Tech Vibe Radio (01/18/26)

The following is paid for by the Pittsburgh Technology Council. Information on the program is intended to solely further the public's general knowledge about the product. Opinions expressed should not be relied upon for any purpose by any member of the audience. News Radio KDCA does not guarantee the accuracy of any of the information aired on the following program. This is TechVyb Radio. It's your front row seat to Pittsburgh's technology and innovation ecosystem. TechVive is brought to you by the generous support of Compionetics at Compionetics.com. Chorus call at choruscall.com. Hi, Mark. at highmark.com, Huntington Bank at Huntington.com, the kindling culture agency at the kindling agency.com. PNC Bank at PNC.com. Savier at savier.com. And Studio Me at StudioMe Productions.com. Tech vibe proudly broadcast from the Huntington Bank Studios. Let's get the show on the road. Oh my god, Audrey, I'm exhausted. It's been crazy, man. It's been crazy. It just got back from Vegas. You have to have a great time. Are you going to tell us what you did in Vegas? Well, besides riding the high roller and going to the F1 bar. No, no. You did go to the F1 bar. You did. That's because one of our partners had a thing there. Oh, stop. I had to go to the F1 bar and actually maybe meet, like, you know, a Jensen button F1 driver from the day. But you know what I'm talking about. CES every year. This is like our third straight year. or the Tech Council goes to CES because not only are members there, but we actually help CES with content. We put on a panel discussion every year. And it's an honor, Audrey. It is. It is so cool for us to actually take Pittsburgh companies, give them a center stage on things that are changing the world. It's amazing. It's fun. And this year, it was all. And you got a chance to listen to the keynote. The keynote, well, yeah, let's start off with that real fast. So, I mean, the kickoff of it was with Lenovo at the sphere with Y, Y, Y. It was a two-hour thing. A little long. For two hours? Well, it was off and on things for two hours. But here's the team. You mean like Gwen Stefani dance in between? She came at the end. Nothing in between. The in-between stuff was like announcements as to how, you know, AI is going to be. integrated in even more stuff than we ever thought it could be integrated into. In fact, I'm starting to wonder if we need human beings anymore or not. And suffice to say, I'm going to say we still do, but they sure want to sell us a lot of AI. But it's incredible to see, I mean, so I mean, at that, at the event, of course, you know, Jensen from and video was there, which was pretty amazing to have just to see him speak. It's like, oh my.

God, man, like your company and their chips allow this stuff. Yeah, and it looks getting a little old. I'm sorry. I mean, it's cool, but like. I think I'm just going to start wearing, I love black. Yeah. I think I'm just going to start doing black and gold. You could. I mean, but just mix it up. I feel like he's got, I mean, he probably has 27 of those $10,000 motorcycle jackets, you know, because I know they're not cheap. They're beautiful. Oh, yeah. I'm not ripping on them. I'm saying, but I would diversify my look. That's just me. I mean, he can do him and his hundreds of millions and billions of dollars and I'll do. me with my never near a million dollars. So, you know, you do the math. I know who's cooler. It's not me. But anyhow, it was the whole, the whole thing is AI, AI, AI for two hours. And as you go through the show, it's AI. But then you say to yourself, for this AI to work, it needs data centers, it needs energy. And that's what the tech. Energy, baby. And that's what the tech council brought to the stage. Literally, we had a panel discussion. that just blew my mind. We talked about sustainable data centers, reliable data centers. And on this panel, we had Katie Momini from PWC. She's also on our board of directors. She was our moderator. We had the likes of synopsis hanging out with us, Westinghouse, excess renewables and AWS. I can't think of any more important companies that are shaping the future. Excess renewables focuses on. Yeah. Just solar, wind. And battery storage. So we can power these data centers. We had Westinghouse talking about the nuclear going on in there. And so, do you know me? I grab interviews with everybody. Oh, that's so fun. We're bringing interviews in the panel today, which I'm just so excited about because the panel discussion was amazing. I'm going to bring you, we're going to kick it off with Katie Momini from PWC. And then we're going to jump into Anthony Matarazzo from Synopsis, still ANSIS as well, too, and what they do. So we're going to check that out. Katie, it's so cool to have you here at CES with us. This is our big day. It is. It's been an exciting couple of days. I'm like, I'm exhausted, but in such a good way, though. We've gotten a lot of steps in. Absolutely. First off, PWC's presence at CES has been amazing this year. I can't imagine a better place for people to see it. Your investment in AI that you've been making over the past years is just leading the industry. Absolutely. As far as that is, how cool to show how you guys are harnessing the power of this and helping businesses actually use it. Yes, as we've been investing a