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PODCAST

FT Tech Tonic

Financial Times

We are in the midst of a digital revolution, where the line between our physical world and cyberspace is blurring. Tech Tonic is the show that investigates the promises and perils of this new technological age. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

technology entrepreneurship

All Episodes

31:14

Defying death: The future of forever

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/12/10

Gene and stem cell therapies have been touted as the next phase in the longevity movement, with promises to rejuvenate the body at the cellular level and reverse the effects of ageing. But, as the prospect of life extension moves into the mainstream, it presents big questions for society as a whole. Are we ready for a world where people live much longer lives?In this final episode, the FT’s Michael Peel and Hannah Kuchler dive into the tough moral questions at the heart of the longevity movement

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32:28

Defying death: The longevity lab

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/12/03

Singapore has become a model for longevity-focused healthcare. With an ageing population and citizens willing to spend money on anti-ageing treatments, the government and private companies are spending big on new ways to slow ageing, and help people live healthier for longer.In this episode the FT’s Michael Peel visits the city-state to find out how longevity treatments are moving into the mainstream. He meets venture capitalist Boyang Wang, personal trainer Tiat Lim (‘Singapore’s Benjamin Button’),

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35:49

Defying death: The origins of ageing

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/11/26

How much do we really know about ageing? For decades, scientists have been trying to understand the biology of the ageing process - what happens to our bodies as we get older? And is it possible to slow that process down or even stop it all together?In this series of Tech Tonic, the FT’s Hannah Kuchler and Michael Peel look into the past, present and future of longevity - the wellness movement focused on extending and bettering your quality of life. Episode 1 follows Hannah as she speaks with UCL

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1:30

Coming soon: Defying death

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/11/19

Investors are spending billions of dollars on novel ways to extend human life through inventive treatments, therapies, and even manipulating our genes. And increasingly, it seems as though anti-ageing efforts have moved from the super rich to a mass market consumer industry. In this series, we’re covering the past, present and future of the longevity movement. We’ll be looking at where the fixation on longevity is coming from, and trying to understand the practical and ethical issues at the heart of

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2:16

Introducing Untold: Toxic Legacy

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/10/23

Introducing Toxic Legacy, a new season of Untold from the Financial Times. Host Laura Hughes uncovers a lead poisoning epidemic across the UK. You might be living with lead and not know it: the toxin is often invisible to the human eye, but wreaks havoc on our bodies once we’re exposed.Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you get your podcasts.For information on how to live safely with lead, please visit the LEAPP Alliance website. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for

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31:17

Mission to Mars: Bad science fiction

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/10/22

For decades, science fiction writers have envisaged colonising Mars, even building cities on the red planet. Advocates for Mars exploration, such as Elon Musk, want to make that vision a reality. But can humans really live in an alien world?The FT’s space industry editor Peggy Hollinger speaks to researchers about the physical and mental pressures astronauts would face living millions of miles from home and to scientists studying the suitability of Mars’ atmosphere and soil.This episode of Tech

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29:53

Mission to Mars: The new space race

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/10/15

US President Donald Trump wants to “plant the stars and stripes on the planet Mars”. But more than 50 years on from the moon landings, America’s space agency, Nasa, is in disarray. Meanwhile, China is forging ahead with its own plans for manned missions to the Moon and perhapsto Mars. Who will win the race to the red planet?The FT’s space industry editor Peggy Hollinger speaks to former and current Nasa employees about the challenges facing the space agency, and to Jared Isaacman, Trump’s one-time

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29:34

Mission to Mars: Elon Musk's 'Starship' Enterprise

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/10/08

Elon Musk wants humans to settle on Mars, and his rocket company SpaceX is spending billions of dollars on developing the spacecraft to take us there. The ‘Starship’ is being designed to take astronauts back to the moon, and eventually, on to the red planet. But why is Musk so obsessed with building a colony on Mars, and is he really the man to take us there?The FT’s space industry editor Peggy Hollinger speaks to space experts and Mars enthusiasts about the pull of the red planet, both for

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1:40

Coming soon: Mission to Mars

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/10/01

US President Donald Trump has pledged to “plant the stars and stripes on the planet Mars”, China says it will send its first crewed mission to Mars within a decade, and Elon Musk wants people to actually settle on Mars, transforming the human race into an interplanetary species.In a new series of Tech Tonic, the FT’s Peggy Hollinger asks if we’re really about to land, and even live, on the red planet.Free to read:Musk’s mission to MarsThree days with America’s rocket chasersTech Tonic is produced by

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0:49

Vote for Tech Tonic in the Signal Awards!

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/09/30

Tech Tonic has been nominated for a Signal Award in the Technology category! It's a Listener Choice award, which means we need your help. Vote for us to win here. We appreciate your support.And while you're at it, vote for some other FT podcasts that have also been nominated. The FT News Briefing podcast was nominated for best daily podcast category. Vote here. And Behind the Money was nominated in the Money & Finance category. Vote here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more

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31:11

AI Music: ‘Theft machines’?

