moved up the ladder, never staying in the same role for more than 4 years. In 2018, he was promoted to president of Consumer and Marketplace, a role he held until 2020 when he. Hired, but his exit didn't last long. Four years later, Nike's former CEO John Donahoe was out. Nike's CEO John Donahoe is going to be leaving the company. During the pandemic. Donahoe's aggressive e-commerce and direct to consumer business approach helped drive Nike's share price to a historic high in November 2021. But as the pandemic wound down, market conditions. Changed and the strategy started to backfire. The company lost market share and strained its relationships with retail partners, all while losing sales and street cred. The board needed a replacement. Walk me through how this came to fruition, your return to Nike. I, I had stayed in touch with people at Nike at all levels of the organization. It was a series of phone calls and I, you know what, I, it was a pretty quick decision for me. Nike's share price jumped by more than 6% just a day after it announced Hill would assume the top job. Is there a part of you that felt you had something to prove? Had a great Second chapter, if you will, business career. I was doing a number of investments and projects that inspired me, motivated, kept me busy, but I have to admit there were those moments when I would walk away from a board meeting as an example where your responsibility is to steer, guide, suggest. You know, provide thoughts, perspectives, and then you leave and you don't have the responsibility for continuing the execution. There was a moment when I started to think to myself, is this really what the rest of my life's going to be like? And then I get the phone call. And so and then here we are and my whole world turns upside down and uh and uh and it's just been a crazy 75 days. What's one of mind for you? The next 30 days, the next year, the next 5 years, well, the 1st 60 days were a sprint. I'll tell you that. What I wanted to do first and foremost was to re-engage with the team. So I spent the 1st 60 days and my first day in the office. I did an all employee meeting, brought everybody together, had a fireside chat so they could get to know me. We get to work in schools. We do. That we do, that we do. What are they telling you? What are you hearing? Where we're headed, which is around celebrating the passion and emotions sport that excites them that that gets them motivated. That's what we have to do more of. That's when we're at our finest is when we put athletes at the center of everything we do. We take the insights from those athletes. That's what drives our product innovation pipeline. That's what drives those emotional and inspiring stories that we tell. Those athletes' stories have become synonymous with Nike's brand. 26 times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot. And missed. From Michael Jordan and LeBron James to Serena Williams. And Ronaldo Nazario. This is the Ronaldo pitch as we call it the Ronaldo Field, and so to, to celebrate him and all that he means to Nike, we, we dedicated the the pitch and his name and then of course we have the the statue here and. And we've been fortunate to continue our relationship with him even beyond his playing days. Hill sees those athlete partnerships as a crucial element of Nike's past and future success. As Nike's vice president of North America, Hill forged a strong partnership with Michael Jordan and was instrumental in encouraging the basketball legend to expand his brand globally. The strategy has paid off with sales growing to over $7 billion annually in 2024. Now Nike is looking ahead. We had Caitlyn Clark here I saw that she was in yesterday on her signature shoe that we launch and we're working on her logo and design of her logo. She signed an 8 year $28 million endorsement deal with Nike in April of. Last year, making it the largest sponsorship contract for a women's basketball player, what was the motivation behind that and and what impact do you think it will have on, on women's sports certainly on the WNBA? When we were running just basketball, we never got to the women's opportunity, but by having this small team. That's focused on women's basketball. It unlocked, we believe, opportunities for the game of basketball, but also in product. It becomes an opportunity to grow the overall marketplace by inviting more and more girls into the world of sport. It is in an area that we'll continue to invest in, and we see tremendous tremendous momentum right now. Hill's new role comes at a critical time for Nike. Sales dropped in the last three quarters of 2024, and shares have slumped to more than 43% since 2023. In an effort to clear out inventory, the company began offering massive discounts throughout the year, slashing prices by as much as 30%. Hill says that approach has hurt the brand. You said in the December earnings call, uh, your first as Nike CEO that Nike has become too promotional offering too many discounts. I'm certainly not complaining, but what what's your vision for how Nike should approach pricing and discounts and still uphold its brand value and market position? There are moments in the traditional retail cycle where it makes sense to be promotional Black Friday, Cyber Monday. But we had become too promotional in between those moments we were even leveraging promotions to drive revenue, and frankly that's not great for margin. It's not great for the brand. It's