lot, we're building a lot, just like everybody else, and it continues to evolve. But we're very excited to be here, and this has been a great showcase the last couple of days with so many individuals and networking. And I've learned something about F1, what you guys do with F1. It really showcases the whole experience and all the capabilities. that PWC has when it comes to helping other businesses. I think F1's like the ultimate case. Yes, F1 has a lot going on. And in particular, when you think about behind the scenes, how fast the cars are going, all of the automation and technology that drives that. So we're proud to be a sponsor of F1. Yeah. When we cannot be more excited to have you moderating our discussion today. Thank you. Databases, you know, sustainable reliability. These are such things that are driving growth in Pittsburgh. But this is what's going to drive growth around the world because we need all of this. And we couldn't think of a better person to be leading this thing, you know, because you guys are, you know, so much about this stuff. Thank you. We're looking forward to an amazing conversation today. It's going to be great. We have a distinguished panel of individuals, as you mentioned. Pittsburgh is the epicenter. A lot of what's going on as it relates to data centers, sustainability, and energy. So I'm super excited to moderate with you.

Fast, like, what do you think about in terms of, like, the opportunities that we see in the Pittsburgh area when it comes to this and how this is going to be driving what we do with AI? Yeah, absolutely. As you'll see on our panel today, we've got Westinghouse here. We've got ANCAS slash synopsis, right? We've got Amazon. You've got them all. But we have it sitting in our backyard. And even with the new airport that just opened, it's fronning on its own power grid. So we're at the forefront of what is happening as it relates to technology. And it's super exciting to be at a conference with. globally, and we have a Pittsburgh-specific panel, which is awesome. It's going to be good stuff. I cannot wait. I'm going to learn so much today. And so thank you for being part of this with us. We could not do without you. Yes, thank you. No, I'm happy to be here. Thanks, John. Awesome. Anthony, oh my goodness. So great to see you. Good to see him. Yeah, I'm so excited about today. When we were assembling this panel, for like, we've got to get anther on this panel. And what Snopsis is doing is, my God, it drives so, I've tried everything that's happening in the world as far as I'm concerned. So tell me a little bit about real fast about the synopsis and answers and what you're doing here. Yeah, really, it's a matter of where the technology is going and the community of everything, right? When you look at pumps to vehicles, to UAVs, to robots, to data centers. You know, there's one thing in common, and that's, everything's connected, autonomous, and intelligent, right? So the engineering that has to go behind, you know, the tech from silicon to systems is really important, and it's really difficult. You know, computer's going to power the next generation of the models that we need, and physics needs to anchor AI in reality, because there's a lot of hallucinations up. I love to say that it has to anchor it into reality because that is so true, and that's exactly what you guys are able to do with your software. Absolutely. That's why you make your money, man. That's so cool. Then you make it sound so simple because it is not. Part of it is we do sell rocket science, but we have to be able to articulate it to, you know, next generation engineers, which, you know, you think about AI and just the complexity of where that tech is going. The whole landscape is completely shifted. Yeah, we have a star-studded cast up there, and you guys really make it Pittsburgh proud. This is showing this is what Pittsburgh brings to the table. When it comes to technology, data centers, AI, everything. Real fast with the change over to synopsis and the ANSys thing, you guys are continuing to grow in Pittsburgh. Totally, yeah. So we have about 900, almost 1,000 individuals in the Pittsburgh area. Forget how many that is. That's just, wow. It's incredible. Yeah, that is just amazing. And I think over the years has just been the legacy of, you know, we were spent off out of Westinghouse 50 years ago. Exactly. We just continued to grow and make acquisitions. And just the history of, you know, industrial kind of meets AI robotics, really unique, kind of where we're at in the middle of it. It's good stuff all the way around. We could be more proud to have you guys here. I am so looking forward to this conversation today because we're going to learn just a ton. I can't wait to bring more content coming in from that. So it's worth for like pre-game in here. We're warming up. So thank you, Anthony. You're the best, man. Yeah, thanks for everything. Awesome. Thank you much. So much fun, Audrey. We're coming right back after this quick break. Talk about more. CES 2026 in the panel discussion. More interviews coming your way. What do you say? That's great. I think fantastic. Hang tight, everybody. But stays in Las Vegas comes to Pittsburgh. Exactly right. That's the new, that's the new tagline. Super, super cool. Anyhow, everyone, we're taking a break. Jonathan Kirsting.

