The Big View podcast

The Exchange: Matthew Putman

30 Sep 2019

The factory floor may be an odd place to find a musical virtuoso. But the founder of Nanotronics, a near-unicorn on the Brooklyn waterfront with Peter Thiel on its board, is as comfortable tinkling the ivories as he is tinkering with the complexities of process automation.

The Exchange: Lord John Browne

23 Sep 2019

The former BP boss-turned-renewable-energy-supporter-turned-gas baron stops by to discuss “Make, Think, Imagine,” his new book that’s part an explanation of and part an ode to the benefits of engineering. As UN Climate Week kicks off, he also discusses his take on global warming.

The Exchange: White House hopeful Tom Steyer

3 Sep 2019

The hedge fund founder has already spent millions to impeach Donald Trump. He’s now trying to replace the U.S. president, joining a crowded Democratic field. The Exchange went to his campaign office to discuss why he is running and what he thinks of businessmen as politicians.

The Exchange: Nile Rodgers and Merck Mercuriadis

13 Aug 2019

How much is a song worth? Two people who should know are the Chic founder and his manager, who have started a company to buy some of the world’s most famous back catalogues. They explain how music investing works and why many songwriters are miffed with Spotify.

The Exchange: Soccer gets smart

30 Jul 2019

It’s summer, which means top teams like Barcelona and Manchester United are brandishing their cheque books in the player-transfer market. But the way soccer clubs choose their stars and fund the purchases is changing. Researcher Sophie Tomlinson and financier Jason Traub explain.

The Exchange: Andreessen Horowitz’s Scott Kupor

22 Jul 2019

The venture capitalist’s new book, “Secrets of Sand Hill Road,” is a fundraising guide for entrepreneurs. At his office off the famed Silicon Valley street he discusses with Breakingviews whether tech founders make good CEOs and details the biggest financial mistakes they make.

The Exchange: Surviving the digital-media meltdown

8 Jul 2019

Venture capitalist Ben Lerer, whose firm backed BuzzFeed and Axios, drops by Breakingviews to discuss why startups in the news industry have been suffering. Unlike some of his peers, Lerer reckons these minnows can have mutually beneficial relationships with giants like Facebook.

The Exchange: Escaping carbon’s grip

25 Jun 2019

Saipem made its name building drills and pipelines for fossil-fuel giants like Saudi Aramco. CEO Stefano Cao visits Breakingviews to discuss how climate change is pushing the company into greener projects – and how tech challenges and a need to protect margins will drive M&A.

The Exchange: John Delaney

17 Jun 2019

The first Democrat to bid for 2020’s presidential election has a pitch rarely heard in today’s political slugfest: that Democrats and Republicans can get along. Despite being a peacemaker, the former Maryland congressman has some punchy views on China, Big Tech and drug prices.

The Exchange: Dick’s sticks to its guns

10 Jun 2019

Dick’s Sporting Goods lost sales, customers and suppliers when it banned assault-style weapons from its stores last year. Over a year later, boss Ed Stack tells Breakingviews what he learned from taking a stand on gun violence, and addresses his newer challenge of China tariffs.

The Exchange: Dustin Yellin

3 Jun 2019

Is there a better way to signal the hydrocarbon era’s end than by flipping a 1,000-foot oil tanker vertically from the sea to create the world’s largest sculpture? Not according to the artist behind “The Bridge,” who discussed his project with Rob Cox at his Brooklyn studio.

The Exchange: The trouble with America

20 May 2019

The country no longer loves the unremarkable and its inequitable universities are unsustainable, NYU’s Scott Galloway tells Breakingviews. As his new book “The Algebra of Happiness” hits the shelves, he also discusses his prescient Amazon call and why Big Tech needs breaking up.

The Exchange: John Taylor

13 May 2019

The economist and leading proponent of a rules-based strategy for monetary policy recently convened a powwow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution at which top policymakers brought diverse views on the Fed’s conduct to the fore. He fillets some of the choicest bits with Rob Cox.

The Exchange: Joseph Stiglitz

29 Apr 2019

Americans are unequal, unheeded and underpaid, the former White House economist argues in his new book “People, Power, and Profits.” He stopped by Breakingviews to discuss why global trade needs a rewrite, Facebook deserves a break-up and socialism is less scary than it sounds.

The Exchange: Laurence Boone

8 Apr 2019

The yellow-vest protests are fizzling out in France, but the inequities that fueled them haven’t gone away. That it takes six generations for the poorest to reach the middle class is a big one. The OECD chief economist discusses this, Brexit, Italy and more with Rob Cox.

The Exchange: The water-crisis marathoner

19 Mar 2019

Investors and companies are ill prepared for the rising scarcity of this most important natural resource. With World Water Day on March 22, Thirst CEO Mina Guli lays out the issues and explains why she decided to run 100 marathons in 100 days to draw attention to the problem.

The Exchange: Austerity in the age of populism

8 Mar 2019

Fiscal restraint is going out of fashion. In his new book “Austerity”, Harvard professor Alberto Alesina sets out to explain when it’s needed. He tells Breakingviews of the hidden long-term risks of U.S. President Donald Trump’s policies and why Italy’s debt risks are not over.

The Exchange: Fixing tech’s gender disparity

19 Feb 2019

Women hold too few roles in corporate America, especially in engineering and computer science. Verizon’s Genia Wilbourn joins Breakingviews to discuss how she and the telecom company are addressing that, from diversity training to influencing suppliers to the CEO’s crucial role.

The Exchange: Hollowing out white-collar jobs

13 Feb 2019

In “The Globotics Upheaval” Richard Baldwin predicts machine learning and instant communications will disrupt service workers just as automation and offshoring upended Western factories. He tells Breakingviews what’s coming, and what we can do to slow it down.

The Exchange: Huawei’s U.S. security chief

11 Feb 2019

Andy Purdy, who previously worked in academia and for the U.S. government, talks about the geopolitical edge to allegations about Beijing’s influence at Chinese tech group Huawei, and how communications equipment needs global standards and better testing across the board.