332. Fritz Lanman, CEO of Playlist

Today, I'm joined by Fritz Lanman, CEO of Playlist.   Operator of ClassPass and Mindbody, Playlist's recent merger with EGYM forms a $7.5B company spanning AI, hardware, and software, with a mission to modernize booking, corporate wellness, and membership management.   In this episode, we discuss building the wellness industry's full-stack operating system.   We also cover:   Raising $785M from Vista, Temasek, and L Catterton Setting the platform's boundaries and roadmap The anti-tech tech company philosophy   Subscribe to the podcast → insider.fitt.co/podcast  Subscribe to our newsletter → insider.fitt.co/subscribe  Follow us on LinkedIn → linkedin.com/company/fittinsider    Website: www.playlist.com  ClassPass: www.classpass.com  Mindbody: www.mindbody.io  EGYM: www.egym.com  The Fitt Insider Podcast is brought to you by EGYM. Visit EGYM.com to learn more about its smart fitness ecosystem for fitness and health facilities.   Fitt Talent: https://talent.fitt.co/  Consulting: https://consulting.fitt.co/  Investments: https://capital.fitt.co/    Chapters:   (00:00) Introduction (01:36) EGYM merger announcement (02:41) Industry validation moment (03:20) Tech outsider perspective advantage (05:52) Communication challenges with industry (07:05) AI adoption hesitation and diffusion (09:56) AI throughout platform history (11:41) Operating system vs. co-pilot (13:24) AI investment surprise and acceleration (15:50) Transformer paradigm capabilities (17:35) 175K lines of code in eight weeks (18:40) Anti-tech tech company philosophy (20:58) Platform boundaries and roadmap (23:29) Speed of change impact on planning (26:10) Agent-driven onboarding and configurations (28:13) Long-term societal impacts (29:40) UBI and wealth concentration questions (31:03) Industry macro optimism (32:20) Experience economy and human connection (33:40) Conclusion