Adruza. From the Pittsburgh Tech Council. Go to pghthTech.org. We're right back. More CES coming your way. Studio Me Productions is a full-service video production company based in Pittsburgh. It offers custom video production services, podcast studio rentals, and communication studio buildouts. Choosing Studio Me Productions means investing in a partnership that values creativity and delivers results that exceed expectations. With a deep understanding of marketing and storytelling, Studio Me ensures your project will captivate and engage your viewers. Learn more at StudioMeeproductions.com. That's StudioMeoproductions.com. A strong work culture is the invisible force that bonds employees to each other, to the company, and to their work. It's linked to better business outcomes, happier employees, and increased retention. How we work and where we work continue to evolve in almost every way, yet our human need for connection and purpose remains. Help your employees connect and thrive by evolving your culture to support your team, regardless of how or where they work. So discover how the Kindling Culture Agency... can transform your company's culture at spark something big.com. That's the kindling culture agency at spark something big.com. Compionetics is the leading developer of unified voice, video, and data collaboration and conferencing applications for the service provider, government, and unique workflow applications. The Summit Olympus and Evergreen platforms, driven by their encrypted user interfaces, enable powerful and secure collaboration. Combined with world-class support and innovative professional services, Compunetics delivers the right solution every time. Learn more at Compunetics.com. This is TechVyb Radio, your front row seat at Pittsburgh's technology and innovation economy. TechVive is brought you by Compunetics at Compunetics.com. Choruscall at choruscall.com. Highmark at Highmark.com, Huntington Bank at Huntington.com. Kindling at thekindlingagency.com. PNC Bank at PNC.com. And Saviore at Saviore.com. Tech vibe proudly broadcast from the Huntington Bank Studios. Audrey, like I said, I'm still, like rotting this bubble. I know you are. Did you gamble while you were there? No gambling. I will never gamble. I just don't do that, but what I was gambling on it was my health. Every time I get sick, I did not get sick this year. Like, flu, cold, something. What did you do differently? Asked up on the plane.

