The business case for AI: Brent Hayward of Salesforce, David Carmona of Microsoft & Nagraj Kashyap of Touring Capital
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What makes this AI wave different from previous technology shifts?
What is fundamentally different about this wave is who started it. It was Microsoft as a big incumbent teaming up with OpenAI, which is a startup. So they're innovating at the speed of a startup with the resources of a Microsoft.
Welcome to Orbit, the HG podcast series, where we speak to leaders from across the tech ecosystem to hear how they've built and scaled some of the most successful software companies in the world. Good morning. Uh it's my pleasure to introduce you to Brent, David, and Nagraj, who have a lot to talk about based on what we heard. Um a number of you had the pleasure to meet with David last year. David is uh CTO and VP of Strategic Incubations for Microsoft, where he's in charge of topics such as AI, quantum computing, and space. Um a lot of what he talked about. Last year actually happened, so I suggest you listen carefully to what he has to say today. Um Brand is a senior exec at Salesforce and and and and and uh most recently CEO of Millsoft, probably the most successful acquisition in Salesforce history.
Uh reaching two billion dollars uh uh uh run rate and a five forty percent uh revenue carger in the past five years. Um A number of you in the room actually use Salesforce. I know a vast majority actually do as part of the core infrastructure to run the customer information and customer business. And so we're very keen to hear your thoughts. Um and then finally, Nagraj is the general partner at Touring Capital. He's a 20-year experience in venture capital. He was the um head of Microsoft's venture business, M12. Previous these were for Qualcomm Ventures on hardware side. And then I was also a managing partner at the Softbank Vision Fund, the largest venture capital fund in the world. I suspect a number of Dagras' previous investments will be part of your daily life, depending on your level of activity, Zoom, ways, and for some of us, or some of you, I shall say, Fitbit.
So welcome. I think we're going to talk about AI today, AI tomorrow. We're also going to talk about the scaffolding a fair bit and how we see those layers moving. But maybe to ground the conversation first. Um, you know, what does the current moment in the eye mean for you personally and your company? So I'll start with you, David.
Uh I I love the comparison by the way of uh beforefront uh uh from the presenters on kids versus adults. I love it. And and I think it's it's it's something that that we're learning how to manage, right? So under under that, I immediately consider myself A teenager, right? Because my my role in in Microsoft is really to work closely with those incubations and turn them into businesses, right? That's that's my role. And I I I was starting to do that with the cloud, then I moved to AI eight years ago, where if most of my work was with the kids, right? With uh Microsoft research and trying to commercialize that that innovation. Uh and most recently with with Gen AI uh a few years ago. We called that that project internally in Microsoft Aristotle and that was, I mean, the the result of that is is what you see today on commercializing that innovation.
Which means that it's it's very troubling years. this this teenage uh era, right? Because you have you you are neither an adult or a kid. And I feel exactly like that. So that's my point in my career personally with AI.
Great. Brandt?
Uh maybe build on the teenager theme. I I mean personally I think it's been amazing. I use generative AI every day. I use it uh primarily to summarize tasks. I feel like the the business workplace today is just so noisy. I get literally thousands of Slack messages a day and to be able to sort of take the team's output and be able to summarize that quickly and act on it is a simple task that probably saves hours and hours a day. Uh my youngest daughter uses it to write her uh papers so that she can go perfect her career as a Fortnite uh player. So there's wonderful other human things going on with the technology. Um I think from a business perspective though, and I think as CEOs, you know, we all need to appreciate that it's an existential threat uh every single day.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What makes this AI wave different from previous technology shifts?
0:09–5:00
2
How does Microsoft’s “Aristotle” project illustrate early AI commercialization?
5:00–10:35
3
What practical AI use‑cases are Salesforce teams deploying today?
10:35–15:19
4
Why do most AI pilots fail and how should companies measure ROI?
15:19–19:56
5
How does the “first‑party = third‑party” principle shape Microsoft’s AI strategy?
19:56–25:47
6
What opportunities exist in vertical AI versus commoditized LLMs?
25:47–31:39
7
How can proprietary customer data become a competitive moat for AI?
31:39–37:20
8
What is the future role of autonomous agents in enterprise workflows?
37:20–42:15
Speakers
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