not great for our wholesale partners because they end up competing against us and profitability matters for them. And so starting this spring we're moving to a position where Nike Direct both digital. Physical is going to actually lead the marketplace and be less not only less promotional but elevate the experience that the consumer has with our brand. Nike also faced backlash over its direct to consumer sales strategy. Before the pandemic, it started to pull back from large wholesalers like Foot Locker and Dick Sporting Goods to focus on its own brick and mortar stores and e-commerce. Now that strategy is changing. Pre-pandemic, Nike severed ties with retailers wanted to focus more on direct to consumer. What are your plans to evolve to rebuild, you know, your partnership with wholesale retailers like Foot Locker and so on? I think it all starts with the consumer. There are consumers that want to shop choice wholesale, either digital or physical, and the good news is the space that I spent a big part of my career. I have great relationships with our retailers, made it. Very, very clear to our team first and foremost that we were going to run a balanced. Marketplace and I've had countless numbers of phone calls and meetings already with them making certain that they understand the importance uh that they play to our brand and the development of our brand that's been a great reception by the way, from our retailers are saying OK. Nike's back. Gone are the days of going wide. Hill wants to go deep, and he says Nike will be zeroed in on 5 main categories moving forward running, basketball, training, football, and sportswear. I live in Manhattan. I run in Central Park. I see a lot of people wearing Nike. And but I also see on run. I see hook, right? A lot of these brands that I've eaten into Nike's market share. So what are your thoughts on how you go back to reestablishing yourself as the premium athletic brand and what do you see as the number one driver for growth for Nike as we move forward? It does always come back to have new, different innovative coveted beautiful product. The lineup that we have in running. Uh, is the strongest lineup that I've seen since I've been here top to bottom across the board, and we have to have those retail partners to help us take shelf space, open to buy and market share from our competitors because frankly that's we left it open ultimately. We have to earn our way back onto the shelves. It's that simple. You've repeatedly made this reference where you say we're going back to sports. Sport is at the heart of our brand. When I think of Nike, I think sports apparel. So what do you mean by that? We were running at what we call the gender offense, so men's, women's, and kids, we lost the sharpness around sport. And so we're reorienting the organization to focus sport first, so think running, think basketball, think football or soccer. And then gender second by lining up by gender, it also helps us find opportunities specifically for that gender, whether it's color and material that's different for a man versus a woman. Another big focus for Hill is product innovation. This is the LeBron James Center, and it's all about advanced R&D and innovation, and it's without question we believe one of the foremost centers of innovation of athletic and human performance. Hill still recalls the 1988 unveiling of Nike's now famous Just Do It campaign. I'm thinking of being a lawyer. He also led launches of footwear for elite athletes, but in recent years, critics, including investors, say Nike has fallen behind in the innovation race. What does product innovation look like for Nike as you move forward? We have a team of people that are already working on product in 28, 29. What's that look like? So long term, very futuristic innovation. The best innovation does come from an athlete, how to make you run faster, jump higher. Uh be safer, move quicker. For Nike, many of those insights came from athlete partnerships. Nike's at its best when we have an athlete, and we have a great relationship with that athlete, and we're able to partner with that athlete to take insights from their game and This case obviously basketball and to build the product around that individual's game in this case it happens to be LeBron James. He's very involved in the footwear that he wears and how it looks, how it fits, how it performs. He's just a representation of some of the. The great executions that we've done with him. Few are as familiar as Hill with the history, people, and inner workings of Nike. Despite three decades of experience and a clear enthusiasm for the CEO role, he has his work cut out for him. In your 60 days as a CEO, what have you learned about yourself? What have you learned about leadership? I have to be who I was always. I have to remain authentic. Just because I have a title and a new responsibility, it can't change how I show up because I think if I do, people will see it, smell it, sniff it, and I've done some just real tactical things to try to do that. I it sounds so simple, but I go get my own coffee in the morning and I go get my own coffee in the afternoon. I work out in our gyms here every morning and I move around the gyms and the coffee places so that I can interact with more and more of our teammates. You can't let a A title or new responsibility to change who you are to your core, you have to show up as authentic authentically yourself as you possibly can.

