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In partnership withMichigan Economic Development Corporation When Darren Riley moved to Detroit seven years ago, he didn’t expect the city’s air to change his life—literally. Developing asthma as an adult opened his eyes to a much larger problem: the invisible but pervasive impact of air pollution on the health of marginalized communities. “I was fascinated about why we don’t have the data we need,” Riley recalls, “or why we don’t have the infrastructure to solve these issues, to understand where pollution is coming from, how it’s impacting our communities, so that we can solve these problems and make an equitable breathing environment for everybody.” That personal reckoning sparked the idea for JustAir, a Michigan-based clean-tech startup building neighborhood-level air quality monitoring tools. The goal is simple but urgent: provide communities with access to hyper-local data so they can better manage pollution and protect public health. As Riley puts it, “JustAir is solving the problem of how to better manage local pollution so that we can make sure our communities, our lifestyles—where we work, where we play, and where we learn—are really protected.” Founded during the height of the pandemic, when the connection between health disparities and air quality became impossible to ignore, JustAir now partners with local governments, health departments, and community residents to deploy monitoring networks that offer key data relevant to everything from policy to personal decision-making. From the start, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC) offered key support that helped turn JustAir’s bold vision into technical infrastructure. Through the MEDC’s early-stage funding partners and a network of mentorship and resources known as SmartZones, JustAir sharpened its product-market fit and gained critical momentum. Success for Riley isn’t just about scale, it’s about impact. “It warms my heart, and it shows that we’re doing exactly what we said we wanted to do,” Riley says, “which is to make sure that communities have the data that they deserve to create the future, the clean, healthy future that they desperately need.” To other burgeoning entrepreneurs, Riley sees a sense of community as key to lasting and impactful change. “When people are celebrating you with your head up, and then when people are helping you put your chin up when your head’s down, I think it’s so, so critical. I found that here in Michigan, and also found it here in our community, right here in Detroit. Passion and finding a community that’s going to help get you through the journey is all it takes.” This episode of Business Lab is produced in association with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. Full Transcript Megan Tatum: From MIT Technology Review, I’m Megan Tatum, and this is Business Lab, the show that helps business leaders make sense of new technologies coming out of the lab and into the marketplace.Today’s episode is brought to you in partnership with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation.Our topic today is building a technology startup in the U.S. state of Michigan. Taking an innovative idea to a full-fledged product and company requires resources that individuals might not have. That’s why the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, the MEDC, has launched an innovation campaign to support technology entrepreneurs.Two words for you: startup ecosystem.My guest is Darren Riley, the co-founder and CEO at JustAir, a clean air startup that began its journey in Michigan.Welcome, Darren. Darren Riley: Hi. Thanks for having me. Megan: Thank you ever so much for being with us. To get us started, let’s just talk a bit about JustAir. How did the idea for the company come about, and what does your company do as well? Darren: Yeah, absolutely. The real thesis of JustAir, is really a combination of one, my personal experience but also my professional experience. On the professional side, background in software engineering, graduated from Carnegie Mellon University, but I was always fascinated by how to use technology to really support and innovate and really push the frontier on issues that are near and dear to my heart. Coming from Houston, Texas, coming from communities that often are restricted with certain issues, systemic issues, is something that I always carried in my heart. And on the personal side, it was around seven years ago when I moved to Detroit, in Southwest Detroit, where I developed asthma. Not growing up with asthma and not developing any issues, having that disease of the lungs really opened my eyes to just how much our environment impacts our health and well-being.The combination of those, that pain point and also my background in technology, I was fascinated about why we don’t have the data we need or why we don’t have the infrastructure to solve these issues, to understand where pollution is coming from, how it’s impacting our communities, so that we can solve these problems and make an equitable breathing environment for everybody. That’s kind of what birthed JustAir in a way.And actually, it was around COVID-19 where we really started to push forward, where we saw all this information and research around health disparities and a lot of the issues of mortality rates around COVID-19, which kind of coincides with COPD, asthma, and other diseases that are often overburdened in communities that look like ours, in Black and brown communities. That’s kind of where we got our start.And what is JustAir today? JustAir is solving the problem of how to better manage local pollution so that we can make sure our communities, our lifestyles—where we work, where we play, and where we learn—are really protected. And, so, what JustAir does is build hyper-local neighborhood-level air quality monitoring networks. Communities have access to the data, policymakers and decision-makers can use that data to really influence and push things to help protect the community, but also other stakeholders can use the data to move the environment to a healthier state. So that’s where we are, and we’re four years strong, and I’m really excited to be a part of this journey here in Michigan. Megan: So you launched about four years ago now. Why did you choose to build and grow just there in Michigan? Darren: Yeah, I think a combination of things, the reason why I chose to start here and be intentional about building our team here. I think first is really around the ecosystem support around Michigan. So the MEDC has a network of what we call SmartZones that really offer funding, resources, mentorship, advisory on the different challenges that can range from capital, legal, and other issues that kind of hold an entrepreneur from just getting out there and putting their product in the market. First and foremost, I’m super thankful and grateful for just the state really focusing on and putting entrepreneurs first in that regard. I think secondly is community. I really felt a strong sense of community here in Detroit. One of the founding members of an organization called Black Tech Saturdays, which sees over hundreds, 500-1,000 folks almost every Saturday of the month, just really sharing and really engaging with tech-curious folks from all different walks of life, but making intentional space for folks who are often left out of those rooms and out of those conversations. And just really seeing a peer network of entrepreneurs who come from a similar cultural background or a similar situation, really going after it together and helping each other navigate some issues. And then lastly, I talk about this a lot, but problem-solution fit. Being here in Detroit where I developed asthma, where we have many issues and many around the environment that have hit some communities the hardest, right here in Detroit in my own backyard I really want to be very narrowly focused and make sure that I’m building something that actually solves the problem that got me on this journey in the first place. Not thinking about regional-wide, different country, international, et cetera, but how do we build something right here in the backyard that solves the problem for my neighbors and makes sure that we can make a real difference in the community. So, from the community to the problem that I really care about and make sure we solve, and then also just the ecosystem support is why we’re here in Michigan and why we plan to really grow and really be a part of this movement. Megan: Fantastic. And you’ve touched on a few of those already, but as you were getting started, what specific resources, partnerships, or