Last Week

Last week saw a new NexusTek Winners Circle episode dropped, I joined the NC TECH Board of Advisors, and more NexusTek Insights.

#nctechadvisors | North Carolina Technology Association (NC TECH) | 11 comments

Welcome to one of our newest #NCTECHAdvisors, Jay Cuthrell with NexusTek! Advisors serve as a resource by providing guidance and feedback, assisting with growing the membership, and promoting NC TECH through their networks. Advisors range from those who have interest in eventual service on NC TECH’s governing Board of Directors, to those that appreciate the benefit of discounted event registrations, to those who seek a more visible level of engagement and more exclusive relationship building o...

Winners Circle Ep. 4: How to Build a Tech Foundation for What’s Next

Discover key insights from NexusTek’s Winners Circle Episode 4 on building a resilient technology foundation to navigate AI acceleration, cloud expansion, and compliance challenges while driving sustainable innovation.

The Modern Guest Checklist: Five Hotel Must-Haves for Today’s Five-Star Stay

Discover how modern hotels combine timeless hospitality with advanced technology to enhance guest satisfaction. Learn how secure digital infrastructure supports efficiency, personalization, and seamless amenities.

The Grok Wake-Up Call

The Grok AI platform exposed user conversations online, highlighting the urgent need for businesses to prioritize AI security and data protection. Discover NexusTek's secure AI solutions.

This Week

I have no travel plans and I'm looking forward to tuning up more automation.

📈 Markets Monday for 2025-08-25

My screener is getting closer!

Wackyparse RetCon Thesis: AST SpaceMobile and Nextnav are focused on new connectivity and precision location infrastructure to... play Roblox? 🤣

🔥 Hot Takes Tuesday for 2025-08-26

💰 AI continues to attract huge amounts of capital

• Casca (AI-powered loan origination tools): $29M
• Blue Water Autonomy (AI-powered unmanned defense ships): $50M
• Attio (Agentic AI-powered CRM service): $52M

🤪 Wacky Wednesday for 2025-08-27

🔙 Throwback Thursday for 2025-08-28

Goole data centers articles over the years paint an interesting picture.

2025

Techmeme: Google plans to invest an additional $9B in Virginia through 2026 to boost its cloud and AI infrastructure, including a new data center in Chesterfield County (Emily Forgash/Bloomberg)

By Emily Forgash / Bloomberg. View the full context on Techmeme.

2020

Techmeme: Google says it will spend $10B on offices and data centers in the US this year, focusing on 11 states including MA and NY, down from $13B in 2019 (Amal S/Reuters)

By Amal S / Reuters. View the full context on Techmeme.

2016

Techmeme: Google to boost hiring for cloud division, plans 12 new data centers in next 18 months (Jack Clark/Bloomberg Business)

By Jack Clark / Bloomberg Business. View the full context on Techmeme.

✅ Final Thoughts Friday for 2025-08-29

📶 🗼 🛜 I believe biggest story of the week was the sale of spectrum licenses.

Addition of spectrum can increase competitiveness and ORAN could (should?) expand.

Techmeme: AT&T agrees to buy spectrum licenses from EchoStar for ~$23B in cash, adding ~50MHz of spectrum, expected to close by mid-2026, pending regulatory approval (Bloomberg)

From Bloomberg. View the full context on Techmeme.

🔮 Sneak Peak Saturday for 2025-08-30

🌮 + 🍔 + 🍟 + 🥤 + 🗣️ + 🤖 = 🤔

When it works, you'll know — eventually. In some use cases, there are reasons for tactile knobs, dials, and buttons are better than touch screens.

The same might be said for humans and mobile apps being better than the current imagination for AI powered fast-food ordering in a drive-thru.

In 2025, voice ordering from a standard drive-thru fast food menu connected to AI is still challenging.

Techmeme: Taco Bell, which deployed voice AI-powered ordering at 500+ drive-through locations, is now reconsidering the tech after viral videos of glitches and pranks (Isabelle Bousquette/Wall Street Journal)

By Isabelle Bousquette / Wall Street Journal. View the full context on Techmeme.

In 2024, the challenge was just as stark.

Techmeme: McDonald's ends its IBM partnership to test automated Drive Thru orders, plans to remove the tech from 100+ restaurants by July 26, and seeks a new partner (Jonathan Maze/Restaurant Business)

By Jonathan Maze / Restaurant Business. View the full context on Techmeme.

In 2023, the learning curve was steep.

Techmeme: Wendy's partners with Google to automate its drive-throughs using an AI chatbot that has been taught to upsell, rolling out in June 2023 to an Ohio restaurant (Angus Loten/Wall Street Journal)

By Angus Loten / Wall Street Journal. View the full context on Techmeme.

In 2019, the aspirational goals were just starting to form.

Techmeme: How McDonald's is using AI and experimenting with voice recognition tech for new ways to lure customers, as fast-food sales decline across the US (David Yaffe-Bellany/New York Times)

By David Yaffe-Bellany / New York Times. View the full context on Techmeme.

#OpenToWork Weekly

I participated in a #NeverSearchAlone #JSC after rebooting Cuthrell Consulting and joining NexusTek.

I added those #OpenToWork from my LinkedIn network to this newsletter. Over time, we've grown an Alumni 🎉 section for those that transitioned to their next career adventure.

Alumni 🎉

• Congrats Nathan Clyker 🎉
• Congrats Kelly Britt 🎉
• Congrats Tamera Rousseau King 🎉
• Congrats Thomas Chatham 🎉
• Congrats Dan Kelleher 🎉
• Congrats Jarrod Weise 🎉
• Congrats Karl Edwards 🎉
• Congrats Paul Lysko 🎉
• Congrats Bob Lima, PMP 🎉
• Congrats Rich Green 🎉
• Congrats Sheri Gearhart 🎉
• Congrats Shianna Maxwell 🎉
• Congrats Richard Arnesen! 🎉

Those in my network that are #OpenToWork:

• Scott Place - High Performance Sales Rep
• Trevor Schulz - 20+ Years in Tech Sales | Loyal, Dedicated, and Ready to Work Today
• Brian Booden - Ranked #1 in the UK for Qlik and DataViz Content
• Elizabeth Quintanilla - Fractional CMO, Digital Marketing Consultant & Coach, Marketing Gunslinger
• Barbara Hadley, EdM, SPHR - Strategic HR Leader | Employee Engagement Expert
• Andrew Webber - Proven Leader | Consumer Product Innovation & Scaling
• Lida Tohidi - Award-Winning Product & Marketing Leader | Startup Advisor
• Gina (Gina Minks) Rosenthal - Global Product Marketing Manager | Technical Content Strategist
• Janel Van Beek - Business Strategist & Master Coach | Leadership & Change Expert
• Greg Phillips - Cloud Platform & Strategic Marketing Leader
• Ricardo Perez - Virtualization Architect | PowerFlex & VxRail Specialist
• Mike Berteletti, CISSP - Experienced IT Professional | Infrastructure & Security
• Chris Mojica - Technical Sales & Solutions Architect
• Matthew Leib - Data Center, Cloud & Storage Architect | Technical Writer & Analyst
• Michael Joffe - Global Technology Leader | P&L Management | SaaS & OEM
• Colleen Coll - Event Technology & Digital Media Specialist | Live Reporting
• Sam Aiello, Ph.D. - Cybersecurity & Technology Strategist | Pre-Sales Leadership