The Dynamo Show: a Dynamo Ventures Podcast

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372

Latest episode

Oct 2026

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EN-US

About the show

Capital is abundant. Understanding is scarce. The Dynamo show goes deep with the new industrialists rejuvenating industry and commerce. Brought to you by Dynamo Ventures. Learn more at dynamo.vc/podcast

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60 recent

October 14, 202634 min

Cargo Theft and The Gaps Criminals Exploit

In this episode, host Madelyn O’Farrell sits down with Scott Cornell, EVP, Crime & Theft Specialist at SPG Cargo & Logistics, to explore how cargo theft has evolved from localized theft into more sophisticated strategic theft. Scott traces his career and explains the difference between straight theft and strategic theft, describes how international crime rings now coordinate much of the activity, and notes the sharp rise in strategic theft. He also questions widely cited loss estimates, points to the broader costs they miss, walks through schemes such as double brokering, MC number fraud, and the Trojan Driver Scam, and discusses insurance and liability challenges. The conversation closes with prevention through staff education, sound processes, careful driver and carrier vetting, and pickup verification tools. Highlights from their conversation include: Introducing Scott Cornell and His Cargo-Theft Expertise (0:28) Why “Freight Fraud” Isn’t a Separate Theft Category (2:00) Why the Industry Should Focus on Becoming a Harder Target (3:29) How Cargo Theft Shifted From Local Crews to International Crime Rings (5:45) Why Cargo-Theft Statistics Understate the True Cost of Losses (11:14) How Double-Brokering Scams and MC Number Fraud Hijack Loads (15:42) How the Trojan Driver Scam Turns Trusted Drivers Into Insider Threats (18:21) Background Checks That Can Help Prevent Planted-Driver Theft (22:24) How Cargo Theft Is Changing Insurance Coverage and Costs (23:01) Why Liability for Strategic Cargo Theft Can Be Hard to Determine (25:51) Why Pickup Verification, Staff Training, and Vetting Processes Matter (29:11) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc . Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

October 7, 202632 min

Why AI’s Biggest Risk Is Chips

In this episode, host Madelyn O’Farrell sits down with Rakesh Kumar, University of Illinois professor and semiconductor expert, to explore the technology and economics behind the global chip industry. Kumar explains how the rise of AI is driving demand for chips while high factory costs, long construction timelines, and uncertainty about future demand make it difficult for supply to keep pace. They discuss the risks those dynamics could create for AI companies and the broader economy, what gives Nvidia its competitive advantage beyond CUDA, and whether the CHIPS Act and U.S. export controls are achieving their goals. The conversation also examines how flexible designs, general-purpose chips, and chiplets could make supply chains more resilient, and looks ahead to possible advances in optical communication and three-dimensional chip architecture. Highlights from their conversation include: Rakesh Kumar’s Path Into Semiconductors (0:46) Why Chips Matter to the Public and Policymakers (2:02) Rising Chip Costs and the Economic Risks of the AI Boom (6:51) Nvidia’s Competitive Moat Beyond CUDA (13:19) The CHIPS Act: Spending, Research, and Results (15:09) U.S. Export Controls and China’s Chip Industry (19:19) Why Semiconductor Supply Chains Are Fragile (22:32) Building Resilience With General-Purpose Chips and Chiplets (25:58) The Future of Computing: GPUs, Photons, and 3D Chips (27:58) Final Thoughts and Takeaways (32:00) If you're interested in learning more, check out Rakesh's new book, The Chip Age: How Semiconductors Became the World's Most Powerful Resource (Amazon) . Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc . Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

September 30, 202631 min

The Circular Supply Chain for AI Hardware

In this episode, Madelyn O'Farrell talks with Tom Delahunty, VP of Operations for Asset Lifecycle Management at Iron Mountain, about what happens to IT hardware after its first life. Tom makes the case that decommissioned equipment is a secondary supply chain rather than a waste problem, pointing to 88% year-over-year growth in Q2 as AI and data center buildouts push assets out of service. The conversation covers how a hyperscale decommission works, from data sanitization and secure chain of custody through remarketing that cascades from full systems down to components, and how GPU-dense infrastructure and liquid cooling raise the bar on testing capability. The takeaway for listeners: plan for end of use early, expect used GPUs to become a normal part of procurement, and watch for more R&D investment in reuse and critical mineral recovery as the industry matures toward something closer to the used car market. Highlights from their conversation include: Introduction to Tom Delahunty and Iron Mountain (0:29) What Iron Mountain Is and Who It Serves (1:43) Record Revenue Growth and Scaling Operations (4:23) Data Sanitization, Mobile Shred Units and Chain of Custody (7:00) How Reuse Rates Vary Across Decommissioning Projects (8:58) Why GPUs Should Follow the Same Longevity Curve as CPUs (11:20) Generating Demand Before Assets Arrive (14:40) Bottlenecks and Wishes for the Secondary Market (17:21) Design for End of Use Improving Among OEMs (18:50) Whether the ITAD Industry Can Handle Coming Volume (20:59) The Case for R&D Investment in ITAD (23:56) Planning Future Compute Needs Around Used Supply (28:40) Final Thoughts and Episode Wrap-Up (30:55) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