Fortune 500 Titans and Disruptors of Industry

From one of the largest bankruptcies in U.S. history to leading the industry in market capitalization and premium customer satisfaction, Delta Air Lines has rewritten the business of flying in the last two decades. 

In this episode, Fortune's Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell sits down with CEO Ed Bastian at Delta’s Atlanta headquarters to discuss the strategic maneuvers behind the airline’s resurgence. Bastian details his 'people-first' leadership philosophy, the evolution of the lucrative American Express partnership, and his vision for the future of travel, from AI-powered concierge services to the launch of flying taxis.

Delta: Bankrupt to Billions | Titans and Disruptors

What if AI made your paycheck optional? Vinod Khosla, one of the world's greatest venture capitalists and an early backer of AI, believes the technology will take over 80% of labor, freeing humans to live on passion instead.

His track record backs up the boldness, as early bets on OpenAI, DoorDash, Instacart, and Square have made him one of the most consequential investors of our time.

In this episode of Titans, Khosla sits down with Fortune Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell to unpack his abundant vision for the AI future, what government policy should tackle for a more equitable 2040, and what the U.S. needs to do to win the global AI race. 

The End of Work: Vinod Khosla's Bold AI Prediction | Titans and Disruptors

Dr. Albert Bourla became Pfizer’s CEO months before the COVID-19 pandemic took hold of the US. Under his leadership, Pfizer manufactured 3 billion doses of the first FDA-approved vaccine in the first year, which led to record-breaking earnings. Yet over the past few years, post-pandemic sales slumps, patent cliffs and vaccine skepticism have driven down Pfizer’s earnings. In this episode of Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors of Industry, Fortune’s Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell sits down with Bourla to talk about how he is answering this new set of challenges with science, innovation and optimistic leadership.

Pfizer CEO took on COVID. Now he wants to cure cancer | Titans and Disruptors

It’s been one year since Vice President Kamala Harris and then-Democratic nominee was coming down to her final days of the 2024 presidential campaign against Donald Trump. She spent 107 days on the road in a bid to earn their vote, but it wasn’t enough. Almost one year later, she’s had time to reflect. In a wide-ranging conversation at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women summit, Harris joined Fortune’s Editor in Chief Alyson Shontell at the Washington National Cathedral to discuss the growing divides between Republicans and Democrats, how the government is not meeting Americans’ basic needs, and why not inviting Elon Musk to the White House was a “mistake”.

Kamala Harris says the ‘Glass Cliff’ Suggests Finality: “I’m Not Into That”

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has led the nation's largest financial institution through times of disruption for two decades. As Dimon navigates today's world of generative AI, President Trump's policies, and the effects on the global economy, Dimon sat down with Fortune's Editor-in-Chief, Alyson Shontell, to discuss these topics at the Most Powerful Women Summit in Washington, D.C. Dimon shares his thoughts on Washington, as the government is currently shut down, and Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist leading polls in the New York City mayoral race.

Jamie Dimon on What Kills Companies and the Key to Business Leadership

Ramp CEO Eric Glyman has helped build one of fintech’s fastest-growing startups — hitting $1 billion in annualized revenue, serving 45,000 businesses, and soaring to a $22.5 billion valuation in just 2,367 days. In this episode of Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors of Industry, he sits down with Fortune’s Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell to break down Ramp’s meteoric rise, the business model flipping corporate cards on their head, and why he believes speed and focus are the keys to scaling.

How Ramp's Eric Glyman Built a $22.5 Billion Startup in 2,367 Days

In this segment of Fortune 500:Titans and Disruptors of Industry Accenture CEO Julie Sweet opens up about how a breast cancer diagnosis reshaped her perspective and sharpened her resolve. She reflects on saying “yes” to a stretch role that would set her on the path to CEO, and on how decisive leadership has become her trademark in moments of uncertainty.

How a Cancer Diagnosis Reframed Julie Sweet’s Approach Work and Leadership

Fortune's Editor and Chief Alyson Shontell sits down with Accenture CEO Julie Sweet

How a life-changing diagnosis forged Accenture CEO Julie Sweet’s leadership style

For Accenture CEO Julie Sweet, surviving cancer twice brought both clarity and urgency. In this conversation, she shares how those lessons shaped her path to the top.

