For large corporations, sustainability sits at the intersection of long-term strategic necessity and short-term financial pressure, and most companies are still trying to figure out how to make it work. In this episode, Kevin Rabinovitch, Global VP of Sustainability at Mars, joins Sanjeev to make the business case for why Mars has been betting on sustainability for decades. He breaks down how the company thinks about risk, supply chain resilience, and long-term value creation and walks through Mars' internal Compass framework, how real supply disruptions and unexpected ancillary benefits have validated the strategy, and why sustainability goals are most useful when treated like R&D investments rather than compliance obligations. He also gets honest about the challenges, such as the persistent gap between what consumers say they care about and how they actually shop, the difficulty of selling a problem and a solution in the same breath, and how to get an organization to apply existing skills toward new sustainability goals. With regulatory tailwinds shifting and food and agriculture facing compounding supply chain pressures, this conversation offers an honest look at what it takes to embed sustainability in the core of a business that intends to be around for generations.

Chapters:

04:00 - What Mars Does

05:34 - Business Case for Sustainability

07:31 - Mars Compass Framework

11:24 - Supply Chain Climate Risks

13:08 - Future Proofing Value Chains

17:30 - Sustainability’s Competitive Advantage

19:39 - The Consumer Contradiction

23:21 - Innovation Pace and Potential

26:04 - Frictions

31:40 - Advice for Companies Selling to Mars

35:09 - Past and Future Reflections

This content is for informational purposes only, should not be taken as legal, business, tax or investment advice, or be used to evaluate any investment or security, and is not directed at any investor or potential investor in any investment vehicle sponsored by S2G. Investing involves risk, including the risk of loss. Specific companies mentioned in this podcast are for educational purposes and should not be construed as an endorsement of any kind. S2G holds positions in the companies referenced, but this podcast is for information purposes only and is not intended to promote any such company. All views of the guests on this podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of S2G. Any past performance discussed is not indicative of future results. The views expressed herein are opinions based on certain assumptions and subject to change.

For more important information, please see s2ginvestments.com/disclosures.

We are at an inflection point in manufacturing where artificial intelligence, robotics, and data are converging to fundamentally change what's possible in the physical world. In this episode, Barak Bar-Cohen, founder and CEO of Sojo Industries, joins Chuck Templeton to explore what that transformation actually looks like on the ground, using one of the most deceptively complex problems in consumer goods: the variety pack. What starts as a story about putting different flavors into one box quickly opens up into a much bigger conversation about why traditional manufacturing is so difficult to innovate in, and how mobility, automation, and AI can finally change that. Together, they dig into what it really means to layer AI throughout a physical business, capturing everything from machine error codes to engineering conversations, and let the whole operation learn from itself and rapidly improve. It's a conversation that will change the way you think about the snack aisle and the future of physical AI.

Chapters:

2:29 — The Variety Pack Problem

9:20 — The Door to Floor Model

11:38 — Business Model Breakdown

15:20 — Sojo Shield and Traceability

19:01 — Layering AI Into the Organization

28:10 — The AI Culture Shift

34:17 — Sojo and Sustainability

26:47 — Sojo’s Futurę Vision

This content is for informational purposes only, should not be taken as legal, business, tax or investment advice, or be used to evaluate any investment or security, and is not directed at any investor or potential investor in any investment vehicle sponsored by S2G. Investing involves risk, including the risk of loss. Specific companies mentioned in this podcast are for educational purposes and should not be construed as an endorsement of any kind. S2G holds positions in the companies referenced, but this podcast is for information purposes only and is not intended to promote any such company. All views of the guests on this podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of S2G. Any past performance discussed is not indicative of future results. The views expressed herein are opinions based on certain assumptions and subject to change.

For more important information, please see s2ginvestments.com/disclosures.

In this episode, Gayle Tzemach Lemmon joins Sanjeev Krishnan for a conversation about resilience and opportunity in a world defined by volatility. Gayle brings a rare breadth of experience as a builder, early-stage advisor, PE portfolio strategist, foreign policy veteran, former political reporter, investor, and three-time New York Times best-selling author on geopolitical topics, with a front-row seat to multiple moments of global transition. Together, they dig into Gayle’s idea of a “triangle of opportunity” at the intersection of energy, artificial intelligence, and geopolitics, and why those forces are increasingly shaping how societies and economies evolve. They also talk about how to separate signal from noise in today’s policy landscape and what business leaders can learn from entrepreneurs operating in the most fragile and constrained environments. It’s a grounded, clear-eyed conversation about how to think, communicate, and build when the rules are constantly changing.

Key Takeaways:

1. Economics and politics can’t be separated anymore. Gayle explains how political forces quietly shape markets, capital flows, and business outcomes, whether leaders want to admit it or not. She argues this is a moment of rising political corners and borders.
2. Fairness has become a defining theme of this era. From labor to capital markets, Sanjeev and Gayle discuss why perceptions of who benefits and who doesn’t are influencing trust, policy, and long-term stability.
3. Homogeneous thinking is a real business risk in periods of rapid change. Gayle argues that value is increasingly created by people who can move across disciplines and see congruities that others may miss.
4. AI, energy, and geopolitics are tightly linked. Sanjeev and Gayle explore how each of these forces shapes the others, and decisions in one area increasingly ripple and resonate across the rest in sometimes unpredictable ways.
5. Clear, genuine storytelling is no longer optional. According to Gayle, in a crowded, noisy investment landscape, leaders and companies that can communicate simply and authentically are more likely to earn trust and endure.

You can purchase Gayle’s first book, “The Dressmaker of Khair Khana,” referenced in this episode here: https://www.amazon.com/Dressmaker-Khair-Khana-Remarkable-Everything/dp/0061732478

This content is for informational purposes only, should not be taken as legal, business, tax or investment advice, or be used to evaluate any investment or security, and is not directed at any investor or potential investor in any investment vehicle sponsored by S2G. Investing involves risk, including the risk of loss. Specific companies mentioned in this podcast are for educational purposes and should not be construed as an endorsement of any kind. S2G holds positions in the companies referenced, but this podcast is for information purposes only and is not intended to promote any such company. All views of the guests on this podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of S2G. Any past performance discussed is not indicative of future results. The views expressed herein are opinions based on certain assumptions and subject to change.

For more important information, please see s2ginvestments.com/disclosures.