Available to book
Cathy Hackl
Future Trends
Artificial Intelligence
Future of Work
Global tech futurist and CEO Cathy Hackl helps Fortune 100 leaders navigate the post-LLM era and the shift toward spatial, embodied, and physical AI. Cathy has advised leading brands including Nike, Walmart, and Louis Vuitton and was named a Top 25 AI Visionary by Newsweek.
Futurist
Visionary
Female CEO
Women in Tech
Digital Expert
Business Consulting
Innovator
Thought Leader
Influencer
Cathy Hackl has spent over a decade being early — on spatial computing, on AI hardware, on smart glasses, on gaming and world models, on robotics and on intelligent agentic systems. The author of five books, she draws on earlier roles at Amazon Web Services, Magic Leap, and HTC VIVE to connect where technology is heading with decisions organizations need to make now. In 2022, Cathy became the first person to ring the NASDAQ opening bell simultaneously in physical and avatar form on live television.
Named a Top 25 AI Visionary by Newsweek, recognized by Ad Age and Vogue Business as a top innovator, and featured on the cover of Forbes LatAm's 100 Most Powerful Women, Cathy is one of the world's most credible voices on what comes after the LLM era. She has been featured on CNBC's Squawk Box, 60 Minutes, CNN, Good Morning America, GQ, Time, The Economist, and Bloomberg, and hosts Adweek's TechMagic podcast.
Cathy is CEO of Future Dynamics, Co-Founder of Journey, Futurist-in-Residence at Nokia, and External Advisor to BCG's Frontier Tech Group. Based between Washington, D.C. and Dubai, she advises global leaders, governments, and Fortune 100 companies on navigating the shift toward spatial, embodied, and physical AI, bringing a rare, real-time vantage point on how technology, policy, culture, and capital converge across the U.S., Middle East, and global markets. Cathy has advised Nike, Walmart, Ralph Lauren, Louis Vuitton, and Clinique and has spoken at Harvard Business School, MIT, SXSW, Comic-Con, WEF, CES, and MWC, among others.
Audiences leave Cathy's sessions with a clearer picture of where technology is taking their industry, practical strategies for evaluating emerging tools and platforms, and a more grounded understanding of how human behavior is shifting in a rapidly changing world. Her presentations are built on over a decade of hands-on advisory and executive work across tech and business, not abstract forecasting.
Book Cathy Hackl to give your audience a highly credible, specific view of what comes next.
Topics, sessions and talks
Cathy Hackl maps what happens after large language models — and it's not a screen. As AI moves from conversational interfaces into the physical world, spatial systems that understand geometry, depth, and motion are redefining computing itself. Cathy examines the shift from cloud-based AI to edge and on-device intelligence embedded in wearables, smart glasses, and robotics, using case studies across gaming, simulation, and luxury retail. Leaders leave with a strategic lens for navigating a world where intelligence becomes ambient, spatial, and always-on.
While large language models have reshaped content and knowledge work, Cathy Hackl argues the more significant shift is still coming. Spatial AI and world models don't just generate — they simulate environments, reason about physics, and act with autonomy. Cathy unpacks how industries from robotics to mobility to luxury retail are building competitive advantage on geospatial data and edge computing. Leaders gain the frameworks to identify where spatial intelligence unlocks new value — and to stop building AI strategies constrained by screen-first thinking.
The software era of AI dominance is ending. Cathy Hackl makes the case that as foundational models commoditise, the defining competitive advantage shifts to proprietary hardware ecosystems — smart glasses, spatial sensors, robotics, and AI-native wearables that capture unique multimodal data and create defensible feedback loops. Drawing on examples from gaming, mobility, and enterprise systems, Cathy offers a practical framework for evaluating hardware strategy: build, partner, or invest. Investors and enterprise leaders walk away with clarity on why the future of AI is wearable, embedded, and physical.
Digital transformation gave organisations the cloud, optimised data, and AI-assisted workflows. Cathy Hackl argues that era is already giving way to something more profound: spatial transformation. Persistent intelligent systems, on-device AI, and AR/XR interfaces are converging into a unified ecosystem that changes how people work, learn, shop, and collaborate — in real space, in real time. Cathy unpacks the leadership, infrastructure, and talent implications of this shift, equipping transformation leaders to move from incremental AI adoption toward building organisations that operate beyond the screen.
Digital platforms spent decades optimising for attention. Cathy Hackl asks what comes next — and the answer demands a fundamentally different design philosophy. As AI systems become companions, collaborators, and decision-making partners embedded in smart glasses and spatial interfaces, the stakes shift from engagement metrics to trust architecture and emotional intelligence. Cathy introduces the Intimacy Economy framework, exploring how design choices in AI-native products shape human behaviour, deepen or diminish connection, and determine long-term adoption. Product leaders and founders leave equipped to build technology that scales intelligently without sacrificing the human at its core.
Named a Top 25 AI Visionary by Newsweek and featured on the cover of Forbes LatAm's 100 Most Powerful Women, Cathy combines years of hands-on executive work at AWS, Magic Leap, and HTC VIVE with active advisory roles at Nokia, BCG's Frontier Tech Group, and her own firm. That combination of real operating experience and current market access means leadership audiences get analysis rooted in where technology is actually heading, not where it has been.
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frequently asked questions
Something we've not covered here?
Email cathy.hackl@getapeptalk.com or call PepTalk on +44 20 3835 2929 (UK) or +1 737 888 5112 (US), and one of our speaker agents will contact you within hours to confirm Cathy's availability and fees. If you can, please include your budget upfront – it helps us fast-track your request. It’s also helpful to know the date, format (virtual or in-person), location, and a bit about your audience.
Cathy Hackl structures sessions around a case study framework, drawing on industries such as gaming, mobility, luxury retail, and enterprise systems to illustrate how spatial AI and hardware ecosystems create competitive advantage. Each session delivers a named decision framework — such as build, partner, or invest — giving leaders a practical tool to apply immediately after the talk.
Cathy Hackl's sessions address the transition from large language models to spatial AI and world models, the rise of embodied intelligence in hardware ecosystems including smart glasses, robotics, and AI-native wearables, and competitive strategy for edge computing and geospatial data across industries including gaming, mobility, and luxury retail. She was named a Top 25 AI Visionary by Newsweek and in 2022 became the first person to ring the NASDAQ opening bell simultaneously in physical and avatar form on live television.
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Three to six months ahead is comfortable for most events, and 12 months is better for large conferences, peak-season dates or one specific in-demand speaker. Shorter timelines are workable, and PepTalk regularly fills last-minute and replacement bookings within days. Availability is the constraint, so get in touch as soon as you have a date.
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