A huge break that you got and deserved, frankly was the North America CEO job. How did you first know that that was something that you wanted? And how did that come about? That seems like a really big career moment and a really big opportunity that you had. So I'm just curious if there's a backstory there and how you prepared. I went from GC straight to the head of North America. Wow, and I remember the moment this even became a possibility. So I, I worked for an amazing CEO, Pierenter, and I was in Paris. He was French and we were having just a usual meeting. I was his general counsel. It's a very close relationship. We were kind of, you know, just doing the usual meeting. At the end of the meeting, he closes his notebook and he pushes it aside, and he says to me, completely out of the blue, he says, I think you could run this place someday, but you'd have to run something else first. You can't go from general counsel to CEO. Well, so he thought you could be the CEO of the whole thing, like, right, he could see me. He said, you know, do you want that? Now at the time, what ran into my head immediately was something that we had this incredible director Dina Dulon, who had once talked to a group of women, and she'd given us advice. She said, When someone gives you a stretch role, and let's face it, moving from GC to, you know, being the global CEO is a stretch role, it's like, chances are that the person offering you a stretch role is as nervous or more nervous than you are. So don't say anything like, are you sure? You know, right? And it would have been really easy to, because I was very close to Pierre, um, and, you know, it would have been easy to be kind of like, oh, are you sure? da da da. And you know, what's most remarkable about me being global CEO is not that I'm the first woman or that I was a lawyer, but I'm actually the first CEO that didn't start out of college, right? So like, it had never occurred to me that Accenture. would take someone who hadn't grown up here to be CEO and then you add on top of it, I was the general counsel like it wasn't just part of like something I thought I could reasonably aspire to. So I looked at him and I said, with Dena in my head, why yes, I'd be interested. What did you have in mind? Is that like interim step, you know, and it was really funny because he said, Well, you know, products is going to come available. That's one of our business scene, he's like, but that's really big. He's like, Ooh la la, you know, maybe not. And he said, Well, you know, maybe the North America job. So that was just like an incredible moment. And a month later I found out I had breast cancer. Oh my gosh. So I wasn't thinking too much about, you know, running North America at the time, and he was so incredible to me. And then when I came back full time, I had a lot of complications. And when I came back full time, the North America job actually opened up and You know, what an amazing company I work for, because, you know, I battled with all the different things around breast cancer for about 9 months, and I remember I came back in January of 2015 and there wasn't something like, oh, you know, Julie's been out or anything. It was just like, oh, she's back. The job, you know, became available and Um, you know, long story short, on June 1st, 2015, I became the North America CEO, which, you know, was the stepping stone to be able to become the global CEO four years later. Wow. There must be something so clarifying and distilling about getting a diagnosis like that. And I'm curious how, and you've battled it now twice, including recently, and I'm so glad that your treatment has passed, and I hope, I hope you're doing well. I'm doing great, so thank you, and I've had so much support. It's been amazing. So I'm curious how it's changed you as a person. I'm sure you know it brings empathy with it, but also clarity of how do I want to be spending my time? Am I doing the thing that I really want to be doing? Do I want to spend all this time at work? So I'm curious how you've worked through that. When I go back to 2014, I had young kids, they were 6 and 7, and uh which is always scary, um. And you know at the time, I felt good about how I'd been living my life because I said, you know, like, do I have any regrets? And I, and I actually felt like I'd struck the right balance with the given that obviously I'd chosen a career that I was going to work a lot, like so it's not that I was, you know, like that was just a that was a choice, but within that choice I felt good about the choices that I had made in terms of time. And in the intervening years I've used that as kind of a litmus test because I mean, you know, like I know your job is crazy, so I know you, you relate to this, right? You can get sucked into different times being really busy and so I would, I would stop and ask myself like if, you know, if something happened to me tomorrow, would I still feel like I didn't have any regrets? And sometimes I'd be like, no, I would be regretful and I'd have to adjust. And so I think it helped me. Bring more balance over the 10 years and balance, not like somehow some nirvana, but being able to stay focused on what's important, which is my family and, and, you know, being with them. And then this, you know, this latest time is just of course always a reminder. So for me, you know, probably the thing that as a working mom kind of went to the wayside the most was a focus on my health. Then now fortunately the one area I always did was self exams because I actually found Recent cancer through a breast self exam and I always talk about that because I really want to encourage women to make sure that they're getting their mammograms and they're doing their regular self exams and because, you know, ultimately because I caught it early, you know, I'm here and I was able to get through it pretty quickly. But you know, this time around for me it was a little bit more of a wake up call that, you know, just focusing on my health and, you know, not so much but because of the cancer, but recognizing that I'm probably, I wasn't spending as much time. It wouldn't have affected whether I had cancer or not, but it was kind of like a reflection on I want to live a really long life. Like you get really clear, I want to live a really long life, and I want that to be a quality life and I was reading this book by Peter Atia, I don't know if you know it outlived and And he talks about, you know, having a health quality, not just life, you know, tenure, and what he talks about is like you want to have that last 10 years of your life be very high quality, and that means you've got to do things now. And so I'm super focused on making sure that I'm doing the things that I need to do now that are good for my health now but also put me in a position that You know, I have, you know, an opportunity in the last decade of my life to live it to the fullest. Even as she faced her own health struggles, Sweet was steering Accenture through seismic shifts in geopolitics, the economy, and rapid tech change. In 2022, after navigating the firm through COVID, she made the swift decision to pull Accenture's operations out of Russia just one week after the country's invasion of Ukraine. Russia overnight launched its long anticipated attack on Ukraine, striking military posts across the country. That kind of rapid response reflects a broader leadership style, spotting opportunities and moving fast to act on them. Sweet has also helped drive an aggressive mergers and acquisitions push. In 2024 alone, Accenture completed 46 acquisitions worth $6.6 billion. The company targeted firms in data, analytics, marketing, and AI to strengthen its position in fast growing sectors. Beyond AI, the company is pushing into bold new areas too, from humanoid robots to space tech and even building digital twins. I think one of the defining things that I just heard from your peers, we have a great profile of you out in Fortune. Every everybody should go read it. Jane Frazier, who runs City, said, you know, Julie is a great leader, but she makes decisive quick decisions, and that seems to be just something that's trademark about your to lead is that you are able to take a lot of noise and just be like this is the path going with conviction. How do you make those decisions because from everybody else it seems like it's fast and quick, but I'm sure to you there must be something going on internally. Is it data? Is it gut? Is it talking to peers? How are you coming to these conclusions? Well, first of all, Jane is an amazing leader, so it's so nice of her to say this. Um, it starts with a great team, and what do I mean by that? I have a team that is constantly, like, also, you know, acting with humility, excellence and confidence, right? We are constantly challenging each other and our assumptions. And when you have a team that thinks that way, right, not that they all think the same, in fact, the exact opposite because we put together teams with like diverse experiences and ideas, but when you build a team that thinks that status quo is challenging assumptions embracing change, it means you're constantly questioning, right? You don't need to stop and have a big strategy, sort of like, let's take the next, you know, 12 months to look at it because you're always working on the strategy. And when you have that base, that means that you have like leaders to go to to like to be starting to question and test things and then I have a larger team, a global management committee. That is deeply steeped in our strategy. They own every dollar of revenue and cost who are like also constantly providing input and they're there to bounce ideas off very, very quickly. And this was an innovation when I became the CEO. A back in 2019 because the prior CEO only had his direct reports as the Global Management Committee, and I expanded that to me the direct reports and the people who lead our services, so think of that as our products and our markets and what that Means is I have about 45 people who are deeply steeped in our strategy, not, you know, sort of meeting once a year, you know, like lots of companies have these like kind of groups of leaders that are almost an adjunct. These are the leaders who are running the company and they provide that constant input. And so I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to have a body of leaders who know more than just their role. who believe that their role is is also to lead the company and that you can have like this constant resource of input so that as you're testing ideas you know you've got the right input and that makes me able to make decisions with a lot of confidence and to do so with my team.