September 23, 202621 min

Offshore Wind, SMRs & Naval Vessels: One HVAC to Rule Them All

In this episode, Halton Group executive Shuresh Maran joins Madelyn O’Farrell to explore how Halton designs mission-critical HVAC and ventilation systems for the most demanding environments, including cruise ships, naval vessels, nuclear facilities, offshore oil and gas, offshore wind, and modern data centers. Shuresh explains how Halton’s core strengths—high-integrity engineering, rigorous testing, and long-life reliability—carry across sectors, and why their equipment must function flawlessly in rare but life-or-equipment-saving moments. He outlines the company’s growth strategy to double revenue by 2030, driven by rebounding cruise demand, long-cycle nuclear buildouts (including small modular reactors), and booming offshore wind. The conversation also covers the shift to unmanned offshore platforms, the importance of cybersecurity and supply chain resilience in defense and energy, the rising expectations of data center owners around longevity and climate adaptation, and Halton’s cautious approach to IoT and remote monitoring in security-sensitive environments. A key takeaway is that as energy and digital infrastructure scales, getting the physical built environment “right” from day one—by partnering with experienced suppliers—dramatically reduces operational risk and cost over a project’s lifecycle. Highlights from their conversation include: Shuresh’s Background and Global Career Journey (0:51) What Halton Group Does and Its Four Divisions (1:47) Why Ventilation Is Mission Critical in Extreme Environments (3:00) Operating Differently Inside Halton for Demanding Sectors (4:47) Growth Strategy and Doubling Revenue by 2030 (6:06) Offshore Wind vs Oil and Gas: What Transfers and What’s New (7:18) Naval and Defense Demand, Long Project Cycles, and Cybersecurity (9:14) Data Centers, Reliability, and Climate Adaptation Pressures (11:41) Supply Chain, Standardization, and Reducing Bottlenecks (14:06) IoT, Remote Monitoring, and Cybersecurity Constraints (16:09) Future of Mission Critical Built Environments and Final Takeaways (18:44) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc . Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

September 16, 202629 min

Demand-Side Grid Resilience: Enrollment, Flexibility, and What a Load Is Really Worth

In this episode, Rachel Permut draws on decades of experience in distributed energy and virtual power plants to explain how demand-side flexibility is becoming a critical grid resource. She breaks down what DERs and VPPs are, why customer enrollment and revenue mechanics matter more than the “shiny” technology, and how fragmented U.S. markets create both complexity and opportunity, with DR payments now reaching up to $100/kW in some regions. Rachel dives into the evolving role of data centers, including flexible AI and batch workloads, water-based cooling trade-offs, and emerging models where data centers pay others on their circuit to reduce load. She outlines the full demand response lifecycle from contract and enrollment through dispatch, baseline measurement, and payment, highlighting where programs typically fail and how better communication, software, and market design can unlock more value. Ultimately, she argues that DERs and VPPs are not a silver bullet but are fast, cost-effective tools that must play a much larger role alongside new generation to address growing grid stress. Highlights from their conversation include: Meet Rachel Permut And Her Energy Industry Background (0:29) Why Rachel Focused On Demand-Side Energy And Flexible Load (1:28) What DERs Are And How Virtual Power Plants Work (3:23) How Much Flexible Load Is Worth Across Different US Markets (7:08) Role Of Aggregators And Market Selection For Industrial Operators (9:37) Data Centers As Flexible Load And Deferrable Compute Workloads (11:06) Where Demand Response Programs Fail and Opportunities For Startups (16:44) Measurement, Verification, and Baselines For Load Curtailment (20:25) Why DERs and VPPs Should Be A Bigger Part Of Grid Solutions (22:40) Policy, Market Design, and Local Capacity Value (24:16) ERCOT, PJM, and How Markets Are Evolving For Flexibility (26:35) How Industrial Operators Should Approach Aggregators (27:52) Closing Thoughts Episode Wrap-Up (28:38) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc . Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