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/09/10

AI models have learned to create their own music by harvesting millions of songs from the internet. But critics say they’re using musicians’ work without permission, and three major record labels are suing them for ‘copyright infringement on an almost unimaginable scale’.In the second episode of this two part series, the FT’s pop critic Ludovic Hunter-Tilney speaks to campaigners and lawyers about the legal battle over AI generators, and to artists about the growth of AI music on streaming

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28:02

AI Music: The Infinite Jukebox

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/09/03

Generative AI models trained on vast swaths of popular music can create songs almost indistinguishable from human-made work. For some, they represent the future of pop music. For others, they threaten to flood the world with ‘AI slop’, drowning out the work of human artists, stealing musicians' jobs, and ending the process of music-making as we know it. Is this just a case of technophobia? Or could AI music generators replace human musicians altogether?In the first in a two-part series, the FT’s pop

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1:53

Coming soon: Will AI ruin music?

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/08/27

AI music generators - platforms that use artificial intelligence to create new, original music from scratch - can make songs that are almost indistinguishable from human creations. For some musicians, they’re the next frontier in music-making technology. But for others, they represent a grave threat, flooding the world with low-grade AI music, stealing the jobs of working musicians, and even spelling the end of the creative process as we know it. Is this just technophobia, or is music facing AI

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31:00

Trump’s tech bros: The enigma of Peter Thiel

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/07/08

Peter Thiel is unlike any other Trump tech bro. As well as a wildly successful investor, he’s seen as a thinker - the philosopher king of Silicon Valley. Thiel’s acolytes in the tech world and Washington include vice-president JD Vance but his relationship with the Trump camp is complicated. And there are still questions about what, if anything, he wants with the president.In the final episode of this season of Tech Tonic, Murad Ahmed speaks to FT columnist Gillian Tett about Thiel’s political

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29:14

Trump’s Tech Bros: Is ‘Maga Mark’ the real Mark...

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/07/01

Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has undergone a transformation, both physical and political. The skinny teenager who founded Facebook in his dorm room is now a muscular jiu-jitsu enthusiast who’s called US President Donald Trump a “badass” and wants to see more “masculine energy” in the workplace.Is this all an act? Is Zuckerberg doing whatever it takes to ingratiate himself with the Trump administration and ensure that Meta emerges a winner in the AI race? Or has “Maga Mark” been the real Mark

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25:42

Trump’s Tech Bros: Has Jeff Bezos sold out?

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/06/24

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was once a vocal critic of Donald Trump. But that changed during last year’s election campaign. Now, he has instructed the newspaper he owns, The Washington Post, to shift its editorial line to be more in line with the president. So what provoked Bezos’s political change of heart?Murad Ahmed and the FT’s US media editor Anna Nicolau speak to Marty Baron, the former executive editor of the Washington Post, about why Bezos bought the Post in the first place, the effect his

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37:00

Trump's Tech Bros: The tragedy of Elon Musk

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/06/17

When Donald Trump re-entered the White House, Elon Musk came with him as his ‘tech bro-in-chief’, tasked with rebooting the government machine. But five months on, Musk’s ambitious plan to cut $2tn from the annual government budget has failed, and his relationship with the president has ended in a bitter break-up. Could the world’s richest man come to regret his time in politics?Murad Ahmed speaks to Joe Miller, the FT’s Washington correspondent, about how and why Musk’s time in DC came to an abrupt

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26:44

Trump’s Tech Bros: Can Tim Cook save Apple from the...

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/06/10

During the US president’s first term in office, Tim Cook appeared to be the ultimate Trump whisperer, winning tariff exemptions despite Apple’s heavy reliance on Chinese manufacturing. Now, the iPhone-maker-in-chief has found himself under the toughest pressure yet from Trump, who has threatened smartphone tariffs as high as 25%. Does Tim Cook still have a way out, or is Apple out of options? And what does Cook's relationship with Trump tell us about the future of the trade war?FT tech editor Murad

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1:01

Coming soon: The rise and fall of Trump’s tech bros

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/06/09

Can Tim Cook save Apple from the trade war? Has Mark Zuckerberg really been a fan of Donald Trump all along? And is the bromance between Elon Musk and the president really over?In a new season of Tech Tonic, Murad Ahmed explores the relationships between Trump and some of the titans of the tech world. What is really driving those relationships, and what might they mean for the future of technology in the US and beyond?Free to read:‘He is power’: billionaires line up for Donald Trump’s

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30:22

Future weapons: Tomorrow’s technology

FT Tech Tonic ·

2025/05/13

How is defence tech reshaping geopolitics? And what does the battlefield of the future look like? In the final episode of our series on the technological weapons of war, the FT’s innovation editor John Thornhill sits down with the FT’s industry correspondent Sylvia Pfeifer, deputy Beijing bureau chief Ryan McMorrow and US-China correspondent Demetri Sevastopulo.Clips: MCA/Universal Pictures, CCTV, NBCFree to read:China gains dexterous upper hand in humanoid robot tussle with USBuyout groups and VCs

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240 results

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