Accenture CEO Julie Sweet leads one of the world’s largest workforces—and is navigating an era defined by AI disruption, geopolitical volatility, and shifting global markets. In this segment of the Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors of Industry vodcast, she shares how she advises fellow CEOs to reinvent their companies, reflects on her unconventional leap from law to CEO, and opens up about the lessons that shaped her rise to one of the most powerful roles in business. 

How Accenture’s CEO Took the Leap From Law to Consulting

Alyson Shontell sits down with Accenture CEO Julie Sweet

Julie Sweet shares how she her unconventional path from lawyer to CEO—and what it takes to rewire companies in the age of AI disruption.

From law to the corner office: Accenture CEO Julie Sweet reflects on her rise and why today’s leaders must rewire their companies to withstand AI and shifting markets.

You are able to take a lot of noise and just be like this is the path going with conviction. How do you make those decisions? It starts with a great team. We are constantly challenging each other and our assumptions, and that makes me able to make decisions with a lot of confidence. AI is transforming every industry, and it puts even the biggest companies at risk. Top venture capitalists. The Node COSLA predicts that the 2030s will see the demise of more Fortune 500 companies than at any point in history. This transformation is the number one thing on every Fortune 500 CEO's mind, especially for Julie Sweet, who runs one of the largest workforces in the world with more than 770,000 employees. In order to capture the opportunity with AI, you have to be willing to rewire your company. I recently sat down with Julie about how she's advising other CEOs to transform their companies and how she's trying to keep AI from eating Accenture's own lunch. Our conversation was packed full of advice and it was personal. Her journey from a small California town to becoming one of the most powerful people in global business is inspiring, especially as she has battled and beaten cancer now twice. I'm your host, Importance's editor in chief, Allison Chantel. Please enjoy the first episode of my podcast, Fortune 500, Titans and Disruptors of Industry with Accenter CEO Julie Sweet. Julie, it is so nice to be here with you today. Thank you for joining me. It's the inaugural Fortune 500 podcast podcast episode of Titans and Destructors of Industry, and who better to have in you. Well, thank you, Allison, and I'm really honored to be your first, so that's that's really exciting for me. So thank you for having me. Since becoming CEO, Sweet has nearly doubled Accenture's value and grown its workforce to over 770,000 employees across 52 countries. That's more than 20 times the size of a key rival, McKinsey, ranked number 211 on our Fortune Global 500 list. It's also among the mere 5% of Fortune Global 500 companies that's run by a woman. First off, you're on Accenture. You've run it since 2019. It is in the top five largest workforces in the world. On top of that, you generate some of the largest revenue in the world. You're number 211 on our Fortune 50 Global 500 list, right, that ranks companies by revenue. I think it's like $65 billion. In a year or something that a center does and then also just you are incredibly powerful. You rank number 11 on our most powerful people in business lists. So I'd just love to start with an economic snapshot from your vantage point. What are the major things on your radar that are affecting your business, but also the businesses of all the CEOs that seek your counsel and work with the center? Well, there's a lot of trends that are literally affecting the world, right? So one, the obvious one, has been tariffs and trade. And that affects countries differently, but there isn't a country that's not being touched by that, so that's one. Second, there has been an ongoing shift in geopolitics, and you know, sometimes people say to me like, oh, right now it's so volatile and uncertain, and you know, I've been CEO for 6 years and I'm kind of like, that's been the story of the last 6 years and And we'll talk about that later, I'm sure, but you've been seeing a shift in geopolitics for some time, like the role of the Middle East. We look at Southeast Asia as things have changed with China, and so making sure that you understand the opportunities and the challenges. So oftentimes people think about the supply chain, but it's also a huge opportunity and are you positioned to take advantage of where growth may come. In the future, so those are two of the big ones. And of course then you can't go, you know, you can't walk past AI, so you'll notice I didn't start there, the obvious one. When I think about AI, the thing that for me is so exciting is that, you know, the last several years have been a series of what were once black swan events. And now the CEOs around the world have a powerful set of tools that they didn't have for some of those events before. Now those tools are hard and they're complex and they have a lot of different, you know, aspects to consider. But as I look forward, it's, you know, very rare as a CEO that you're handed something that is brand new, wasn't part of the toolkit, and allows you to look at the world and really shape your future, and we talk a lot about You know, how do you set the next performance frontier, and AI is definitely something that allows you to think very differently about your future trajectory. So those are the three of the big ones. There's more demographic changes we can go on and on, but those are 3 that I'm talking to a ton of CEOs about, and of course underlying all of that are the talent implications. Unlike traditional strategy focused consulting firms, Accenture doesn't just advise. It also takes on operations and services on behalf of its clients, and its clients span a wide range of industries from banks like Citi and Barclays to Nestle, Saudi Aramco, and pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer. Since we took the helm in 2019, she's helped boost the company's revenue more than 50% to $65 billion. But Sweet's path to CEO was far from typical. In