[laughs] Good point.

That's the important thing.

[laughs]No, I mean, Psychomagnet, it, it still is along that trend, but we, we have our first semi-hopeful ballad with it though on that album.

Um, I mean, there's, there's that one which, which has kind of a wistful tinge, but it's not a totally a downer.

Um, we have Knock You Down, which I, I was, you know, watching Brittany watch and it just, I don't know, it hit me all of a sudden.

I don't know how it happened, but 10 minutes later the song was written.

Beats me.

Now, you said you recorded your stuff in your studio there and, uh, sent it to Beau, so you didn't work with him directly, or he worked with your tracks, or how did that, how did that work out?

[laughs] Good point.

That's the important thing.

[laughs]No, I mean, Psychomagnet, it, it still is along that trend, but we, we have our first semi-hopeful ballad with it, Only, on that album.

Um, I mean, there's, there's that one, which, which has kind of a wistful tinge, but it's not a, totally a downer.

Um, we have Knock You Down, which I, I was, you know, watching Britney watch, and it just, I don't know, it hit me all of a sudden.

I don't know how it happened, but 10 minutes later, the song was written.

Beats me.

Now, you said you recorded your stuff in your studio there and, uh, sent it to Beau, so you didn't work with him directly, or he worked with your tracks? Or how did that, how did that work out?

It, it feels almost like just a, a churning of different sectors in the market from day to day.

So I, I think that tech overall can, can do very well.

You know, one of the things that we saw when the market was...

when the S&P 500 was consolidating was there was this big negative correlation between the hyperscalers and the AI infrastructure names.

And, you know, the more CapEx that there, that was expected, the market took it as a negative for hyperscalers and positive for everything else.

I think now there's been an inflection where they can really work together, and it has started, and we think it's gonna continue because there's been this inflection in the view around ROI on this CapEx.

You're seeing it from the GPU rental prices are going higher.

I just wonder how you see that playing out.

[laughs] Good point.

That's the important thing.

[laughs]No, I mean, Psycho Magnet, it still is along that trend, but we, we have our first semi-hopeful ballad with it, only, on that album.

Um, I mean, there's, there's that one, which, which has kind of a wistful tinge, but it's not a, totally a downer.

Um, we have Knock You Down, which I, I was, you know, watching Britney watch, and it just, I don't know, it hit me all of a sudden.

I don't know how it happened, but 10 minutes later, the song was written.

Beats me.

Now, you said you recorded your stuff in your studio there and, uh, sent it to Bo, so you didn't work with him directly, or he worked with your tracks? Or how did that, how did that work out?

hate.When I talked to Dallas' mayor, Eric Johnson, a few months ago, he explicitly called out both California and New York.

I mean, we, we very much are a pro-business, um, city, and we, we don't vilify corporations down here.

We view them as, as partners, and we view them as job creators that we want to support.

So we're always trying to figure out ways to make it easier to do business down here, so-

But Eric talks about this heated rivalry for businesses on a more epic scale.

I really do believe that we represent the future of capitalism in this country, and we are a sanctuary city from socialism.

How is AI showing up in trade and supply chains?

So it's been front and center for me.

I am tracking kind of the software that's developed on behalf of supply chain operators and logistics partners.

So it's been very much, in my view, for a long period of time, very interesting to see it interact with the physical world more recently.

So I tend to think of it from two different prisms.

First, you have the infrastructure perspective that Lawrence just went into and how that impacts freight flows.

So you have everything from container infrastructure flatbed truck, project vessels, brake bulk operators, all benefiting from this activity right now.

And Eric, how about you? Front of mind looking to next year?

So maybe we could start with that.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, I was trying to think about some of my, like, true backcountry fishing experiences, and they're quite a bit different here in the upper Midwest.

But I'm based just outside of Madison, Wisconsin, in the southwest corner of the state, a couple hours from Madison.

And it's a part of the upper Midwest called the Driftless, which I'm sure many of your listeners are familiar with.

But it's this really interesting geological area of the country where, by the last glacial drift – more or less went around a big section of this part of the country.

And so what that means is we've got some really beautiful rolling hills, these springs that bubble up in these farmland ravines, and it's just an amazing trout fishery.

