Beyond the limits: A conversation on ambition, performance, and partnership with McLaren Racing

Beyond the limits: A conversation on ambition, performance, and partnership with McLaren Racing

Performance at the highest level is rarely defined by one big breakthrough. It’s built through culture, people, technology, and the ability to improve through small, consistent gains. In this episode of The Airwallex Podcast, Jack Zhang sits down with Zak Brown, CEO of McLaren Racing, to unpack the leadership principles behind building a championship-winning organisation. They explore how McLaren transformed its culture, why empowering teams and trusting expertise drives better decisions, and how AI is helping accelerate performance across the business. Zak shares lessons from Formula 1 on scaling globally, managing complexity, creating a winning environment, and staying hungry even after reaching the top. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Zak Brown is the CEO of McLaren Racing, who led the team to the top of Formula 1 with back-to-back wins of the Constructors’ World Championship in 2024 and 1025. A former professional racer, Zak founded JMI, one of the world’s leading motorsport marketing agencies, and co-owns United Autosports. His career spans racing, business, and building high-performance organisations across global motorsport. Jack Zhang is the Co-Founder and CEO of Airwallex, the global financial platform powering the banking and payment needs of more than 200,000 businesses worldwide. Jack co-founded Airwallex in 2015 after experiencing firsthand the inefficiencies of cross-border payments while running a small Melbourne coffee business. That insight led to building one of the world’s most comprehensive modern financial infrastructures – enabling businesses to move money globally, manage multi-currency finance, and scale without borders. Episode Resources: * Zak Brown on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/zak-brown-46b168104/] * McLaren Racing website [https://www.mclaren.com/racing/] * Jack Zhang on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-zhang-05200222/] * Airwallex Website [https://www.airwallex.com/the-airwallex-podcast] * The Airwallex Podcast on Apple Podcast [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-airwallex-podcast/id1893945314] * The Airwallex Podcast on Spotify [https://open.spotify.com/show/4ELMlccGH7wikFXT76quuW] * The Airwallex Podcast on YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrlJT59TVib299ZMGzuqJIOnDVA9sI6Gz]

How product teams are restructuring for AI – Anything Vibe-Coding Platform

What happens when anyone in a company can ship production software with AI agents? The traditional boundaries between technical and non-technical teams start to disappear. In this episode of The Airwallex Podcast, Shannon Scott sits down with Dhruv Amin, co-founder of vibe-coding platform Anything, to talk about how AI is changing the way product teams are structured. They explore why many companies are still layering AI onto legacy workflows, how domain expertise is becoming more important than traditional engineering pathways, and what it means when building software is no longer confined to specialist teams. They also unpack how AI agents are changing day-to-day workflows across organisations, and why today’s “vibe coding” tools are still just the earliest version of what’s coming next. Subscribe for new episodes. —--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dhruv Amin is the co-founder of Anything, a platform that lets non-technical people build production-ready software from a prompt. Anything has over two million users and is reshaping how businesses think about who can contribute to product development. Shannon Scott is the Chief Product Officer at Airwallex, bringing deep expertise in product strategy and the architectural design of complex financial platforms. With over six years at Airwallex, Shannon has been instrumental in expanding the platform from cross-border money movement into an AI-native finance platform for global businesses. Episode Resources: * Dhruv Amin on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/dhruvamin/] * Anything Website [https://www.anything.ai/] * Scott Shannon on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottsj/] * Airwallex Website [https://www.airwallex.com/the-airwallex-podcast] * The Airwallex Podcast on Apple Podcast [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-airwallex-podcast/id1893945314] * The Airwallex Podcast on Spotify [https://open.spotify.com/show/4ELMlccGH7wikFXT76quuW] * The Airwallex Podcast on YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@airwallex]

Dashboards to decisions: How AI is closing the gap between insight and action – Hex AI Analytics Platform