her years before joining Accenture, Sweet had a high profile legal career, earning a scholarship to Claremont McKenna College, graduating from Columbia Law, and making partner at an elite firm within 8 years. In 2007, she landed on the cover of American Lawyer as dealmaker of the Year. So when you decide to come to the center, by the way, you've already had a tremendous career as a lawyer, a career that I think most people wouldn't have said, Oh, I'm just going to forget this path. You rose to partner at one of the top law firms within 8 years, and I'm curious, why did you make that career change? Why say I'm going to go into this crazy tech consulting firm that I don't really don't know that much about, and I'm going to leave this really cushy setup I've created for myself and go try something totally different. How do you weigh a big career change like that? Well, and Allison, one of the things I look back to and now that's like not many people realized was I made the change when I had a 2 year old and a 3 year old as well. I respect that. I took this job when I had a newborn, exactly, which I'm like it all up at the same time. Exactly. You're like, I'm like, oh my gosh, what was I thinking? Well, you know, it is interesting because I was in my office and I love my law firm, so I love the job and I got a call and my assistant had had stepped away and I, this was like a very You know, like a law firm where you had somebody answer always answers your phone, you know, and we had like iced tea delivered 3 times a day to my office, you know, I had a beautiful office. And so I pick up the phone because she'd stepped away and it was a head hunter talking about like this great opportunity and You know, I look back, I was 42, and my father had actually just passed away recently, and I think that definitely affected me because he died quite young at 68. So I'm like listening to this and I'm like, you know what, I'm going to take a meeting. And when I did that, I said to myself like, I know I'm 42, I'm super successful, and I absolutely know what my future is going to be like at Cravath, right? Like because it's like the deals would change, but I made partner and I was like, OK, I could see my future and Then I went and I interviewed with Accenture, who I knew about because I'd done actually a securities deal for a competitor where, you know, we had to like learn about Accenture as a competitor and so I respected the company. Their CEO Bill Green was incredibly charismatic. He had the best line ever for me. Like I, I just fell for a hook line and sinker in my interview. He said, I'm not looking for a lawyer, which is kind of funny because he was hiring a general counsel. He said, I'm looking for a business leader with legal experience. And I'm like, that's what I want to be. And so I ended up taking, you know, taking the leap, and it was the it was the right time. And you know, when I, you know, think back to it, I'm sure my dad's passing had something to do with it, but also just the possibilities of making an impact and uh you know, I've just, I was so fortunate because I absolutely love Accenture. It's an amazing company. I was very privileged to join and I feel really privileged every day to leave this place. So it sounds like a big new opportunity and challenge, a chance to try something new, but to really expand who you were. So you've said that when you were 42 and you came in as general counsel to Accenture, you didn't have the skill set then to be the. CEO, but you're the CEO. So what happened? What was missing and how did you work on those things and know to work on those things? Well, just to start with, I didn't understand technology when I joined, and Accenture is all about technology, and I figured out pretty quickly that If I wanted to be the business leader with legal experience, I had to deeply understand the business. And so after I'd been here nearly 12 months, probably, I made friends with someone named Bhaskar Ghosh, who was running our India technology practice at the time. He would eventually become our global head of technology and now my chief strategy officer, and I asked him, I said, Will you teach me technology? And it really was because I thought of myself as a business leader and I didn't deeply understand the business that we were in. And so we used to meet every 2 weeks for about 18 months, and he would send me off to meet people to learn things. I still remember the guy that taught me, you know, what cloud was, and and that really set me on a very different path because I think my boss at the time, Pierre Naner, saw me differently too. He saw me showing up differently and so did my colleagues. And so anywhere in do it because sometimes it can feel like, oh, I just want to act like I know this thing, but I really don't know this thing, but You seem pretty fearless about just going in and saying like nope, don't know it, tell me everything. I think one of my superpowers is asking for help, you know, I, and maybe that goes back to humility and the idea of building great teams, and so I've always been that way. I've always, you know, if you focus on how you deliver value, then it becomes very natural that you have to have a team and you have to ask for help because at the level that we operate, no one delivers value alone. And one of the things I I coach a lot of people because the people come to me and say, Well, how do I network, etc. and I'm like, look, don't think about networking. Think about connecting with people that can help you deliver more value or who you can help deliver more value and focus on that as opposed to someone who can get you your next job, because the more value you can contribute to your company, the more likely you're going to get that best next job and I've always thought about that with my clients, right? It's like, what do my clients need? They need me to better understand this. And when I was the general counsel, my, my client was actually the company, and what did they need from me? They needed me to understand the business better, to be a better general counsel. And so that focus on value has really been, I think, a big part of my career trajectory.