And I guess I'm curious for how you manage that and sort of if that's something that you hear on a regular basis.

What do investors expect will happen 18 months or 24 months after this round closed?

For us, it's a unique situation because we've actually been profitable for many years, even when I had that high interest debt payment.

And we, like last year, close to $7-8 million in EBITDA.

So we've always been a cash flow heavy business.

So for us, it's not necessarily about losing money right now.

It's more so about reinvesting.

any profits we have right and giving ourselves a little bit you know uh more cushion to do so right um this is a true kind of in in all shapes and you know this is a growth investment which is cool like it's not a hey you know the investors are looking for dividend returns right in the next you know three years or the investors are are looking to just do nothing but you know go buy companies right it's it's an organic growth story And we're going to be, you know, you know, opportunistic in the M&A activity.

Is that still the direction of travel on trade?

Yeah.

Thanks, Kristen.

Really delighted to be here.

I would say even more so maybe than we had foreseen at the start of 26.

We have physical constraints to trade between hemispheres, some of which didn't exist at the beginning of 26.

And we obviously have trade policy constraints that are making intra-hemisphere trade look a bit more attractive than it might have looked in years past.

What should shippers be watching and could this change routing decisions in a more lasting way?

yeah,

and that's a great question.

In fact, the book that I just mentioned, The Next Mormons, does talk about that.

But I'm going to compare that with something that took place in 2012. another survey by Mormon Studies, former Mormons.

John Dillon is a famous podcaster here in the Utah area.

Many, many people listen to him.

He's an atheist and oftentimes has been very angry against Christianity.

What, what do you have to add to that? Um,

We really are.

They're constantly changing.

They're constantly evolving as they go through these different phases of development.

And we constantly are talking about what are you observing? What are you hearing? What are you seeing with each of them? And sometimes it's a struggle to let them to be unique.

We make decisions and we choose to step into the activities that they like.

And some of them I love, and some of them are a real stretch.

They're a real stretch for me.

That assurance.

If the one thing the shipping industry has had to learn over the past decade, it's how to be flexible.

Anybody who's moving goods from point A to point B, you always have to have a plan B, and a plan C, and a plan D, depending on the risk sort of profile of the area.

Johnson with the Journal of Commerce says this latest crisis is prompting shipping companies to think about new trade patterns, markets that aren't hindered by choke points like the Strait of Hormuz.

If your job is to move goods, you're gonna start thinking, "What are markets that we can actually access that require the least amount of transit and the m- least amount of political kind of turmoil that we might encounter?"

Ah.

I think Buffalo's gonna be a lot better, uh, in the long run.

I think they just missed the playoffs by a point.

You know, I know Nashville is known as a better place to live than Buffalo, but if the team's good and the hockey's good, it doesn't matter where you live.I'm gonna sign in Buffalo.

I, I don't wanna do that to my old team, my old fan base, and ruin any, any of my, my past accolades or, or any of that reputation I had for, for being an Av and, and playing for, for those fans.

So I always wanted to play in Nashville, but I didn't because I didn't wanna do that to Avs fans for how big of a rival Nashville was.

So I went to Buffalo, enjoyed my time there.

Yeah

Horno, what's going on, pal?

Oh, not much.

Just, uh, yeah, not a g- not a great golf game on, on Friday here in Cherry Hills.

Couple, uh, couple chunks, couple tight, uh, rotator cuffs.

What should we be expecting here tomorrow as puck drops for the Stanley Cup Finals, Horno?

All right.

So this might not be the sexiest TV matchup, right? I, I think, you know, people think when you hear Vegas-Carolina, you might think, like, it's not a, a made-for-TV series.

Um, sorry if I cut out there.

Which may feed into where we go on to talk about today, Eric, you know, that sense of do we see ourselves in how we are described, or do we see ourselves in some of the labels that are attributed to us? So before we get into your personal relationship with, um, our series topic, I like to start by asking guests how they personally describe the imposter phenomenon 'cause I think there are lots of many different descriptions and interpretations, and today we are hearing your story, so I'd really like to start with getting a sense of your view.

Okay.

So for me, um, that imposter phen- phenomena is, is one where I feel I don't deserve to be where I am and doing the job that I'm doing.