One of the biggest constraints in data-driven decision-making is access to the people who can interpret the data. That’s now changing. A new generation of AI-native analytics platforms is improving data accessibility, narrowing the gap between question, insight, and action. In this episode of The Airwallex Podcast, Barry McCardel sits down with Firdevs Abacioglu to unpack why businesses are finally ready for AI-powered analytics. They explore how AI is reshaping the analytics function, what it takes to build trust in AI-generated insights, and why accuracy, consistency, and control matter more as adoption scales. The conversation offers a practical lens on building the right teams, skills, and systems to turn faster insights into better decisions Subscribe for new episodes. —---------------------------------------------------------------------- Barry McCardel is the CEO and co-founder of Hex, the world’s leading AI analytics platform. Prior to Hex, Barry led deployment and product teams at Palantir, working on solutions to data problems all over the world. He was then at TrialSpark/Formation Bio, where he helped stand up their clinical trial platform. He has a B.S. from Northwestern University, where he focused on network science. Firdevs Abacioglu is the Head of Strategic Data Science and AI at Airwallex, where she leads the company's AI Analytics and Agentic GTM efforts. A former Meta executive, she spent nine years leading Revenue Strategy, Analytics, and Data Science organisations – helping scale the business from $25B to $200B. Her path began in investing, giving her a lens few operators share.   Episode Resources: * Barry McCardel on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/barrymccardel] * Hex Website [https://hex.tech/] * Firdevs Abacioglu on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/firdevsabacioglu/] * Airwallex Website [https://www.airwallex.com/the-airwallex-podcast] * The Airwallex Podcast on Apple Podcast [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-airwallex-podcast/id1893945314] * The Airwallex Podcast on Spotify [https://open.spotify.com/show/4ELMlccGH7wikFXT76quuW]

The VC view: Defensibility during the rise of AI-native companies – Square Peg VC

The VC view: Defensibility during the rise of AI-native companies In this episode of The Airwallex Podcast, Shannon Scott sits down with Paul Bassat to unpack what actually sets AI winners apart. They talk about why it’s not about chasing new tools, but tackling problems that weren’t solvable before, how founders can move quickly without losing focus, and why having strong conviction, loosely held, matters more than ever. The conversation offers a practical lens on identifying real AI opportunities, navigating constant change, and building companies that last.  What you will learn: * Where the most durable moats come from for businesses navigating the AI boom * How VCs recognise world-class founders in the AI era * What questions investors are now asking around safety, trust, and compliance * The infrastructure and tech challenges that still slow global growth * How to avoid the trap of starting with technology instead of problems —---------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul Bassat is the Co-Founder of Square Peg, an Australian venture capital firm, and a seasoned early-stage investor known for his expertise in identifying transformative technology trends. With a background spanning the internet era as the founder of SEEK (1997) and two decades of venture investing, Paul brings deep insights into how disruptive technologies reshape industries.  Shannon Scott is the Chief Product Officer at Airwallex, bringing deep expertise in product strategy and the architectural design of complex financial platforms. With over six years at Airwallex, Shannon has been instrumental in expanding the platform from cross-border money movement into an AI-native finance platform for global businesses. Episode Resources: * Paul Bassat on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulbassat/] * Square Peg Website [https://www.squarepeg.vc/] * Shannon Scott on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottsj/] * Airwallex Website [https://www.airwallex.com/] * The Airwallex Podcast on Apple Podcast [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-airwallex-podcast/id1893945314] * The Airwallex Podcast on Spotify [https://open.spotify.com/show/4ELMlccGH7wikFXT76quuW]

Building the future of global finance with Jack Zhang and Shannon Scott – Airwallex Finance Platform

In the first episode of The Airwallex Podcast, Jack Zhang, Co-founder and CEO of Airwallex, sits down with Shannon Scott, Chief Product Officer, to unpack how Airwallex is building the future of global finance. They explore how the company has reimagined financial operations, integrating infrastructure, software, and AI into one unified stack. From managing money across 180+ countries to deploying AI across the entire finance function, the conversation covers consolidation, automation, and what it takes to build financial systems that truly scale with ambition. You’ll learn: * Jack and Shannon’s vision for what the future of global finance should look like * How fragmented finance tools break down at scale * Why multi-currency infrastructure is critical for scaling globally * The AI agent framework that supports autonomous finance * How to evaluate emerging technologies like stablecoins strategically Jack Zhang is the Co-Founder and CEO of Airwallex, the global financial platform powering the banking and payment needs of more than 200,000 businesses worldwide. Jack co-founded Airwallex in 2015 after experiencing firsthand the inefficiencies of cross-border payments while running a small Melbourne coffee business. That insight led to building one of the world’s most comprehensive modern financial infrastructures – enabling businesses to move money globally, manage multi-currency finance, and scale without borders. Shannon Scott is the Chief Product Officer at Airwallex, bringing deep expertise in product strategy and the architectural design of complex financial platforms. With over six years at Airwallex, Shannon has been instrumental in expanding the platform from cross-border money movement into an AI-native finance operating system for global businesses.