community support helped you navigate the early-stage research and development stages? Darren: One example, really early, actually, I forgot about this for a while, but we have a Business Accelerator Fund here in Michigan where there’s funding offered to entrepreneurs for technical assistance. I used that to operationalize some of our technical roadmap processes to build out the infrastructure that we really intended to do. So, that real funding that was non-dilutive that the state provided helped accelerate some of those issues in the early days, where it was just myself and advisors going after this problem. And so now, where we are today, there are funds that receive funding from MEDC, so local funds and venture capital that help you get your first check. Those are really helpful as well. All that to say is basically a combination of funding primary source, but also strategically, that funding is going towards product positioning and product-market fit. Those were some of the two core examples that have been beneficial. And then, I think the last thing I’ll mention as well, MEDC and a lot of the SmartZones within the state, these SmartZones are just bucketed in different regions and areas, so you have Ann Arbor, you’ve got Detroit, you have Grand Rapids, the whole nine yards, having these events and creating these clusters, if you will, of density of entrepreneurs, I think is super, super critical. I’ve experienced in New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, and other bigger ecosystems that density is so critical to where you’re constantly rubbing shoulders with the next entrepreneur, the next investor, the next customer, to really kind of accelerate that velocity of your journey. Megan: Yeah. Having that ecosystem makes such a difference, doesn’t it? Darren: Oh yeah, absolutely. Megan: And tech acumen and business acumen are very different sets of skills. I wonder what was the process like developing out your technology whilst also building out a viable business plan? Darren: I think I have a real unique opportunity. Having a software background, I code all the time, felt I had a lot of ideas, always joked that I had a Google Drive of 30 ideas that never worked, that I never showed anybody. I really felt I had that piece. What I was missing in my journey and why nothing ever came to fruition was just the simple principles of, are you solving a real problem, a real pain point for a customer?Two things on the business acumen side are having an affinity for the problem. I truly believe that going on the entrepreneurial journey is lonely, it’s risky, it’s stressful, and tiring. The more I can wake up in the morning and think about [how] the problems that we solve could actually result in a breath of clean air for someone who may not have that awareness or have the tools to advocate on their behalf, just having that extra motivation and having that affinity towards a problem that I feel really deeply, I think does help.But I think also from the business acumen side of things, I had the opportunity to work at an organization called Endeavor based here in Michigan, where I was on the other side of an entrepreneur resource support organization. I got to see founders from high-growth companies throughout Michigan, series A, series B, retail, fintech, the whole nine yards, health tech, and seeing where are the challenges, where are things going well and where things are going wrong, from co-founder struggles to missing the market timing or going through banking issues from a couple years ago and all that stuff. All those things really help build a muscle memory of, I don’t have all the answers, but being able to pull through those experiences and pattern matching does help as well, from how you actually build a business from zero, from product-market fit to scale and grow. Megan: Yeah, absolutely. And as you say, it can be a stressful journey, life as an entrepreneur, but I wonder if you could also share some highlights from your journey so far, any partnerships or projects that you’re really excited about at the moment? Darren: I think the first and foremost highlight [that] I didn’t realize I would come to enjoy so much is certainly my team. Being able to work with people who are aligned in passionate values and just kind of the culture and the focus is immensely valuable. If I’m going to spend this many hours in a week or in a year, I’d love to spend it with folks who are really passionate about it. I want to see them succeed. So I think first and foremost, I think the biggest success is really just the fortunate opportunity to work with people I really enjoy working with.The others I’ll mention [are] we have one of the largest county-owned monitoring networks in the country within Wayne County. The Health Department of Wayne County and Executive Warren Evans established this partnership where we deployed 100 fixed monitors throughout Wayne County to understand the patterns of local pollution to where we can help combat some of these issues where we are ranked F in air quality from the Lung Association, or Detroit is the third-worst from Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, the third-worst place to live in with asthma. So, how do we really look at this data and tell the story, and how can we really mitigate solutions, while also giving data to the public so that they can navigate the world that’s happening to them. That’s one of our critical partnerships.We’re also very excited, we just got announced in Fast Company as one of the most innovative companies of 2025, so woo-hoo to that. Megan: Congratulations. Darren: It is really exciting, yeah, in the social impact, social good category. There are many, many more, but I think the last one, I’m so, so grateful for, and I tell our team this all the time, is that we’ve already succeeded. Going to community meetings, hearing people raise their hand, asking questions about the adjuster application or about their data, and I to emphasize that when you hear community members saying ‘our data’ and not an ask, but as something that they have obtained, it warms my heart, and it shows that we’re doing exactly what we said we wanted to do, which is to make sure that communities have the data that they deserve to create the future, the clean, healthy future that they desperately need.”. Megan: Yeah, absolutely, what an incredible achievement. And what advice, finally, would you offer to other burgeoning entrepreneurs? Darren: Yeah, I think really something you are passionate about. Repeat that point again, do something that you feel that you can really go through those pain points and struggles for, [because] you need some extra kick to get you through and navigate these challenges.The second thing, and the most important thing that a lot of people take away is community, community, community. I wouldn’t be here today if I didn’t have people to call on when I’m at my lowest points, and call on people in my highest points. When people are celebrating you with your head up, and then when people are helping you put your chin up when your head’s down, I think it’s so, so critical. I found that here in Michigan, and also found it here in our community, right here in Detroit. Passion and finding a community that’s going to help get you through the journey is all it takes. Megan: Fantastic. All great advice. Thank you ever so much, Darren. Darren: Absolutely. Megan: That was Darren Riley, the co-founder and CEO at JustAir whom I spoke with from Brighton, England. That’s it for this episode of Business Lab. I’m your host, Megan Tatum. I’m a contributing editor and host for Insights, the custom publishing division of MIT Technology Review. We were founded in 1899 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and you can find us in print on the web and at events each year around the world. For more information about us on the show, please check out our website at technologyreview.com.This show is available wherever you get your podcasts. And if you enjoyed this episode, we hope you’ll take a moment to rate and review us. Business Lab is a production of MIT Technology Review. This episode was produced by Giro Studios. Thanks for listening. This content was produced by Insights, the custom content arm of MIT Technology Review. It was not written by MIT Technology Review’s editorial staff. This content was researched, designed, and written entirely by human writers, editors, analysts, and illustrators. This includes the writing of surveys and collection of data for surveys. AI tools that may have been used were limited to secondary production processes that passed thorough human review.

