Why We're Launching AI Speed in 2026
- Evan J. Cholfin
- Mar 5
- 3 min read
How AI-Powered Companies Are Helping Traditional Businesses Adapt Faster Than Ever
By Evan J. Cholfin
At LUXHAMMER, we work with companies at moments of inflection—when growth is possible, but only if they move faster, smarter, and with more precision than they ever have before.
Across health, wellness, food & beverage, personal care, media, and technology, we spend our time helping leadership teams translate innovation into execution. Not in theory—but inside real businesses, with real constraints, real customers, and real revenue targets.
Over the past few years, one pattern has become impossible to ignore:
The companies pulling ahead aren’t the ones talking the most about AI.They’re the ones partnering with the right AI-powered companies—and adopting those capabilities faster than their competitors.
That insight is what led us to launch a new podcast in 2026: AI Speed.
In 2026, there’s a reality every traditional company is confronting—whether they’re ready to say it out loud or not:
AI adoption is no longer optional.
But the real story isn’t that every company needs to become an AI company.
It’s that every company needs to work with AI companies.
The fastest path to transformation today isn’t building everything in-house. It’s partnering with AI-native companies that already understand the technology, the constraints of legacy systems, and the operational realities inside traditional organizations.
That’s what AI Speed is about.
The Real Challenge Isn’t AI — It’s Adoption
Most conversations around AI focus on capability.
Inside traditional businesses, the challenge is something else entirely:
Leadership alignment
Legacy infrastructure
Risk, compliance, and governance
Change management
Proof of ROI under real-world constraints
This is why adoption stalls.
Not because the technology isn’t powerful—but because implementation inside established organizations is hard.
A new class of companies is emerging to solve this problem:
AI-powered companies built specifically to help traditional businesses adopt, integrate, and scale AI—without destabilizing their operations.
They’re not selling “AI.”
They’re selling outcomes:
Speed
Efficiency
Better decision-making
Automation
Cost reduction
New revenue
They are the connective tissue between possibility and execution.
What AI Speed Is About
AI Speed is a weekly interview series featuring leaders of AI companies that sell directly into traditional industries.
These are founders and executives operating at the front lines of adoption—working daily with enterprises, mid-market companies, and legacy organizations that need to modernize quickly, responsibly, and measurably.
Each conversation goes deep into questions such as:
What traditional companies are actually buying when they buy AI
Where AI deals break down—and why
The biggest internal blockers to adoption inside legacy organizations
What successful implementation looks like in practice
How AI vendors prove ROI fast enough to earn trust and expansion
Patterns emerging across industries that signal where adoption is accelerating next
This isn’t a theoretical discussion.
It’s a practical, operator-level view into how AI transformation is happening right now—through the companies enabling it.
Why This Podcast, Now
We’ve reached a point where AI is no longer experimental.
It’s becoming infrastructure.
Traditional companies don’t need more hype. They need clarity:
What actually works
What doesn’t
What scales
What creates durable advantage
What accelerates adoption instead of creating internal friction
AI Speed is designed to surface those answers directly from the leaders building the platforms, products, and services driving real-world adoption across industries.
This is a conversation about execution, not speculation.
And A Healthier, Happier You Continues
We’ll continue hosting A Healthier, Happier You: The People Working to Make It Happen, a podcast focused on the innovators improving our lives through health, wellness, personal care, and food.
The two shows are distinct—but connected.
AI is already reshaping healthcare, consumer products, manufacturing, education, media, and beyond.
Both podcasts explore the same underlying question from different angles:
How meaningful change actually happens inside complex systems.
The Throughline
The next decade won’t be defined by who has access to AI.
It will be defined by who can adopt it fastest, integrate it intelligently, and deploy it responsibly—through the right partnerships.
AI Speed exists to document, examine, and accelerate that shift.
— Evan J. Cholfin
Founder & CEO, LUXHAMMER
Host, AI Speed
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