Copilot, Claude, & OptiGPT: The AI Stack Driving Optimizely

September 25th, 2025  |  8 mins 36 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

How is Optimizely reshaping experimentation with AI? Cory Liebgott, VP of Product at Optimizely, joins LaunchPod to share how her team is using AI into both customer-facing solutions and their own product workflows.

Cory shares how her team:

• Uses Copilot and Claude for everything from PRD writing and meeting recaps to translating technical language into accessible insights
• Developed OptiGPT, an internal AI assistant that surfaces customer data, product knowledge, and HR policies in seconds
• Built a customer-facing AI query tool that also became a surprise hit internally for measuring customer health and engagement
• Encourages a culture of experimentation where PMs demo and share AI tools, turning emergent use cases into productivity boosts across teams

How 1 CPO Uses AI to Deliver Like a Full Product Team | Michael Krafft, CPO (FoundersCard)

September 23rd, 2025  |  35 mins 26 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

Today, we’re joined by Michael Krafft, CPO at FoundersCard, a membership community for entrepreneurs and executives offering exclusive perks and VIP treatment.

Previously, Michael worked in investment banking, led product teams at American Express, and played a key role in turning around Alight, an HR-tech firm, ahead of its IPO.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How Michael uses AI to be a 1-person Product team at a profitable startup with more than 250K members
• His AI-driven discovery engine that automates interviews, segments users, and turns feedback into roadmap-shaping insights
• Why working as both a leader and IC lets him move from idea to prototype to product in record time with tools like V-Zero and Lovable
• The simple test that boosted paid conversions by 50%—and how he runs growth experiments far beyond his team’s size

Why Optimizely is Betting on Agentic AI | Cory Liebgott, VP of Product (Optimizely)

September 16th, 2025  |  Season 1  |  31 mins 7 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

How is Optimizely reshaping experimentation with AI? Cory Liebgott, VP of Product at Optimizely, joins LaunchPod to share how her team is building agentic AI tools that put customer trust at the center.

Cory shares how her team:

• Pivoted away from risky benchmarking AI to focus on agentic AI tailored to each customer’s brand and data
• Launched Opal, Optimizely’s AI suite built on Google Gemini, with strict governance to keep customer data secure
• Developed experimentation agents that suggest test ideas, run experiments, and summarize results
• Built internal AI tools like OptiGPT to streamline workflows, from PRDs to customer research, boosting productivity across teams

The Company Using AI to Change the Game for Sports Betting | Marty Styles, VP of Product (PFF)

September 9th, 2025  |  Season 1  |  33 mins 25 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

How is AI changing the game for sports betting? Marty Styles, VP of Product at Pro Football Focus (PFF), visits LaunchPod to share how his team is bringing pro-grade football analytics, trusted by every NFL team, to everyday bettors.

Marty shares how his team:

• Built Key Insights, an AI-powered feature that simplifies 200+ data points per play into actionable betting takeaways
• Designed the Player Prop Tool, which combines PFF’s grades with market odds to reveal hidden betting edges
• Used Play Finder and AI-driven film study to transform raw data into instant, searchable insights
• Positioned PFF as the “Bloomberg Terminal of sports betting”, giving bettors the same edge NFL teams rely on

Why You Can’t Ignore AI Moving to the Edge | Joel Polanco, Senior Hardware Product Manager (Intel)

August 28th, 2025  |  Season 1  |  32 mins 54 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

On today’s episode of LaunchPod AI, we’re talking with Joel Polanco, Senior Hardware Product Manager at Intel’s Edge Computing Group. He’s led dozens of enterprise AI edge deployments and knows exactly what it takes to run AI models locally at scale.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Why AI at the edge will cause a whole new wave of disruption across multiple industries
• Why moving AI to the edge slashes costs and levels up customer experience
• And real-world examples of edge AI deployments Joel has seen - from IT assistants to agents that restock store shelves from a single photo

The AI Agent Behind 4x Productivity in Collections Teams | Dave Ruda, VP Product (Billtrust)

August 26th, 2025  |  Season 1  |  28 mins 53 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

How did an AI agent help 4x the productivity of collections teams? Dave Ruda, VP of Product at Billtrust, visits LaunchPod to share how his team built a collections AI that transformed drudgery work into high-impact outcomes.

Dave shares how his team:
*Reduced average email handling time from 8 minutes to just 2.5 minutes
*Built an AI agent that categorizes and prioritizes collector workflows to maximize efficiency
*Designed a “human in the loop” system to ensure trust, personalization, and better customer outcomes
*Developed a learning loop that adapts to each collector’s voice and scales across email and voice channels

The 3 Biggest Barriers to AI Adoption Across Your Team | Derek Pharr, CPO (Sporcle)

August 21st, 2025  |  30 mins 19 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

Why is AI adoption so hard inside companies? Derek Pharr, CPO at Sporcle, joins LaunchPod to reveal the 3 biggest barriers to AI adoption and how he helped his team overcome them.

In this episode, you’ll learn how Sporcle:

*The 3 biggest barriers to AI adoption and how Derek addressed them
*How Sporcle built a “content intern” with Claude Projects to augment trivia writers and improve user engagement
*How Derek prototyped, tested, and rejected a doomed product idea in under an hour

The EdTech Graduating 150K by 2X’ing Completion Rates | Zach Heller, VP of Prod. (Penn Foster)

August 19th, 2025  |  38 mins

business, digital experience, product management, technology

Today, we’re talking with Zach Heller, VP of Product at Penn Foster Group.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How Penn Foster plans to literally “fill a stadium” with 150,000 graduates by 2029—doubling completion rates to do it
• Why they shifted focus from acquisition to graduation—and how that’s now driving over 50% of enrollments through word-of-mouth
• How AI-powered learning tools boosted course completions by 25% in just one year, setting a new record for outcomes

Agentic AI for Vertical Software | Bret Tushaus, VP Product (Deltek)

August 12th, 2025  |  Season 1  |  28 mins 16 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

Today on LaunchPod, we’re talking with Bret Tushaus, VP of Product at Deltek.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How Deltek built Dela—an AI agent framework powering everything from smart summaries to autonomous accounting
• Why AI is rewriting the role of Product Management, and what leaders need to know now
• And how Bret’s team leveled up their AI skills fast — with short, high-impact sprints focused on real tools and real problems

AI Is Killing SaaS Pricing: Lessons From 10k+ Customers | Prittam Bagani, VP of PM (Chargebee)

August 5th, 2025  |  Season 1  |  42 mins 43 secs

business, digital experience, product management, technology

Today, we’re talking with Prittam Bagani, VP of Product Management at Chargebee, where they have insight into how over 10,000 customers are optimizing their pricing models.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How AI is forcing companies to rethink pricing - and why usage-, outcome-, and agent-based models are the future
• Why OpenAI made over 100 pricing changes in a single year and what you can learn about agile pricing experimentation from it
• And how to build the necessary technical and product infrastructure to test pricing models in real-time across millions of users