Um, it's also a feeling that when I go to certain meetings with various people, or I have to manage a meeting with certain people, that, um, I don't know what I'm talking about, and everyone else does.

Um, and that gives me a, a feeling, like a massive knot in my heart and sometimes a feeling of wanting to, you know, be physically ill because I know that I've gotta show up and I've got to, to do a job.

But, um, in my head, I'm-- my, my head is screaming that actually I don't know what I'm doing or how I'm gonna progress something.

Just as we begin to come to a close, Eric, um, I would like to turn my attention to anybody who is listening, who is feeling like they are a bit of a fraud or an imposter right now, so is actually holding those feelings and those thoughts as they are listening, and I wonder what you would say to them.

I think, I think what I would strongly recommend is to start journaling, to get a diary or create a folder on your computer or a inbox that you can send information so that whatever thanks you get, whatever praise, or especially where you feel you've done something right, regardless of what other people may think, that you start putting these messages to yourself so that, you know, at six months, nine months, a year, you can go back and just have a little flick through and go, "Oh, yes, that person valued me at that point.

AI can solve it"? Like, why go down that path to begin with?

You know why? Because, uh, we also had the realization the product we were starting, we, we've been getting into the system, what, what happens is because sometimes the rules of the game is so convoluted, you know-Engineering firms would just submit because we're gonna rely on the city to tell us, and they're gonna give us all these comments back because we don't have confidence in the system.

So submit it, and they'll write up something and let us know.

So when we started to become aware of the percentage of what we call bad plans coming into the city, I was like, "Oh my goodness.

We gotta course correct for this." What if we had a 90% completed plan coming through the process, and there's only 10% left to review? So that realization and, and the realization that we're gonna have to communicate that we are open for business given some of the changes we're seeing in slowing growth, fiscal challenges, inability to grow the tax base all started to come together at the same time, and that's been sort of the basis of it.

And we've been slow- not slowly, but sort of strategically chopping away at things to make it easier to do.

So the AI tool in particular, when we got the call, and the call came from a pro bono startup tech company in Austin, you know? So we didn't have to pay for it.

Wow

Uh, and Eric.

So, I mean, I, I got into journalism so I didn't have to make predictions and by like [laughs] these don't, no one hold me to this.

I, I go, I sort of default, we've said it a bunch today, this industry is fragmented, and, and Mike, I think you said it, the individual companies within it sort of have a, a preference to not be overly concentrated on any specific third party, right? I default with what I'm seeing in the market, the technology market at large, that access to really powerful technology is as democratized as ever.

So, you know, theoretically, a single person is not gonna recreate WiseTech.

It's not gonna recreate Oracle.

It's not gonna recreate a bunch of other name, household names that we know.

But a single person now can sort of manage a bunch of agents to build something pretty, pretty quickly and pretty effective.

Like, that dynamic, that, uh, back and forth was, I thought, pretty good.

Yeah, it was, it was, it was an interesting, uh, it was an interesting dynamic and, you know, here we have this guy who's been a bit of a, you know, self-described lone wolf for most of his life.

You know, he was hurt as a child and then, and then learned that safety was about, you know, being responsible only to himself because the people in his life had hurt him.

And then, you know, being willing to risk that, that safety because he, he knew, he just felt that there was something more in his life.

And then also maybe listening a little too, too well of, you know, respecting boundaries a little too much and, and, um, and learning that love is worth fighting for, and it's worth the sacrifice.

It's worth the risk.

Um, and I think that's really what his journey is, is just, is understanding how much you're willing to risk in order to gain, um, what, what love, uh, can, can, can be.

I just go like that.

Yeah.

So trying to kind of say, "Okay, I have an office hours on Slack.

That's when you should talk to me.

Don't hit me just random times," that kind of thing.

So I was trying to remember, oh, what, what should my Slack days be? What should this...

If this is this kind of meeting, where should it, what day should it be on? It's org.

We do a lot of cross-org.

Mm

Tell us about that.

Well, it's, it's not just to have a proper funeral, but to, you know, we, we say we honor them by taking care of the people they loved.

And, and it starts, you know, i- immediately after, after one falls in the line of duty.

Um, we come, we provide immediate financial support to the, to the family.

You know, when we hear of a tragedy like that, we think, you know, the shock, the grief, and all sorts of emotions.