AI is rewriting the rules of business — and Accenture CEO Julie Sweet says reinvention is the only way Fortune 500s will survive. In the debut episode of Fortune 500: Titans and Disruptors of Industry, Sweet sits down with Fortune’s Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell to reveal how she’s nearly doubled Accenture’s value, grown its workforce to 770,000, and kept the company thriving through disruption.

Julie Sweet’s Path From Lawyer to Leading 770,000 People

Titans and Disruptors of Industry

Next to Lead featuring Fortune editor Ruth Umoh is a weekly vodcast series featuring a new generation of Fortune 500 leaders. Each week we talk to today’s most prominent C-suite executives who are shaping the future of business. Episodes will reveal what drives these executives, their vision for the future, and how to succeed in today’s hyper competitive landscape.

Next to Lead

Adobe built the modern creative economy, but as AI reshapes how content is made, its legacy may be its biggest risk. With a leadership shakeup and rising competition, will Adobe stay indispensable or will they'll be left behind? In a moment of transformational change, Adobe President of Customer Experience, Anil Chakravarthy, says the challenge is moving as fast as AI-- without losing sight of what their creatives, marketing professionals and businesses want. 

Can Adobe survive the AI era it helped shape? | Next to Lead

Adobe built the modern creative economy, but as AI reshapes how content is made, its legacy may be its biggest risk. With a leadership shakeup and rising competition, will Adobe stay indispensable or will they'll be left behind?

Airbnb is evolving from a hotel alternative into a full-scale travel concierge. In this episode of Next to Lead, Airbnb CFO Ellie Mertz joins Fortune’s Ruth Umoh to discuss the company’s expansion into end-to-end travel services and "white space" opportunities.

Airbnb is building a travel platform, not just rentals | Next to Lead

The 2025 Next to Lead List

What makes for a great leader? I read a ton. And how do Fortune 500 companies spot their next CEO? The first thing we look for. Really is like, does this person have horsepower? Hi, I'm Ruth Ummo, editor at Fortune. I read about leadership, management, and the rising stars in corporate America. For the 2nd year in a row, I've compiled the Fortune Next to Lead list featuring 25 of the most powerful Ryzen executives in the Fortune 500. This list spotlights leaders whose influence, performance, track record, and upward trajectory. Signal that they are credible contenders for the CEOC whether within their current organization or at another major company. Over the last year, I've spoken to dozens of analysts, executive recruiters, management consultants, company insiders, and industry peers to understand the shifting power dynamics inside the C-suite and to identify which executives are truly worth featuring. This Rankin listees were evaluated across several key benchmarks such as the scale and significance of their role within a Fortune 500 company, whether they lead major divisions or organizations, their industry-wide and global influence, as well as their financial and operational performance. We have people like IBM's Rob Thomas. You only need three things to drive execution priorities, data. And you need rhythm. Wayfair's John Blattner. Having pride in your own ideas is only, it's never a good thing. And NBC Universal's Donna Langley, and I am a firm believer in the theatrical experience. We also assess these executives' capacity for visionary leadership, whether they've driven transformative strategies, made high stakes decisions, navigated volatility, and inspired. Large teams to deliver outsized results. Cultural and societal contributions, along with longevity and consistency, were equally important. Each of these executives has built a multi-year track record of leadership excellence. What this list underscores is that the Fortune 500 has many leaders who are already operating at CEO altitude, even without a chief executive title yet.