In partnership withMichigan Economic Development Corporation

When Darren Riley moved to Detroit seven years ago, he didn’t expect the city’s air to change his life—literally. Developing asthma as an adult opened his eyes to a much larger problem: the invisible but pervasive impact of air pollution on the health of marginalized communities.

“I was fascinated about why we don’t have the data we need,” Riley recalls, “or why we don’t have the infrastructure to solve these issues, to understand where pollution is coming from, how it’s impacting our communities, so that we can solve these problems and make an equitable breathing environment for everybody.”

That personal reckoning sparked the idea for JustAir, a Michigan-based clean-tech startup building neighborhood-level air quality monitoring tools. The goal is simple but urgent: provide communities with access to hyper-local data so they can better manage pollution and protect public health. As Riley puts it, “JustAir is solving the problem of how to better manage local pollution so that we can make sure our communities, our lifestyles—where we work, where we play, and where we learn—are really protected.”

Founded during the height of the pandemic, when the connection between health disparities and air quality became impossible to ignore, JustAir now partners with local governments, health departments, and community residents to deploy monitoring networks that offer key data relevant to everything from policy to personal decision-making.

From the start, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC) offered key support that helped turn JustAir’s bold vision into technical infrastructure. Through the MEDC’s early-stage funding partners and a network of mentorship and resources known as SmartZones, JustAir sharpened its product-market fit and gained critical momentum.

Success for Riley isn’t just about scale, it’s about impact. “It warms my heart, and it shows that we’re doing exactly what we said we wanted to do,” Riley says, “which is to make sure that communities have the data that they deserve to create the future, the clean, healthy future that they desperately need.”

To other burgeoning entrepreneurs, Riley sees a sense of community as key to lasting and impactful change. “When people are celebrating you with your head up, and then when people are helping you put your chin up when your head’s down, I think it’s so, so critical. I found that here in Michigan, and also found it here in our community, right here in Detroit. Passion and finding a community that’s going to help get you through the journey is all it takes.”

This episode of Business Lab is produced in association with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation.

Full Transcript

Megan Tatum: From MIT Technology Review, I’m Megan Tatum, and this is Business Lab, the show that helps business leaders make sense of new technologies coming out of the lab and into the marketplace.

Today’s episode is brought to you in partnership with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation.

Our topic today is building a technology startup in the U.S. state of Michigan. Taking an innovative idea to a full-fledged product and company requires resources that individuals might not have. That’s why the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, the MEDC, has launched an innovation campaign to support technology entrepreneurs.

Two words for you: startup ecosystem.

My guest is Darren Riley, the co-founder and CEO at JustAir, a clean air startup that began its journey in Michigan.

Welcome, Darren.

Darren Riley: Hi. Thanks for having me.

Megan: Thank you ever so much for being with us. To get us started, let’s just talk a bit about JustAir. How did the idea for the company come about, and what does your company do as well?

Darren: Yeah, absolutely. The real thesis of JustAir, is really a combination of one, my personal experience but also my professional experience. On the professional side, background in software engineering, graduated from Carnegie Mellon University, but I was always fascinated by how to use technology to really support and innovate and really push the frontier on issues that are near and dear to my heart. Coming from Houston, Texas, coming from communities that often are restricted with certain issues, systemic issues, is something that I always carried in my heart.

And on the personal side, it was around seven years ago when I moved to Detroit, in Southwest Detroit, where I developed asthma. Not growing up with asthma and not developing any issues, having that disease of the lungs really opened my eyes to just how much our environment impacts our health and well-being.

The combination of those, that pain point and also my background in technology, I was fascinated about why we don’t have the data we need or why we don’t have the infrastructure to solve these issues, to understand where pollution is coming from, how it’s impacting our communities, so that we can solve these problems and make an equitable breathing environment for everybody. That’s kind of what birthed JustAir in a way.

And actually, it was around COVID-19 where we really started to push forward, where we saw all this information and research around health disparities and a lot of the issues of mortality rates around COVID-19, which kind of coincides with COPD, asthma, and other diseases that are often overburdened in communities that look like ours, in Black and brown communities. That’s kind of where we got our start.

And what is JustAir today? JustAir is solving the problem of how to better manage local pollution so that we can make sure our communities, our lifestyles—where we work, where we play, and where we learn—are really protected. And, so, what JustAir does is build hyper-local neighborhood-level air quality monitoring networks. Communities have access to the data, policymakers and decision-makers can use that data to really influence and push things to help protect the community, but also other stakeholders can use the data to move the environment to a healthier state. So that’s where we are, and we’re four years strong, and I’m really excited to be a part of this journey here in Michigan.

Megan: So you launched about four years ago now. Why did you choose to build and grow just there in Michigan?