Completely scoured myself in all sorts of things that kill germ. Brillopad, bottle of Ajax maybe. That cannot be confirmed nor denied. But you got to play it's a lot of people. I mean, when you're seeing, yes, you're looking at like 200,000 people from all over the world. We all have to breathe, and our breath goes everywhere. But I skirted it this year. But what I did come back with, what I scored our jackpot on was interviews this year. I'm going to play the last two interviews from our panel that we had around sustainable data centers. Got to talk with Jim Spencer of excess renewables. I mean, Jim knows how to build energy companies. He was responsible for all the wind power that we see in Pennsylvania. He's now doing that to provide sustainable energy for data centers. And, Audrey, this was so exciting. interview Shannon Kellogg, who is the VP of policy at Amazon's AWS. Pretty impressive. When you think data centers, that's that. They have some amazing perspective about what it's going to take to keep data centers running. So let's check it out. Jim Spencer, oh my goodness, here at CES with us. At the Tech Council, we were so excited putting this panel together. It's such an honor for us to take Pittsburgh and put it on this global stage. And I'm thinking about what Exus is doing. You're connecting all these dots as to what it's going to make technology actually happen. We need the power in so many different ways. Tell me about Exus real fast and what you guys are up to. Sure. We are a renewable energy IPP. That means that we develop own and operate. Renewable energy projects, primarily large-scale solar and wind and now storage in a big way. And if you think about what we do, we identify sites, we make sure we can get power in and out. We permit those sites. And with the boom in AI and large data centers, it's just that we're doing the same thing. So as we develop projects, now we're looking at... possibility to co-locate data centers. It's all about. It's what it's about, yeah. And I just, I love the idea of obviously the renewable aspect, the sustainable aspect. And the tech council, it's all about the all the above. It takes everything to make this happen. But I just love the fact that the way you're pursuing this, it's just, yeah, it's a gentler way of doing it for a lack of a better term, being able to put some renewables in there. I mean, there's a real Pittsburgh spin to this because we were, we've been selling. Renewable energy to the hyper-scaleers for 15 years. Exactly. But those were AWS distribution centers, helping them to meet their ESG goals, Google, DataBrid, Digital Realty. Now, with these large-scale data centers, there's really no way that we can supply a gigawatt of renewable energy. Right. But how can we? SMRs. In my view, that's... the next sustainable step. That's on the nuclear side of that, yeah. Nuclear side, Pittsburgh, Westinghouse. Yeah, I mean, that we have the roots and we got the expertise. The other thing is LDES, long-duration energy storage, batteries. I'm going to talk to you about that because that is something the molecule don't know about. Talk to me more about that. The idea that we make this energy, we can store it so we can actually use it at the optimal time to use it and so forth. Exactly. So.

Storage is becoming mainstream now, but the reality is that we've just built a large storage project in New Mexico where we serve the metadata center. Okay. But those are four hours, and that's the state of the art in the U.S. right now. Okay. The technology is four hours. But you have form energy, right? West Virginia, close to Pittsburgh. Right, right. Iron air storage, 100 hours. That's going to be a game changer because we'll be able to store... energy for that period of time when they're when it's needed when the sun is not shining so that's a really great opportunity it's just fascinating i get so excited when you're talking about this because i'm not looking you're solving these really tough problems things that are keeping people up at night yeah but there are solutions to these things and you're doing it we're trying that's and that's why we're here at c s to showcase We're solving these problems in Pittsburgh, and it takes companies like Exodus to do that. So, Jim, thank you for being here. Yeah, thanks for inviting us. Of course, man. Happy to be here. Can think of anybody better? Thank you. Appreciate you, man. It's CES. We have the absolute coolest companies hanging out with us today. I can't think of a more powerful company out there than Amazon. And it comes to what we're talking about here with data centers today. I can only imagine the impact that Amazon has and what it means. to the world with what you guys are doing and what it means for you guys to have data centers in there enough power to run those data centers to shannon we are so excited to have you on our panel today We literally have the best of the best. So glad to have you real fast. Tell me, let your stuff real quick. What you do is Amazon. I'm going to jump in a few fast questions. Sure. Yeah, Shannon Kellogg, and I'm a vice president for public policy for the Americas for our AWS division at Amazon. I've been there just over 13 years, and I run the Americas, and we're focusing a lot on data center and energy and infrastructure issues, he says. Obviously, this is at the core what makes Amazon happen. Big chunk of your business, obviously, with all that type of stuff. It is. We've been in the cloud computing business now for about 20 years. That's amazing. When you say that, because when you first started that up, it wasn't really, it was just, it was this idea, it was this thing. It was a trend, but now it's how we do business. Now it's foundational. It is foundational. It is foundational. Yeah, 100%. A hot topic. Which is why we all here? Yeah, absolutely. So tell us about some of the investments that you guys are making. Obviously, I knew it in Pennsylvania. There's some great stuff going on where you're putting. power up, but you're building campuses around that as well, too? Tell me more about that? Earlier this year, sorry, earlier last year, because we're in 2026. In summer of 25, we announced a $20 billion investment in Pennsylvania to continue to build out our data center and infrastructure footprint. in the U.S., and so Pennsylvania is now a destination for us, and we'll be building multiple campuses there, including one that we're building right now around the Telen Energy nuclear plant. It's in the Susquehanna. Right. It's the Susquehanna nuclear plan in Pennsylvania, and we're building a data center campus right around that. I think about the impact of that for the state, and what that means is there's some big...