In 2016, Philip Morris International announced a bold new mission: to deliver a “smoke-free future.” Its U.S. division—Philip Morris U.S.—is now leading that charge with a portfolio of smoke-free products, including the widely known nicotine pouch brand ZYN. Yet globally, Philip Morris International continues to sell cigarettes, fueling the very addiction it says it aims to eliminate.
In this episode, Ruth Umoh sits down with Seth Kaufman, chief commercial officer of Philip Morris U.S., to discuss what success looks like for a company trying to move consumers away from cigarettes, the ethical tensions embedded in its business model, and whether a truly smoke-free future is possible.

Can a tobacco giant build a smokefree future? | Next to Lead 

How does a company founded in 1908 survive the breakneck speed of the 21st century? For Shilpan Amin, General Motors’ global chief procurement and supply chain officer, the answer has been forged through crisis leadership and quiet reinvention over nearly three decades inside one of America’s auto giants. He joins Fortune’s Ruth Umoh to reflect on how mentorship accelerated his career, what it takes to move with speed inside a massive organization, and why supply chain risk is one of the few things that still keeps him up at night.

How America’s oldest automaker is tackling tariffs, electrification, and AI | Next to Lead 

BNY’s Chief Commercial Officer, Cathinka Wahlstrom, joins Fortune’s Ruth Umoh to unpack how a centuries old institution is transforming itself for the next era of finance. Drawing on her nearly three decades at Accenture and her time at Alight, she explains how client obsession and following her gut has shaped her career. 

She discusses why today’s leaders have to be comfortable “living in paradox,” how BNY is adopting AI, and how it’s balancing tradition and innovation. 

How the bank founded by Alexander Hamilton is transforming for the future of finance | Next To Lead

From consoles to cloud, Xbox is reinventing itself for an era where players can game anywhere. Xbox president Sarah Bond sits down with Fortune to discuss the company’s sweeping transformation, her approach to leadership and innovation, and how she plays to redefine the future of gaming.

Is Xbox building the future of gaming?  | Next to Lead

As President of Winfield United and SVP at Land O’Lakes, Leah Anderson has a front-row seat to the challenges and opportunities shaping American agriculture. In conversation with Fortune’s Ruth Umoh, she discusses the macroeconomic headwinds facing farmers, how AI can strengthen the workforce, and the path that led her to the C-suite.


“Farmers are the ultimate entrepreneur,” Land O’Lakes SVP Leah Anderson  | Next to Lead 

A conversation with Land O'Lakes SVP Leah Anderson. 

In the wake of widespread layoffs, UPS is undergoing one of the largest transformations in its nearly 120-year history. Chief commercial officer Matt Guffey explains how a leaner operating model and a sharper focus on healthcare, small and midsized businesses, and international markets are positioning the company for its next era of profitable growth. 

UPS’s Matt Guffey on the company's next act: leaner operations and a sharper focus on growth

Rob Thomas has spent more than two decades at IBM, rising from consultant to SVP of software and chief commercial officer. In this conversation, he explains why real innovation starts close to the customer, why reading is a core leadership habit, and how IBM is shifting from “lightbulb” AI experiments to business-changing “motor” outcomes.

IBM's Rob Thomas on why companies fail at innovation—and how iteration fixes it

Grindr calls itself “the global gayborhood in your pocket,” and since going public in 2022, the dating app for gay men has steadily expanded its reach. Behind that leap to the public markets was CFO Vanna Krantz, who previously helped launch Disney+. She joins Ruth to reflect on being a self-described late bloomer, the joy of working with teams deeply invested in their work, and what’s next for her career.

Google’s AI boss made OpenAI issue code red. Now he wants to solve disease. | Titans and Disruptors

Can Nordstrom thrive in the department store crisis? | Behind The Business

Red Lobster’s CEO says “organizations take on the personality of their leaders” | Next to Lead

How Winston Weinberg built his $11 billion AI Company | Term Sheet

Google’s AI boss made OpenAI issue code red. Now he wants to solve disease. | Titans and Disruptors

Can Nordstrom thrive in the department store crisis? | Behind The Business

Red Lobster’s CEO says “organizations take on the personality of their leaders” | Next to Lead

How Winston Weinberg built his $11 billion AI Company | Term Sheet

Google’s AI boss made OpenAI issue code red. Now he wants to solve disease. | Titans and Disruptors

CONFERENCES

BEHIND THE BUSINESS

TITANS AND DISRUPTORS OF INDUSTRY

NEXT TO LEAD