What's Up with Tech?

Tech Transformation with Evan Kirstel: A podcast exploring the latest trends and innovations in the tech industry, and how businesses can leverage them for growth, diving into the world of B2B, discussing strategies, trends, and sharing insights from industry leaders! With over three decades in telecom and IT, I've mastered the art of transforming social media into a dynamic platform for audience engagement, community building, and establishing thought leadership. My approach isn't about personal brand promotion but about delivering educational and informative content to cultivate a sustainable, long-term business presence. I am the leading content creator in areas like Enterprise AI, UCaaS, CPaaS, CCaaS, Cloud, Telecom, 5G and more!

What's Up with Tech? is a technology podcast hosted by Evan Kirstel, with 677 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Evan Kirstel hosts What's Up with Tech?, a technology show with 677 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  What's Up with Tech?

  What Happens To A Telco When Networks Get Autonomous

  Sep 29, 202627 min

  Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com AI is forcing a hard reset in telecom, and it’s not just about models or GPUs. The real shockwave hits the CIO’s mandate: reinvent IT fast enough to enable enterprise AI while still keeping the lights on across sprawling legacy stacks. We sit down with TM Forum leader and veteran CIO Willie Stegmann to break down why this moment feels different from past digital transformation and cloud migrations, and why boards are pushing for measurable impact rather than more pilots. We get specific about the economics: AI doesn’t come for free, and many executive teams are telling CIOs to self-fund it. That turns AI into both the goal and the lever, using automation inside IT to create budget headroom for broader customer experience and business transformation. From there, the conversation moves into what actually blocks scale in real operators: culture, process change, leadership intent, and the very human question of “what happens to my job?” We also unpack where momentum is building right now, from autonomous networks and intent-based operations to customer contact centers and the rise of AI agents as “machine customers.” Composable IT comes up as a practical path forward, decoupling systems of record from systems of engagement so operators can move faster without dangerous rip-and-replace projects. Finally, we zoom out to the bigger industry landscape, including 5G reality checks, early 6G signals, and satellite connectivity disruptions that could rewrite coverage economics. If you care about telecom IT modernization, autonomous enterprise strategy, and the future of the CIO role, listen now, then subscribe, share this with a colleague, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway. Support the show More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel

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  What's Up with Tech?

  What Tech Expo 26 Reveals About The Future Of Broadband

  Sep 23, 202612 min

  Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com Speed used to be the headline for broadband. Now the real question is tougher: did your internet actually feel reliable all day, on every device, in every room? We talk with Janelle Morse from SCTE, an industry insider helping shape Tech Expo 26 in Atlanta, about why the broadband world is pivoting toward end-to-end customer experience and what that means for operators, engineers, and anyone building modern networks. We break down the event’s theme, “convergence powered, experience protected,” and why convergence is no longer a buzzword. Fiber, HFC, DOCSIS, Wi-Fi, wireless broadband, and even satellite increasingly have to operate as one coordinated system. That pushes the industry toward cloud-native architectures, more virtualization, and more intelligence at the edge, because the network boundary now extends into the connected home where “my Wi-Fi is my internet” becomes the customer’s reality. AI is the accelerant. Instead of vague promises, we get into concrete use cases like network diagnostics, predictive service assurance, fault detection, and optimization, plus the next step: autonomous networks and self-healing operations that can sense issues, predict failures, and take action before customers ever notice. We also talk about how Tech Expo is structured, what to prioritize when you attend, why the expo floor matters, and how workforce skills and upskilling fit into an AI-driven future. If you care about broadband innovation, network reliability, and what’s next for customer experience, hit play, share it with a colleague, and subscribe for more. If you’ve got a strong opinion on fiber vs DOCSIS or where AI should help first, leave a review and tell us what you’re seeing. Support the show More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel

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  What's Up with Tech?