Darren: Yeah, I think a combination of things, the reason why I chose to start here and be intentional about building our team here. I think first is really around the ecosystem support around Michigan. So the MEDC has a network of what we call SmartZones that really offer funding, resources, mentorship, advisory on the different challenges that can range from capital, legal, and other issues that kind of hold an entrepreneur from just getting out there and putting their product in the market. First and foremost, I’m super thankful and grateful for just the state really focusing on and putting entrepreneurs first in that regard.

I think secondly is community. I really felt a strong sense of community here in Detroit. One of the founding members of an organization called Black Tech Saturdays, which sees over hundreds, 500-1,000 folks almost every Saturday of the month, just really sharing and really engaging with tech-curious folks from all different walks of life, but making intentional space for folks who are often left out of those rooms and out of those conversations. And just really seeing a peer network of entrepreneurs who come from a similar cultural background or a similar situation, really going after it together and helping each other navigate some issues.

And then lastly, I talk about this a lot, but problem-solution fit. Being here in Detroit where I developed asthma, where we have many issues and many around the environment that have hit some communities the hardest, right here in Detroit in my own backyard I really want to be very narrowly focused and make sure that I’m building something that actually solves the problem that got me on this journey in the first place. Not thinking about regional-wide, different country, international, et cetera, but how do we build something right here in the backyard that solves the problem for my neighbors and makes sure that we can make a real difference in the community. So, from the community to the problem that I really care about and make sure we solve, and then also just the ecosystem support is why we’re here in Michigan and why we plan to really grow and really be a part of this movement.

Megan: Fantastic. And you’ve touched on a few of those already, but as you were getting started, what specific resources, partnerships, or community support helped you navigate the early-stage research and development stages?

Darren: One example, really early, actually, I forgot about this for a while, but we have a Business Accelerator Fund here in Michigan where there’s funding offered to entrepreneurs for technical assistance. I used that to operationalize some of our technical roadmap processes to build out the infrastructure that we really intended to do. So, that real funding that was non-dilutive that the state provided helped accelerate some of those issues in the early days, where it was just myself and advisors going after this problem. And so now, where we are today, there are funds that receive funding from MEDC, so local funds and venture capital that help you get your first check. Those are really helpful as well. All that to say is basically a combination of funding primary source, but also strategically, that funding is going towards product positioning and product-market fit. Those were some of the two core examples that have been beneficial.

And then, I think the last thing I’ll mention as well, MEDC and a lot of the SmartZones within the state, these SmartZones are just bucketed in different regions and areas, so you have Ann Arbor, you’ve got Detroit, you have Grand Rapids, the whole nine yards, having these events and creating these clusters, if you will, of density of entrepreneurs, I think is super, super critical. I’ve experienced in New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, and other bigger ecosystems that density is so critical to where you’re constantly rubbing shoulders with the next entrepreneur, the next investor, the next customer, to really kind of accelerate that velocity of your journey.

Megan: Yeah. Having that ecosystem makes such a difference, doesn’t it?

Darren: Oh yeah, absolutely.

Megan: And tech acumen and business acumen are very different sets of skills. I wonder what was the process like developing out your technology whilst also building out a viable business plan?

Darren: I think I have a real unique opportunity. Having a software background, I code all the time, felt I had a lot of ideas, always joked that I had a Google Drive of 30 ideas that never worked, that I never showed anybody. I really felt I had that piece. What I was missing in my journey and why nothing ever came to fruition was just the simple principles of, are you solving a real problem, a real pain point for a customer?

Two things on the business acumen side are having an affinity for the problem. I truly believe that going on the entrepreneurial journey is lonely, it’s risky, it’s stressful, and tiring. The more I can wake up in the morning and think about [how] the problems that we solve could actually result in a breath of clean air for someone who may not have that awareness or have the tools to advocate on their behalf, just having that extra motivation and having that affinity towards a problem that I feel really deeply, I think does help.

But I think also from the business acumen side of things, I had the opportunity to work at an organization called Endeavor based here in Michigan, where I was on the other side of an entrepreneur resource support organization. I got to see founders from high-growth companies throughout Michigan, series A, series B, retail, fintech, the whole nine yards, health tech, and seeing where are the challenges, where are things going well and where things are going wrong, from co-founder struggles to missing the market timing or going through banking issues from a couple years ago and all that stuff. All those things really help build a muscle memory of, I don’t have all the answers, but being able to pull through those experiences and pattern matching does help as well, from how you actually build a business from zero, from product-market fit to scale and grow.

Megan: Yeah, absolutely. And as you say, it can be a stressful journey, life as an entrepreneur, but I wonder if you could also share some highlights from your journey so far, any partnerships or projects that you’re really excited about at the moment?

Darren: I think the first and foremost highlight [that] I didn’t realize I would come to enjoy so much is certainly my team. Being able to work with people who are aligned in passionate values and just kind of the culture and the focus is immensely valuable. If I’m going to spend this many hours in a week or in a year, I’d love to spend it with folks who are really passionate about it. I want to see them succeed. So I think first and foremost, I think the biggest success is really just the fortunate opportunity to work with people I really enjoy working with.

The others I’ll mention [are] we have one of the largest county-owned monitoring networks in the country within Wayne County. The Health Department of Wayne County and Executive Warren Evans established this partnership where we deployed 100 fixed monitors throughout Wayne County to understand the patterns of local pollution to where we can help combat some of these issues where we are ranked F in air quality from the Lung Association, or Detroit is the third-worst from Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, the third-worst place to live in with asthma. So, how do we really look at this data and tell the story, and how can we really mitigate solutions, while also giving data to the public so that they can navigate the world that’s happening to them. That’s one of our critical partnerships.

We’re also very excited, we just got announced in Fast Company as one of the most innovative companies of 2025, so woo-hoo to that.

Megan: Congratulations.