September 10, 202630 min

Manufacturing Automation: Why the Model is Only 10% of the Problem

Highlights from their conversation include: Lukas’ Background in Product Design and Manufacturing Gaps (0:44) How Tesla’s Model 3 “Production Hell” Sparked Industrial Next (4:16) Lessons from Waymo on Sensing, Compute, and Safety (7:05) What Contextual Understanding Means in a Factory (9:44) Breakthrough Automating Cable Insertion with Physical AI (11:43) Why Owning the Full Manufacturing AI Stack Matters (14:22) Reshoring, Fragile Supply Chains, and Role of Automation (16:19) Vision for AI-Powered Factories and Mass Production Without Scale (20:46) Cultural Shift Needed for Manufacturing in the U.S. and Europe (23:31) Closing Thoughts on Skilled Trades and Hands-On Engineering (28:28) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

September 2, 202625 min

Re-Air: Always a Fresh Closet: Circular Fashion is the New Way to Get Dressed with Phoebe Tan of Taelor

From time to time, we’ll re-air a previous episode of the show that our newer audience may have missed. In this episode, founder Phoebe Tan shares how her background at Amazon and Singapore Airlines led her to build Taelor, a “Netflix for outfits” circular fashion platform focused on busy professional men. She explains Taelor’s two-sided model, where subscribers rent curated outfits and partner brands monetize inventory and gain rich feedback to improve product design. The discussion dives into how circular systems transform traditional supply chains, the AI and data challenges of working with 100+ brands and non-standard sizing, and how reverse logistics and operations are built for scale from day one. Phoebe also highlights the power of unbiased customer feedback, why access-over-ownership and personalization will accelerate circular fashion over the next 5–10 years, and how sharing models can extend far beyond apparel into other categories of underutilized goods. Highlights from their conversation include: The Origin Story Behind Taelor and Phoebe’s Background (0:29) How Taelor Works as “Netflix For Outfits” for Busy Men (3:21) Rethinking Inventory as Recurring Revenue in Circular Fashion (5:43) Using AI and Data to Solve Sizing and Styling Complexity (8:39) Building Scalable Reverse Logistics and Operations From Day One (11:15) Lessons From Amazon and Singapore Airlines Applied to Taelor (13:32) What Rental and Resale Data Reveal About Consumer Behavior (15:54) Why Access Over Ownership and Personalization Will Dominate (18:07) The Future of Circular Fashion and Taelor’s Role in The Ecosystem (20:32) Resource Sharing Beyond Apparel and Rapid-Fire Founder Questions (23:29) Final Thoughts and Takeaways (25:02) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

August 26, 202624 min

Gigawatt Campuses vs. Edge Zones: The Future of AI Infrastructure

In this episode, Madelyn O’Farrell interviews Eesha Pathak, Senior Director of Product Management at Crusoe, about her unconventional career from software engineering and branding to leading enterprise AI at Google and now building AI-first infrastructure. They discuss Crusoe’s vertically integrated, energy-first approach to cloud and data centers, capturing abundant energy (like stranded gas and renewables) and turning “electrons into intelligence” via GPUs and a custom cloud stack. Eesha explains how Crusoe’s gigawatt-scale campuses and modular Spark edge deployments complement each other to deliver both scale and low-latency inference, dives into the Managed AI platform with its model marketplace, self-serve and tailored deployments, fine-tuning, and upcoming reinforcement learning, and highlights why judgment and holistic thinking are critical in product and engineering. She also unpacks Crusoe’s close partnership with NVIDIA, its role in enabling physical AI and robotics with low-latency compute, a flexible data and partnership strategy, and her long-term vision of Crusoe becoming the most helpful company for people building AI, so customers can focus on their products instead of wrestling with infrastructure. Highlights from their conversation include: Eesha’s Unconventional Career Path from Bosch to Google to Crusoe (0:29) Why Energy Is the Real Bottleneck for AI Infrastructure (3:30) What Energy-First Means and Bringing Compute to Abundant Power (5:04) Spark Modular Data Centers and Edge Zones Strategy (6:22) How Gigawatt Campuses and Edge Zones Work Together (8:26) Importance of Judgment in Product and Engineering Decisions (12:49) NVIDIA Partnership and Day Zero Nemotron Model Launches (15:25) Physical AI, Robotics, and Low-Latency Edge Inference (17:21) Crusoe’s Data Strategy and Partnership Approach (21:52) Vision for Crusoe as Most Helpful Company for AI Builders (22:47) Closing Thoughts and Episode Wrap-Up (24:09) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

