The Aperiam Podcast

Corey Ferengul, Joe Zawadzki
  • 5.0 (3)
  • BUSINESS

Advertising is everywhere and the technology that drives it is ever changing. The Aperiam Podcast is a weekly discussion diving deep on key topics driving the Adtech and Martech industry and is hosted by Aperiam Founder Joe Zawadzki and Partner Corey Ferengul.

  1. Building An Empire, Not A Holdco

    5D AGO

    Building An Empire, Not A Holdco

    George Popstefanov, founder and CEO of PMG, (also Koddi, Further, and the Momentum Group), joins Corey and Joe to discuss how he's built and managed a portfolio of independent, technology-first companies across advertising, commerce, and data. George walks through the three pillars that define every business he builds  and how those principles drive everything from product development to acquisition strategy. The conversation covers how PMG's Ali operating system and Alli Marketplace are becoming central infrastructure for Fortune 500 brands navigating the shift to agentic marketing. George also addresses the AI cost reality check hitting enterprise organizations, the gap between AI usage and AI impact, and why he believes education at the C-suite level — not technology deployment — is the single most important first step for companies trying to transform.

    38 min
  2. Five Trends, Two Guys, and a Lot of Opinions

    APR 15

    Five Trends, Two Guys, and a Lot of Opinions

    Corey Ferengul and Joe Zawadzki sit down to cover five major trends based on what they are seeing cross their desks: the declining health of the open web and what publishers can do to survive, the rapid maturation of influencer marketing and why its infrastructure still lags its ambitions, the early-innings race to monetize through generative engine optimization (GEO/AEO), a surprising surge in out-of-home advertising driven by cheaper screens and easier programmatic delivery, and the growing wave of contextual targeting innovation in CTV. Corey and Joe don't just diagnose the trends — they debate what's noise, what's durable, and where the real opportunity lies.

    33 min
  3. The Evolution of Media Buying

    APR 8

    The Evolution of Media Buying

    Corey Ferengul and Joe Zawadzki are joined by Shane Shevlin, co-founder of Bedrock Platform and a veteran of IPONWeb and the early days of programmatic, to discuss what it looks like to build a next-generation media buying platform from the ground up in the agentic era. Shane walks through Bedrock's core mission — making deal-based trading work more effectively at lower cost — and how a multi-agent system called Pathfinder is creating a compounding intelligence loop that learns from every trader decision. The conversation covers how AI development has collapsed what used to be multi-month builds into days, why sell-side decisioning is reshaping the relationship between buyers and publishers, and how an agent surfacing unexpected auction clearing price data by state actually rewrote Bedrock's own product roadmap. Shane also shares his thinking on YouTube as broadcast-quality inventory, the challenges of entering the US market as a European company, and why the natural language command line may soon make the traditional DSP interface obsolete.

    31 min
  4. Reading the Market with Terry Kawaja

    APR 1

    Reading the Market with Terry Kawaja

    Corey Ferengul and Joe Zawadzki sit down with Terry Kawaja, founder of LUMA Partners and one of ad tech's most respected dealmakers and prognosticators, and discuss where the market stands in early 2026. They break down the M&A landscape — from the post-tariff chill to why late 2025 started to show signs of life — and explains why valuations are split sharply between high-growth capability plays and legacy open web businesses. They hit on what European ad tech companies get wrong about entering the US market, why the SaaS obsession in ad tech was largely misguided, and how the agentic era could either save the open web or consolidate it into a handful of massive platforms. Terence also shares his long-held CTV predictions, why FAST adoption genuinely surprised him, and why 2026 is the year the industry needs to stop talking about AI and start showing results.

    34 min
  5. Building a Value Exchange for the Open Internet

    MAR 25

    Building a Value Exchange for the Open Internet

    Corey Ferengul and Joe Zawadzki are joined by Filippo Gramigna, co-CEO of OneTag — one of the only globally scaled programmatic companies founded in Europe. Filippo walks through OneTag's decade-long evolution, from its origins as a DSP to building a bespoke SSP for Procter & Gamble, pioneering traffic shaping before the term existed, and repositioning multiple times as the market evolved around curation. He explains the company's recent acquisition, Aryel, and how they see a unique fit. The conversation also covers how OneTag is approaching AI pragmatically, why blurring DSP/SSP lines might be inevitable, and what Filippo wishes more brands and agencies understood about cutting through the noise in a crowded market.

    36 min
  6. The M&A Playbook

    MAR 18

    The M&A Playbook

    In this episode, Corey and Joe sit down with Jake Vachal, Managing Director at Raine — a leading banker with a practice focused on Adtech. Jake discusses what's really driving M&A activity right now: a more deal-friendly regulatory environment, PE firms pushing hard for liquidity, and boards grappling with existential questions about their equity story in a world being rapidly reshaped by agentic AI. He shares what he actually looks for when deciding to represent a company, why profitable growth now trumps revenue multiples, why private markets currently offer better outcomes than an IPO, and how AI compressed a typical two-to-three-year market cycle into just three months in 2025.

    35 min
  7. What LLMs Think Of Your Brand

    MAR 11

    What LLMs Think Of Your Brand

    In this episode of the Aperiam Podcast, Corey and Joe are joined by Todd Sawicki, founder and CEO of Gumshoe.ai, to explore one of the most consequential and least understood shifts in marketing today: how AI search is changing the way brands are discovered, recommended, and perceived. Todd breaks down why the concept of "ranking" is obsolete in an LLM world, what it actually means for an AI to have brand preferences, and why the brands that win will be the ones that treat AI like a digital sales rep they need to train. He also explains why growth marketers — not search teams — are the ones best positioned to capitalize on this, and why your customer personas are probably outdated the moment they're printed.

    35 min
  8. The Context of CTV

    MAR 4

    The Context of CTV

    Corey and Joe sit down with Raghu Kodige, CEO and co-founder of Anoki, to explore how AI is transforming the way brands advertise on connected TV. Raghu breaks down why CTV has historically been bought with the same blunt tools as traditional linear TV — and how Anoki is changing that.  Drawing on his background building Alfonso (now LG Ads), Raghu shares how the "seeing is believing" philosophy drives Anoki's approach to AI transparency, why news inventory is massively undervalued, and how generative AI is collapsing the product development timeline in ways that give startups a serious edge.

    35 min
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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
3 Ratings

About

Advertising is everywhere and the technology that drives it is ever changing. The Aperiam Podcast is a weekly discussion diving deep on key topics driving the Adtech and Martech industry and is hosted by Aperiam Founder Joe Zawadzki and Partner Corey Ferengul.

Information

  • Creator
    Corey Ferengul, Joe Zawadzki
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    47
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2025 AperiamVentures
  • Show Website
    The Aperiam Podcast

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