But what we don't often think about is that survivor, especially if they have young children, they're worried, "How am I gonna support the kids? How am I gonna feed the kids? How am I gonna keep our home?" And so that's why it's so important for them to receive support immediately.

You know, we call that a down payment on a promise.

But the reality is, most departments are actually left to navigate these tragedies largely on their own, and that's where you step in.

Tell us about that.

Well, it's, it's not just to have a proper funeral, but to, you know, we, we say we honor them by taking care of the people they loved.

And, and it starts, you know, i- immediately after, after one falls in the line of duty.

Um, we come, we provide immediate financial support to the, to the family.

You know, when we hear of a tragedy like that, we think, you know, the shock, the grief, and all sorts of emotions.

But what we don't often think about is that survivor, especially if they have young children, they're worried, "How am I gonna support the kids? How am I gonna feed the kids? How am I gonna keep our home?" And so that's why it's so important for them to receive support immediately, you know.

We call that a down payment on a promise.

But the reality is most departments are actually left to navigate these tragedies largely on their own, and that's where you step in.

When you're thinking about it or, or, or working it through, uh, how do you bridge that gap?

So, okay, I mean, I, I have to be realistic and say, let's take Zubin, for example.

You- I mean, Zubin is exuberant about what, what WiseTech is right now and what it could become.

If he wasn't that way, he wouldn't be in that role or he shouldn't be in that role.

He would be doing his customers and his employees and his shareholders a disvalue or, you know...

So I walk into every, you know, sort of conversation with a vendor knowing they're gonna be far more excited about this than anybody else in the world, right? So that's a, that's a, an expectation that I, that I have in any conversation.

So what does...

Yeah.

Are you concerned at all that if AI absorbs all these tasks that this knowledge disappears? A- and if so, where does that leave the next generation? Where do they learn?

Yeah, I think, uh, I started thinking about this middle of last year.

I, you know, when, when we started thinking about what an agent...

You know, in another word for an agent might be a digital worker, right? You hear that kind of phrase bandied about and, and it's a, that's a decent way to think about it.

It's a new employee and you're training it over time and it learns probably faster and it doesn't take breaks and all of those things you've heard.

But, so I, I started thinking middle of last year, okay, all of the stuff that people say in our world, and lo- Lord knows there's a ton of it, the manual data entry, the repetitive tasks, the things that you work on on a desk early in your career that you then look back on and go, "Oh my God, I can't believe I filed X number of entries," or, "I did this many booking requests," or whatever it is.

If that goes away because it's perfect fodder for, for an agent, it's repetitive, you know, it, the, it doesn't tend to be outside of a guardrail, well, what does that do to the learning process that the brain undertakes in an industry? So, you know, can you essentially hire someone who skipped those steps of understanding the building blocks of, of a shipment and building blocks of compliance? And we don't know because we don't, we've never been in this, i- in this environment before where that's even an option.

[laughs]

Where would you start?

Yeah.

Where do we start? So lot of excitement about this company, an Aussie/Singapore-based company.

Two people behind it, Tim Rosenfeld and Oliver Curtis, and we, some of your listeners may know Oliver Curtis through his, through his partner, Roxy Jacenko, quite a famous Sydney family.

Oliver is doing his own things, and he's very good at raising money and selling, selling ideas.

He, he's got together with Tim Rosenfeld on, on Firmus Technologies.

This companyInitially, and Curtis was on the ground floor, the, the company was initially a Bitcoin miner.

[laughs]

He doesn't, he doesn't think billionaires should exist.

Dallas was already moving in the direction, um, of being a, a, a, a hub for financial services before, um, the new mayor of New York was elected, and it, it's just going to accelerate now.

It's already accelerating.

I'm, I'm already getting the phone calls.

We're already having more conversations than we've ever had before, more, uh, more interest in moving to Dallas by New York-based financial firms.

Um, so yeah, the answer is, there is a flood and an avalanche of interest in being where I think people who do this for a living, folks in the financial services industry, understand that the future of capitalism in this country is moving west, and it appears to be that New York wants to be the heartbeat of socialism in the United States, and that's appears to be the direction it's going.

But down here in Dallas-

Do you think this party is ready to listen to David Plouffe?