Darren: It is really exciting, yeah, in the social impact, social good category. There are many, many more, but I think the last one, I’m so, so grateful for, and I tell our team this all the time, is that we’ve already succeeded. Going to community meetings, hearing people raise their hand, asking questions about the adjuster application or about their data, and I to emphasize that when you hear community members saying ‘our data’ and not an ask, but as something that they have obtained, it warms my heart, and it shows that we’re doing exactly what we said we wanted to do, which is to make sure that communities have the data that they deserve to create the future, the clean, healthy future that they desperately need.”.

Megan: Yeah, absolutely, what an incredible achievement. And what advice, finally, would you offer to other burgeoning entrepreneurs?

Darren: Yeah, I think really something you are passionate about. Repeat that point again, do something that you feel that you can really go through those pain points and struggles for, [because] you need some extra kick to get you through and navigate these challenges.

The second thing, and the most important thing that a lot of people take away is community, community, community. I wouldn’t be here today if I didn’t have people to call on when I’m at my lowest points, and call on people in my highest points. When people are celebrating you with your head up, and then when people are helping you put your chin up when your head’s down, I think it’s so, so critical. I found that here in Michigan, and also found it here in our community, right here in Detroit. Passion and finding a community that’s going to help get you through the journey is all it takes.

Megan: Fantastic. All great advice. Thank you ever so much, Darren.

Darren: Absolutely.

Megan: That was Darren Riley, the co-founder and CEO at JustAir whom I spoke with from Brighton, England.

That’s it for this episode of Business Lab. I’m your host, Megan Tatum. I’m a contributing editor and host for Insights, the custom publishing division of MIT Technology Review. We were founded in 1899 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and you can find us in print on the web and at events each year around the world. For more information about us on the show, please check out our website at technologyreview.com.

This show is available wherever you get your podcasts. And if you enjoyed this episode, we hope you’ll take a moment to rate and review us. Business Lab is a production of MIT Technology Review. This episode was produced by Giro Studios. Thanks for listening.

This content was produced by Insights, the custom content arm of MIT Technology Review. It was not written by MIT Technology Review’s editorial staff.

This content was researched, designed, and written entirely by human writers, editors, analysts, and illustrators. This includes the writing of surveys and collection of data for surveys. AI tools that may have been used were limited to secondary production processes that passed thorough human review.

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SLB Sees ‘Constructive’ Second Half of 2025

SLB, the world’s largest oil-services provider, sees resiliency in the industry and remains constructive about the second half of 2025 despite uncertainties in customer demand.  “Despite pockets of activity adjustments in key markets, the industry has shown that it can operate through uncertainty without a significant drop in upstream spending,” SLB Chief Executive Officer Olivier Le Peuch said in a statement Friday. “This has been driven by the combination of capital discipline and the need for energy security.” His comments came as SLB posted second-quarter adjusted profit of 74 cents a share, exceeding analyst expectations. SLB, which gets about 82% of its revenue from international markets, has mitigated some of the negative impacts facing smaller peers that are more levered to domestic production. The company is seen as a gauge for the health of the sector through its broad footprint in all major crude-producing theaters.  US oil drilling has dropped 12% this year to the lowest since September 2021, driven by demand concerns triggered by US President Donald Trump’s tariff proposals and faster-than-expected increases in OPEC+ production. Government forecasters have trimmed domestic crude-production estimates for 2025, signaling a lower-for-longer activity environment for service companies. “Looking ahead, assuming commodity prices stay range bound, we remain constructive for the second half of the year,” Le Peuch said. Traders and analysts will also be listening closely to SLB’s quarterly conference call Friday for more details on the completion of the merger with ChampionX Corp. which the company announced Wednesday, according to a statement. SLB is a “leader in digital services for the energy industry and could soon become a leader in production services and equipment post the close of the acquisition,” Citigroup Global Markets Inc. analyst Scott Gruber wrote in a note to clients. SLB is the first of the biggest oilfield contractors

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WTI Flat as EU Targets Russian Refined Fuels

Oil ended the day little changed as traders weighed fresh efforts from the European Union to crimp Russian energy exports. West Texas Intermediate crude held steady to close near $67 a barrel after the EU agreed to a lower price cap for Moscow’s crude as part of a package of sanctions on Moscow. The measures include curbs on fuels made from Russian petroleum, additional banking limitations and a ban on a large oil refinery in India. The Asian country, which buys large amounts of Russian crude, is a major exporter of refined products to Europe, where markets for fuels like diesel have been tight. “While the EU measures may not drastically impact crude flows, the restrictions on refined products and expanded shadow fleet targeting are fueling concern in the diesel complex,” said Rebecca Babin, a senior energy trader at CIBC Private Wealth Group. Oil has trended higher since early May, with both Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. making the case that a buildup in global crude stockpiles has occurred in regions that don’t hold much sway in price-setting. Meanwhile, spreads in the diesel market are indicating tightness. The gap between the first and second month of New York heating oil futures climbed to $4.17 a gallon at one point in the session, up from $2.99 on Thursday. (Diesel and heating oil are the same product in the US, just taxed differently.) “The logic of diesel tightness propping up crude flat prices remains unchanged,” said Huang Wanzhe, an analyst at Dadi Futures Co., who added that the peak-demand season had seen a solid start. “The key question is how long this strength can last,” she said. In wider markets, strong US data on consumer sentiment eased concerns about the world’s largest economy, helping to underpin a risk-on mood. Crude

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EU Slaps New Sanctions on Russia and Its Oil Trade