  Why 100G Networking Is Suddenly A Day To Day Enterprise Problem

  Sep 21, 202622 min

  Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com 100G Ethernet quietly crossed a line from “carrier-only” to “normal enterprise,” and the operational fallout is real: bigger links mean bigger outages, higher stakes, and far less room for sloppy assumptions. We sit down with NetAlly CEO Jeff O’Mara and Product Lead Thomas Doumas to break down why 100G networking is showing up in enterprise environments now, how AI-driven demand is accelerating the bandwidth curve, and what network teams need to do differently when the speed jumps beyond 10G. We get specific about what actually gets harder at 25G, 40G, and 100G. Auto-negotiation habits that feel natural at lower speeds often do not apply, so both ends of the link can require careful hard-coded settings, with many possible port modes and only a few that will work. Add the “fussy” world of fiber optics at 100G, where connector cleanliness and tiny physical issues can become real failures, and you can see why misconfiguration and optical problems dominate modern troubleshooting. We also unpack NetAlly’s approach to AI-assisted troubleshooting through what they call Ally Intelligence: guided, field-tested workflows that turn broad complaints into checkable root causes, without relying on generic chat outputs. Then we talk economics and accountability, including how to validate that a 100G service or upgrade is performing to spec, reduce guesswork, and shorten “time to innocence” when the network gets blamed. We close with the upgrade reality of old and new running together, classic landmines like spanning tree, and what comes next as the industry heads toward 400G. If you want practical, enterprise-focused guidance on testing, troubleshooting, and validating high-speed networks, hit subscribe, share this with your network team, and leave a review. What’s the hardest part of supporting 100G where you work? Support the show More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel

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  What's Up with Tech?

  How Enterprise Tech Awards Help Buyers Find Real Innovation

  Sep 8, 202615 min

  Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com Enterprise tech is having a weird moment: innovation is real, but so is the noise. AI shows up in every pitch, “leading” is used in every sentence, and buyers who actually have budgets and deadlines are stuck asking the same question: what’s genuinely worth my time? I’m joined by Rose Ross, founder and chief Trailblazer at the Tech Trailblazers Awards, to talk about how credible startup awards can act as a practical filter for enterprise IT leaders and a meaningful growth lever for founders. We dig into what makes an enterprise tech awards program valuable instead of performative: clear criteria, a respected panel of judges, and an emphasis on proof over polish. Rose shares how the Tech Trailblazers Awards grew into its 15th edition across categories like cybersecurity, networking, telecoms, containers, sustainability, AI in a B2B context, plus newer frontiers like robotics and quantum computing. We also talk about why customer impact matters more than “sexiness,” and how buyers can use awards as a shortlist without outsourcing their judgment. If you’re a founder or operator, we get very specific on the practical side: who can enter (nine years or younger and not beyond Series C), the Firestarter subset (three years or younger with no Series A), how to think about the entry like an investor pitch deck, and what judges hate most. The simplest advice wins: answer the question, drop the vague buzzwords, and back every claim with evidence. Subscribe for more founder and enterprise tech conversations, share this with a builder or buyer who needs a better filter, and leave a review with the best buzzword you never want to hear again. Support the show More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel

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  What's Up with Tech?

  How Broadcom And VMware Protect Dynamic AI Workloads

  Sep 1, 202612 min

  Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com Agentic AI is showing up everywhere, and it is not waiting for your security program to catch up. From the VMware Explore floor, we talk with Umesh Mahajan, General Manager for Broadcom’s Application Networking and Security Division, about what changes when AI agents become real workloads that talk constantly, call tools through APIs, and evolve by the week. The headline is uncomfortable but useful: AI helps defenders ship faster, but Frontier AI also helps attackers find vulnerabilities and drive more zero-day behavior than many teams are ready to handle. We dig into the security model that holds up when agents are dynamic and mistakes travel fast. Umesh explains why you have to solve a dual problem: protecting agents from attacks while also preventing a compromised or misdirected agent from attacking others. That leads to concrete priorities like lateral segmentation, distributed firewalling, IDS/IPS, and NDR-style behavioral detection, plus network-level controls to reduce the risk of sensitive data exfiltration. We also talk about discovery, because shadow AI is already a reality. If you cannot identify which agents, MCP tools, servers, and models are running, you cannot confidently separate authorized usage from risky sprawl. Finally, we tackle the fear every operator has: security that slows the business down. We cover why performance and latency matter more for AI workloads, how enforcement close to the hypervisor can reduce overhead, and what it takes to deploy protection quickly so “bought but not deployed” does not become your weak spot. If you’re building enterprise AI on VMware infrastructure, this is a practical map for getting safer without stalling momentum. Subscribe for more VMware Explore conversations, share this with the person owning AI rollout, and leave a review with your biggest question about securing agentic AI. Support the show More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel

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