dollars right there. That is no messing around. What made Pennsylvania an attractive place to do this? This is a historic investment for Pennsylvania, and I was there with the Governor Josh Shapiro and Senator McCormick to announce it this summer. And just having them both there as part of the announcement was cool because it really has been a bipartisan effort. It's one of the few things, yeah, to draw us into Pennsylvania and make this historic investment. But There are lots of things attractive about Pennsylvania, but of course, having abundant energy resources and availability and certainty around that is one of the big factors. Yeah, 100%. So that's what we're learning so much. When we're seeing other companies that are investing like this, we see that Pennsylvania, and especially when you go into southwestern Pennsylvania, there's just such opportunity there. So that's why we're so excited to have you here today as to why you're doing this. We want to get the word out there, though, this is what's going on. And when you have places like Amazon making these types of investments, I think something real. No, absolutely. And, of course, there are other investments that are going into Pennsylvania in the space, too. It's not just us, but we were the largest and the biggest and the first to make this kind of an announcement, but others have also followed. And I think it's just the beginning as we look at. the possibilities around AI and maintaining U.S. leadership in AI. And the investment in Pennsylvania and the investments that we're making across the country are part of this historic effort to build out AI-related and digital infrastructure across the U.S. to maintain that leadership for the U.S. globally. Yeah, we couldn't be happier that you're choosing our state, our region in order to do that. You guys really got that ball rolling. That started the momentum that we're seeing right now. That's very exciting. And so far, experience has been really great in Pennsylvania for us. That's fantastic. And I can be more excited to kick off 2026 here at CES with you guys part of our panel. Like it's just, it's so exciting, very fun. Yeah, it's wonderful to be back to CES. I haven't been here for a number of years. And so it's really great to be back here and also to be a part of this discussion today with you all. When I see Amazon's presence here, I see all the AI that's going on. It's just, it's mind bending, but the opportunity is so amazing. We're going to have more next week, Audrey, I swear, because that wasn't all we did. I know. I know it's so much fun. I love it. Every year I get so excited to go there. And to me, it's just an honor. Look at me. I'm smiling right now. I get excited about it. So next week, if you tune in, we're going to talk to some of the companies that were on the floor there, companies like PowerCast, Kvestro, and so many more that I got to talk to at CES. So look for it. Next week, Audrey, what do you say? Yes. Don't forget about Sundays. Do it. And if you forget about Sundays, you can find us anywhere. Exactly right, man. Wherever you get your podcast, go there and check it out for TechVive. So many great ways. Audrey, look forward to hang out with you next week. And I'll see you tomorrow in the office. See you. Thanks for geeking out with us on TechVibreedio. Tune in next Sunday for more tech and innovation stories right here from Pittsburgh. Get TechVib wherever you get your podcasts and never miss a show.

Tech vibe is brought to you by the generous support of Compuetics at Compunetics.com. Chorus call at choruscall.com. Highmark at highmark.com. Huntington Bank at Huntington.com. The kindling culture agency at the kindling agency.com. PNC Bank at PNC.com. Saviour at Savier.com. And Studio Me at StudioMe Productions.com. Tech vibe proudly broadcasts from the Huntington Bank Studios. The preceding was paid for by the Pittsburgh Technology Council. Information on the program was intended to solely further the public's general knowledge about the product. Opinions expressed should not be relied upon for any purpose by any member of the audience. News Radio KDCA does not guarantee the accuracy of any of the information heard on the preceding program.