Artificial intelligence is a hot topic at CES 2025. At the AI Transformation in 2025: Speed, Innovation, and Solving Long-Term Value panel, Carryn Quibell, CEO, Americas, DEPT, moderated a fast-paced panel on navigating the speed at which AI—and the people using and adopting it—is moving and the challenges and pitfalls behind keeping up… or being left behind.
Anushka Salinas, CEO, Nanit; Jinal Shah, CMO, Zip; and Milo Speranzo, NA CMO, Lenovo, joined Quibell to discuss where AI currently is and how businesses need to be prepared for where it is going. The future, as the panelists agreed, belongs to the impatient. Speed of implementation and innovation is not optional—AI is rewriting how retail and eCommerce operates.
The panelists were from three very different walks of life: Nanit has solutions to help make parenting more enjoyable, Zip provides financial services for cash flow management, and Lenovo is a technological giant. All three agreed on one thing: It is important to go slow in order to move fast.
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Speranzo discussed how Lenovo has developed an AI council that puts a framework around the development of AI in Lenovo products and marketing. Having one or two people within the organization that are knowledgeable and passionate about AI helps mitigate the risks of AI. Taking the time to slowly establish AI strategy correctly enables a company to move quickly.
Shah agreed, especially at Zip where the company deals with the very sensitive subject of people’s finances. Take the time to examine risk appetite and uncover which AI tool is most appropriate for people’s finances, she explained. AI literacy is imperative within an organization—it ensures a company navigates and uses AI ethically and in a nondiscriminatory way. As Shah explained, the time Zip took to be critical set Zip up to now move fast.
Unlike many companies in 2025 trying to integrate AI into its foundation, Nanit was built with AI at the core. Founded nearly a decade ago, the company provided insights to parents to help children sleep. AI is foundational for Nanit; however, it is no longer simply about helping people sleep through the night. As the need for more parenting solutions evolves, Salinas said it is important to crawl, walk, and then run for net new products. It starts with a proof of concept in house, moves to beta users (a scaled version of the company’s super users), and once they feel comfortable that the algorithm is safe and accurate they will start to roll it out. Nanit has eyes and ears on a child, so Salinas takes accuracy and security very seriously.
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The three panelists went on to discuss failures and successes of implementing AI, whether in its solutions or in simple marketing messages. As AI evolves and matures, it is important to be ready for failures. “If you’re not failing, you’re not taking risks,” Speranzo said. Most failures, Speranzo said, stem from one thing: there was no crawling and no walking—people just run. The bulk of failures have been through use of tools out there that aren’t ready on the marketing side.
One of the challenges in keeping up with the ever-learning AI is making sure the mission of the company—whether it is monitoring sleep or balancing a budget— is connected to leveraging AI tools. In Salinas’ case, Nanit builds tools to make lives easier and bring more joy to parenting. Success is imperative. Making sure that the mission is inclusive, clear, and rooted in AI helps current innovation and when bringing new people in the company.
Shah pointed out that the use and implementation of AI is like training a new employee. With enough starts and stops, the final outcome can be quite impressive. But does that mean AI is coming for your job? Speranzo feels people won’t lose jobs to AI, but one can lose a job to someone more educated in AI. “It’s definitely not mature enough to take jobs,” he said,” and I don’t think it will ever get there.” AI should be an enablement tool. A tool that enables and empowers creativity.