August 19, 202626 min

Can Construction Keep Up With the Data Center Boom? xPL’s Answer

In this episode, Turner Construction’s Drew Kerr, Vice President and General Manager of xPL Offsite, explains how xPL is redefining construction through offsite manufacturing and deep supply chain integration, starting with data centers and expanding into sectors like semiconductors, healthcare, and industrial facilities. He contrasts traditional, fragmented construction with xPL’s unified model that centralizes manufacturing, supply chain, and field installation to handle unprecedented demand and labor shortages. Using a rapid 30MW data center deployment as a case study, Drew shows how close coordination, prefabrication, and early procurement decisions enabled timelines that would be impossible under conventional methods. He also discusses the limits of true “manufacturing” in construction today, xPL’s use of automation and robotics, and why he believes modularization will become the dominant way we build in the next century. Highlights from their conversation include: Drew’s Background at Turner and Personal Story (0:54) What xPL Offsite Does and Why It Was Created (2:02) How Exponential Party Logistics Reimagines Construction Supply Chains (4:15) Industrial Renaissance, Data Centers, and Physical Economy Bottlenecks (7:25) Why Offsite Construction Is Not Yet True Manufacturing (8:23) Case Study: 30MW “Emergency” Data Center Deployment (10:36) How Integrated Teams Beat Traditional Construction Timelines (11:06) Labor Shortage, Skilled Trades, and Bringing Work to Workers (13:25) Role of Automation, Robotics, and Smart Factory Concepts (15:50) Expanding Beyond Data Centers Into Healthcare, Sports, and Industrial (19:38) Future of Construction and Shift to Modularized Building Models (21:51) Global Modularization Vision for Turner and ACS (24:10) Closing Thoughts and Episode Wrap-Up (25:29) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

August 12, 202643 min

Compute is the Next Utility: Data Center Industrialization

In this episode, Madelyn O’Farrell and Santosh Sankar unpack the data center boom and the idea of compute as the next utility powering an “industrial renaissance.” They explore how AI models are commoditizing, shifting value to the application layer, and draw historical parallels to industrialists like Rockefeller and Carnegie in terms of capital intensity, vertical integration, and long-lived infrastructure. The discussion dives into the biggest bottleneck (access to energy and grid capacity) along with underwhelming GPU utilization, the need for better observability and efficiency, and trends like prefab “constructuring” in data center construction. They also highlight labor and skills constraints in specialty construction, tools like Record Lens to digitize field operations, and the potential for a Foxconn-style contract manufacturer for electrical equipment. The episode closes on what excites them about founders in this space: deep problem understanding, real industrial pain points, and the ambition to build in the physical economy rather than chasing AI hype. Highlights from their conversation include: Setting up Compute as a New Utility and AI Data Center Boom (0:38) Why Compute Becomes a Utility and Implications for Trillion Dollar Tech (3:50) Drawing Parallels Between AI Infrastructure and the Industrial Revolution (6:56) Capital Intensity, Supply Chains, and Long Lived Industrial Assets (7:50) Financing Data Centers Like Power Plants and Identifying Key Bottlenecks (11:44) Energy Queue, Grid Constraints, and Alternative Generation Opportunities (12:25) Efficiency, Grid Utilization, and Rising Importance of Operational Arbitrage (15:13) Utilization, ROI vs. Dark Capacity, and Lessons from the Dot Com Era (21:23) Constructuring Trend and Prefab Manufacturing for Data Centers (26:16) Record Lens and AI Native Project Management for Grid Scale Construction (29:24) Idea of a Foxconn Model for Electrical Equipment Manufacturing (32:47) Standardization, Certification, and Cyber Risk in Grid Infrastructure (36:22) Founder Traits, Industrial Ambition, and Solving Top Three Customer Problems (38:00) Gold Rush Dynamics, Real Pain Points, and Building in the Physical Economy (41:31) FInal Thoughts and Takeaways (42:42) Dynamo Ventures is a venture firm backing founders upgrading the physical economy. As intelligence moves into critical infrastructure and technology collides with physics, industry is entering a new era of transformation - the industrial renaissance. Born from the dirt and grit of supply chains and shaped by operations, not spreadsheets, Dynamo focuses on the complex realities of building in the real world. We invest in companies transforming infrastructure, manufacturing, logistics, transportation, and the systems that power global commerce. Dynamo works closely with founders who combine ambition with a bias to action, bringing a builder mindset to venture capital through deep operational insight, systematic pressure-testing and hands-on partnership. Our purpose is simple: to back the relentless shaping the industrial renaissance. Learn more at www.dynamo.vc Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.