This week, I’m joined by my long-time sparring partner and business builder, Guy Stafford, to reflect on his 25+ years leading the wildly successful procurement firm, Proxima (acquired by Bain), and how those hard-won lessons apply to the age of AI.

Guy pulls back the curtain on Proxima’s creation, from a $35 domain name (Buy.co.uk) in the mid-90s to navigating the dot-com crash, before dissecting his philosophy on mentorship: why he works in the shadows, the power of following up, and why the best advice comes from asking, "Who's done this before?"

We then launch into a high-octane debate on the future of procurement, covering:

• The Proxima 2.0: How AI fundamentally changes the consulting model, forcing businesses to quickly automate tactical work to focus on strategic high-level interactions.

• The Black Box CPO: Why AI will make procurement about more than just savings, and how the micro-coaching capabilities of AI could offer live, tailored advice to category managers (like a fitness tracker for your professional life).

• The Race to Relevance: Guy shares a crucial warning for CPOs: the race isn't defined by industry, but by who in the organization (Finance, IT, or Procurement) effectively wields the new AI power, and what skills are needed to stay on top.

In this episode of Algo Ego, I sit down with Sam Kinney to revisit the rise of FreeMarkets and explore how its core ideas translate into today’s world of AI-driven market design. We unpack the creative auction formats that reshaped industrial sourcing, the cultural engine that powered the company’s talent, and how those lessons apply as AI begins to automate negotiation, supplier discovery, and cost modeling at massive scale.

Sam also shares a forward-looking view of how AI agents might represent buyers and suppliers, how digital “part twins” could reshape engineering, and why rebuilding FreeMarkets today would look radically different — but still grounded in the same market principles that made it work 30 years ago.

In this episode of Algo Ego, I sit down with Stuart Loren — investor, former lawyer, and one of the sharpest voices on AI-driven economic change. Stuart and I talk about how he shifted from corporate law to institutional investing, and why themes like AI, energy supply, and social disruption now sit at the center of his work.

We dig into Jevons’ Paradox and what 19th-century coal demand can teach us about today’s GPU-powered world — including why data centers may jump from 3% to 12% of U.S. electricity use. Stuart explains how this fuels a new global race for power infrastructure, why China is over-building on purpose, and why the West risks falling behind.

We also cover his thesis on social disaffection, how AI may reshape white-collar careers, and what happens when tech giants move from software margins to owning physical assets like data centers and energy. Stuart shares what this means for investors, governments, and the future of cities like Chicago.