European Union states have approved a fresh sanctions package on Russia over its war against Ukraine including a revised oil price cap, new banking restrictions, and curbs on fuels made from Russian petroleum.  The package, the bloc’s 18th since Moscow’s full scale invasion, will see about 20 more Russian banks cut off the international payments system SWIFT and face a full transaction ban, as well as restrictions imposed on Russian petroleum refined in third countries. A large oil refinery in India, part-owned by Russia’s state-run oil company, Rosneft PJSC, was also blacklisted. The cap on Russian oil, currently set at $60 per barrel, will be set dynamically at 15 percent below market rates moving forward. The new mechanism will see the threshold start off somewhere between $45-$50 and automatically revised at least twice a year based on market prices, Bloomberg previously reported. The latest sanctions by the European Union are aimed at further crimping the Kremlin’s energy revenue, the bulk of which comes from oil exports to India and China.  However, the original price cap imposed by the Group of Seven has had a limited impact on Russia’s oil flows, as the nation has built up a huge shadow fleet of tankers to haul its oil without using western services. The EU has also so far failed to convince the US to offer crucial support to the lower cap. Discussions are ongoing with other G-7 members but the US opposition is making it hard to reach agreement, according to people familiar with the matter. The UK, however, is expected to be on board with the move, the people said. The EU’s move to restrict fuels such as diesel made from Russian crude could have some market impact, as Europe imports the fuel from India, which in turn buys large amounts of

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Aramco Nears $10B Jafurah Pipeline Stake Sale to GIP

Saudi Aramco is in advanced talks to sell a roughly $10 billion stake in midstream infrastructure serving the giant Jafurah natural gas project to a group led by BlackRock Inc., according to people with knowledge of the matter.  The consortium is backed by BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners unit and could reach an agreement as soon as the coming days, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing confidential information.  The deal will involve pipelines and other infrastructure serving the $100 billion-plus Jafurah project, which Aramco is developing to supply domestic power plants as well as for export. It’s an unconventional field, meaning the gas is trapped in hard-to-access rock formations and requires special techniques to extract. Reuters reported on Thursday that GIP was nearing a deal, citing unidentified people. Aramco didn’t respond to emailed queries outside regular business hours in Saudi Arabia.  Bloomberg News first revealed in 2021 that Aramco was considering introducing outside investors into parts of the Jafurah project. Aramco was approaching infrastructure funds to gauge their interest in the midstream assets, people with knowledge of the matter said the next year.  State-controlled Aramco has been seeking to bring in international capital and sell stakes in some assets as the government pursues massive projects to build futuristic cities and diversify its economy. The kingdom is pushing ahead with a vast expansion, including developing new tourism destinations and building up a manufacturing base, to prepare for a future in which oil demand will begin to wane. BlackRock was earlier among investors that bought stakes in Aramco’s national gas pipeline network.  WHAT DO YOU THINK? Generated by readers, the comments included herein do not reflect the views and opinions of Rigzone. All comments are subject to editorial review. Off-topic, inappropriate or insulting comments will be removed.

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Germany’s Top Performing Smallcap Surges Again

A breakneck rally in the shares of a German pipeline builder accelerated this week after the company won a role plugging LNG terminals on the coast into the nation’s gas grid.  Friedrich Vorwerk Group SE’s stock is up 24% since last Friday’s close, the biggest gain on Germany’s small-cap SDAX index. The bulk of the advance came after it secured a contract valued in the hundreds of millions of euros to build a 86km-long pipeline with a consortium of companies.  It’s an example of how European firms are benefiting from the wall of money Chancellor Friedrich Merz has unleashed to overhaul the nation’s infrastructure and military. The contract is the latest deal to help revive the fortunes of the builder of underground gas, electricity and hydrogen pipes, sending its stock price to a record high.  It’s “more like an add-on. It’s just nice to have,” said Nikolas Demeter, an analyst at B Metzler Seel Sohn & Co AG. For now, the company still has three buy ratings out of five from analysts. That may change because their targets trail the company’s current share price after this week’s contract win took its advance in the year past 200%. The shares now trade at almost 32 times forward blended earnings, compared with about 14 times for the SDAX index and the Stoxx 600 Index, the European benchmark. Labor Challenge Leon Mühlenbruch at mwb research AG, who has a valuation-driven sell rating on the stock, warns that Vorwerk’s full order book could become a problem. “Capacity constraints are becoming increasingly relevant,” Mühlenbruch said. “Further growth depends on expanding that capacity, a challenge due to the persistent shortage of specialized skilled labor.” But for now the Tostedt-based company is on a roll, and its rebound in recent years has been dramatic. After an initial

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Cisco upgrades 400G optical receiver to boost AI infrastructure throughput

“In the data center, what’s really changed in the last year or so is that with AI buildouts, there’s much, much more optics that are part of 400G and 800G. It’s not so much using 10G and 25G optics, which we still sell a ton of, for campus applications. But for AI infrastructure, the 400G and 800G optics are really the dominant optics for that application,” Gartner said. Most of the AI infrastructure builds have been for training models, especially in hyperscaler environments, Gartner said. “I expect, towards the tail end of this year, we’ll start to see more enterprises deploying AI infrastructure for inference. And once they do that, because it has an Nvidia GPU attached to it, it’s going to be a 400G or 800G optic.” Core enterprise applications – such as real-time trading, high-frequency transactions, multi-cloud communications, cybersecurity analytics, network forensics, and industrial IoT – can also utilize the higher network throughput, Gartner said. 

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Supermicro bets big on 4-socket X14 servers to regain enterprise trust

In April, Dell announced its PowerEdge R470, R570, R670, and R770 servers with Intel Xeon 6 Processors with P-cores, but with single and double-socket servers. Similarly, Lenovo’s ThinkSystem V4 servers are also based on the Intel Xeon 6 processor but are limited to dual socket configurations. The launch of 4-socket servers by Supermicro reflects a growing enterprise need for localized compute that can support memory-bound AI and reduce the complexity of distributed architectures. “The modern 4-socket servers solve multiple pain points that have intensified with GenAI and memory-intensive analytics. Enterprises are increasingly challenged by latency, interconnect complexity, and power budgets in distributed environments. High-capacity, scale-up servers provide an architecture that is more aligned with low-latency, large-model processing, especially where data residency or compliance constraints limit cloud elasticity,” said Sanchit Vir Gogia, chief analyst and CEO at Greyhound Research. “Launching a 4-socket Xeon 6 platform and packaging it within their modular ‘building block’ strategy shows Supermicro is focusing on staying ahead in enterprise and AI data center compute,” said Devroop Dhar, co-founder and MD at Primus Partner. A critical launch after major setbacks Experts peg this to be Supermicro’s most significant product launch since it became mired in governance and regulatory controversies. In 2024, the company lost Ernst & Young, its second auditor in two years, following allegations by Hindenburg Research involving accounting irregularities and the alleged export of sensitive chips to sanctioned entities. Compounding its troubles, Elon Musk’s AI startup xAI redirected its AI server orders to Dell, a move that reportedly cost Supermicro billions in potential revenue and damaged its standing in the hyperscaler ecosystem. Earlier this year, HPE signed a $1 billion contract to provide AI servers for X, a deal Supermicro was also bidding for. “The X14 launch marks a strategic reinforcement for Supermicro, showcasing its commitment

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Moving AI workloads off the cloud? A hefty data center retrofit awaits

“If you have a very specific use case, and you want to fold AI into some of your processes, and you need a GPU or two and a server to do that, then, that’s perfectly acceptable,” he says. “What we’re seeing, kind of universally, is that most of the enterprises want to migrate to these autonomous agents and agentic AI, where you do need a lot of compute capacity.” Racks of brand-new GPUs, even without new power and cooling infrastructure, can be costly, and Schneider Electric often advises cost-conscious clients to look at previous-generation GPUs to save money. GPU and other AI-related technology is advancing so rapidly, however, that it’s hard to know when to put down stakes. “We’re kind of in a situation where five years ago, we were talking about a data center lasting 30 years and going through three refreshes, maybe four,” Carlini says. “Now, because it is changing so much and requiring more and more power and cooling you can’t overbuild and then grow into it like you used to.”

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My take on the Gartner Magic Quadrant for LAN infrastructure? Highly inaccurate

Fortinet being in the leader quadrant may surprise some given they are best known as a security vendor, but the company has quietly built a broad and deep networking portfolio. I have no issue with them being considered a leader and believe for security conscious companies, Fortinet is a great option. Challenger Cisco is the only company listed as a challenger, and its movement out of the leader quadrant highlights just how inaccurate this document is. There is no vendor that sells more networking equipment in more places than Cisco, and it has led enterprise networking for decades. Several years ago, when it was a leader, I could argue the division of engineering between Meraki and Catalyst could have pushed them out, but it didn’t. So why now? At its June Cisco Live event, the company launched a salvo of innovation including AI Canvas, Cisco AI Assistant, and much more. It’s also continually improved the interoperability between Meraki and Catalyst and announced several new products. AI Canvas is a completely new take, was well received by customers at Cisco Live, and reinvents the concept of AIOps. As I stated above, because of the December cutoff time for information gathering, none of this was included, but that makes Cisco’s representation false. Also, I find this MQ very vague in its “Cautions” segment. As an example, it states: “Cisco’s product strategy isn’t well-aligned with key enterprise needs.” Some details here would be helpful. In my conversations with Cisco, which includes with Chief Product Officer and President Jeetu Patel, the company has reiterated that its strategy is to help customers be AI-ready with products that are easier to deploy and manage, more automated, and with a lower cost to run. That seems well-aligned with customer needs. If Gartner is hearing customers want networks

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Equinix, AWS embrace liquid cooling to power AI implementations

With AWS, it deployed In-Row Heat Exchangers (IRHX), a custom-built liquid cooling system designed specifically for servers using Nvidia’s Blackwell GPUs, it’s most powerful but also its hottest running processors used for AI training and inference. The IRHX unit has three components: a water‑distribution cabinet, an integrated pumping unit, and in‑row fan‑coil modules. It uses direct to chip liquid cooling just like the equinox servers, where cold‑plates attached to the chip draw heat from the chips and is cooled by the liquid. The warmed coolant then flows through the coils of heat exchangers, where high‑speed fans Blow on the pipes to cool them, like a car radiator. This type of cooling is nothing new, and there are a few direct to chip liquid cooling solutions on the market from Vertiv, CoolIT, Motivair, and Delta Electronics all sell liquid cooling options. But AWS separates the pumping unit from the fan-coil modules, letting a single pumping system to support large number of fan units. These modular fans can be added or removed as cooling requirements evolve, giving AWS the flexibility to adjust the system per row and site. This led to some concern that Amazon would disrupt the market for liquid cooling, but as a Dell’Oro Group analyst put it, Amazon develops custom technologies for itself and does not go into competition or business with other data center infrastructure companies.

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Intel CEO: We are not in the top 10 semiconductor companies

The Q&A session came on the heels of layoffs across the company. Tan was hired in March, and almost immediately he began to promise to divest and reduce non-core assets. Gelsinger had also begun divesting the company of losers, but they were nibbles around the edge. Tan is promising to take an axe to the place. In addition to discontinuing products, the company has outsourced marketing and media relations — for the first time in more than 25 years of covering this company, I have no internal contacts at Intel. Many more workers are going to lose their jobs in coming weeks. So far about 500 have been cut in Oregon and California but many more is expected — as much as 20% of the overall company staff may go, and Intel has over 100,000 employees, according to published reports. Tan believes the company is bloated and too bogged down with layers of management to be reactive and responsive in the same way that AMD and Nvidia are. “The whole process of that (deciding) is so slow and eventually nobody makes a decision,” he is quoted as saying. Something he has decided on is AI, and he seems to have decided to give up. “On training, I think it is too late for us,” Tan said, adding that Nvidia’s position in that market is simply “too strong.” So there goes what sales Gaudi3 could muster. Instead, Tan said Intel will focus on “edge” artificial intelligence, where AI capabilities Are brought to PCs and other remote devices rather than big AI processors in data centers like Nvidia and AMD are doing. “That’s an area that I think is emerging, coming up very big and we want to make sure that we capture,” Tan said.

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Microsoft will invest $80B in AI data centers in fiscal 2025

And Microsoft isn’t the only one that is ramping up its investments into AI-enabled data centers. Rival cloud service providers are all investing in either upgrading or opening new data centers to capture a larger chunk of business from developers and users of large language models (LLMs).  In a report published in October 2024, Bloomberg Intelligence estimated that demand for generative AI would push Microsoft, AWS, Google, Oracle, Meta, and Apple would between them devote $200 billion to capex in 2025, up from $110 billion in 2023. Microsoft is one of the biggest spenders, followed closely by Google and AWS, Bloomberg Intelligence said. Its estimate of Microsoft’s capital spending on AI, at $62.4 billion for calendar 2025, is lower than Smith’s claim that the company will invest $80 billion in the fiscal year to June 30, 2025. Both figures, though, are way higher than Microsoft’s 2020 capital expenditure of “just” $17.6 billion. The majority of the increased spending is tied to cloud services and the expansion of AI infrastructure needed to provide compute capacity for OpenAI workloads. Separately, last October Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said his company planned total capex spend of $75 billion in 2024 and even more in 2025, with much of it going to AWS, its cloud computing division.

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John Deere unveils more autonomous farm machines to address skill labor shortage

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More Self-driving tractors might be the path to self-driving cars. John Deere has revealed a new line of autonomous machines and tech across agriculture, construction and commercial landscaping. The Moline, Illinois-based John Deere has been in business for 187 years, yet it’s been a regular as a non-tech company showing off technology at the big tech trade show in Las Vegas and is back at CES 2025 with more autonomous tractors and other vehicles. This is not something we usually cover, but John Deere has a lot of data that is interesting in the big picture of tech. The message from the company is that there aren’t enough skilled farm laborers to do the work that its customers need. It’s been a challenge for most of the last two decades, said Jahmy Hindman, CTO at John Deere, in a briefing. Much of the tech will come this fall and after that. He noted that the average farmer in the U.S. is over 58 and works 12 to 18 hours a day to grow food for us. And he said the American Farm Bureau Federation estimates there are roughly 2.4 million farm jobs that need to be filled annually; and the agricultural work force continues to shrink. (This is my hint to the anti-immigration crowd). John Deere’s autonomous 9RX Tractor. Farmers can oversee it using an app. While each of these industries experiences their own set of challenges, a commonality across all is skilled labor availability. In construction, about 80% percent of contractors struggle to find skilled labor. And in commercial landscaping, 86% of landscaping business owners can’t find labor to fill open positions, he said. “They have to figure out how to do

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2025 playbook for enterprise AI success, from agents to evals

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More 2025 is poised to be a pivotal year for enterprise AI. The past year has seen rapid innovation, and this year will see the same. This has made it more critical than ever to revisit your AI strategy to stay competitive and create value for your customers. From scaling AI agents to optimizing costs, here are the five critical areas enterprises should prioritize for their AI strategy this year. 1. Agents: the next generation of automation AI agents are no longer theoretical. In 2025, they’re indispensable tools for enterprises looking to streamline operations and enhance customer interactions. Unlike traditional software, agents powered by large language models (LLMs) can make nuanced decisions, navigate complex multi-step tasks, and integrate seamlessly with tools and APIs. At the start of 2024, agents were not ready for prime time, making frustrating mistakes like hallucinating URLs. They started getting better as frontier large language models themselves improved. “Let me put it this way,” said Sam Witteveen, cofounder of Red Dragon, a company that develops agents for companies, and that recently reviewed the 48 agents it built last year. “Interestingly, the ones that we built at the start of the year, a lot of those worked way better at the end of the year just because the models got better.” Witteveen shared this in the video podcast we filmed to discuss these five big trends in detail. Models are getting better and hallucinating less, and they’re also being trained to do agentic tasks. Another feature that the model providers are researching is a way to use the LLM as a judge, and as models get cheaper (something we’ll cover below), companies can use three or more models to

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OpenAI’s red teaming innovations define new essentials for security leaders in the AI era

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More OpenAI has taken a more aggressive approach to red teaming than its AI competitors, demonstrating its security teams’ advanced capabilities in two areas: multi-step reinforcement and external red teaming. OpenAI recently released two papers that set a new competitive standard for improving the quality, reliability and safety of AI models in these two techniques and more. The first paper, “OpenAI’s Approach to External Red Teaming for AI Models and Systems,” reports that specialized teams outside the company have proven effective in uncovering vulnerabilities that might otherwise have made it into a released model because in-house testing techniques may have missed them. In the second paper, “Diverse and Effective Red Teaming with Auto-Generated Rewards and Multi-Step Reinforcement Learning,” OpenAI introduces an automated framework that relies on iterative reinforcement learning to generate a broad spectrum of novel, wide-ranging attacks. Going all-in on red teaming pays practical, competitive dividends It’s encouraging to see competitive intensity in red teaming growing among AI companies. When Anthropic released its AI red team guidelines in June of last year, it joined AI providers including Google, Microsoft, Nvidia, OpenAI, and even the U.S.’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), which all had released red teaming frameworks. Investing heavily in red teaming yields tangible benefits for security leaders in any organization. OpenAI’s paper on external red teaming provides a detailed analysis of how the company strives to create specialized external teams that include cybersecurity and subject matter experts. The goal is to see if knowledgeable external teams can defeat models’ security perimeters and find gaps in their security, biases and controls that prompt-based testing couldn’t find. What makes OpenAI’s recent papers noteworthy is how well they define using human-in-the-middle

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