Christian Peter Sandvei

Sandvei argues that a trusted data foundation, unified infrastructure, and security and governance around AI must come first; only then can automation and AI deliver practical business results. For CIOs, the question is not "what can we do with AI?" but whether the data, trust and governance are in place to make AI genuinely useful across the business.

XL-BYG, a decentralised wholesale and retail cooperative, illustrates how technology must create value not only centrally but also for independent stores close to their customers.

• As Sandvei summarises it, Steen Villssen argues that, with the foundation in place, AI and automation can improve the supply chain, gross margin, personalisation and customer experience.
• That value must reach individual branches so they can better understand their customers and suppliers.

A later post applies the same claim to industrial businesses, where data joins steel as a raw material, and asks how much work remains on the data foundation before AI and AI agents can scale.

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Sandvei contrasts using AI to speed up current processes with rethinking processes and embedding AI in how a business operates. Success, they conclude, should be measured by value created, not by how many tools an organisation deploys.

BESTSELLER's ambition to move people from Takers to Shapers to Makers illustrates the principle "if you build it, you own it": teams are responsible not only for delivering technology but also for its adoption and continued value. Sandvei closes by asking whether AI is improving how work is done today or changing how it will be done tomorrow.

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With trusted, common context across a business, people, systems and what the post calls AI coworkers can work from the same information, affecting decision-making, quality and agility as well as efficiency. The prerequisite is the underlying data layer.

NTM Group is building a digital thread across engineering and product development, production, service and the customer lifecycle, turning the data foundation from a source of reporting into common ground for the business.

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The CIO role, they say, now extends beyond supplying technology to determining how well a company operates and understands its impact.

Schou Company's ERP, financial and supply chain data underpin planning, transparency and continuous optimisation.

• The line "you cannot manage what you cannot see" extends the argument to sustainability reporting.
• Sandvei asks whether operational performance and sustainability are separate digital agendas or two outcomes of one data strategy.

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Sandvei and Manoj Chandra Jha describe early signals from interviews with CIOs and senior technology leaders across Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland, conducted with Nord-IQ Research & Advisory.

• The themes include AI and agentic AI, data readiness, investment priorities, and the difficulty of converting AI ambition into business impact.
• Sandvei notes that these are early findings; the picture will fill out as the quantitative research and interviews come together.
• The post also marks the next step in the programme: Nordic CIO Pulse dinners in Copenhagen, Stockholm and Oslo in November and December, where CIOs meet a small number of technology partners.
• It invites technology companies to get in touch if the Nordic CIO community matters to their 2027 strategy.

For brands planning a campaign

This is the entry point for a commercial conversation.

• It presents a defined research-and-convening format — interviews, a survey and a small dinner series — rather than a one-off speaking slot.
• That is the programme a sponsor or partner would be buying into.

Sandvei highlights BESTSELLER's ambition to move people from Takers to Shapers to Makers, distinguishing between using AI to become more productive and redesigning processes and ways of working.

• The second idea is accountability: 'If you build it, you own it' — teams are responsible not only for delivering technology but also for whether it is adopted and keeps creating value.
• Sandvei argues that AI success should be measured by value created, not by how many tools are deployed.
• The post ends with the question of whether AI is improving today's work or changing tomorrow's.

For brands planning a campaign

Useful framing for an AI adoption or operating-model report: the productivity-versus-redesign ladder gives a workshop or report chapter a ready-made progression, while the ownership principle offers a concrete governance talking point specific to this source.

Sandvei describes XL-BYG as a decentralised wholesale and retail cooperative where technology has to create value for independent stores close to their local customers, not just centrally.

• Steen Villsen's position, as summarised, is to resist starting with the latest AI capabilities and instead focus on trusted data, unified infrastructure, and security and governance around AI.
• With that foundation in place, AI and automation can improve supply chain, gross margin, personalisation and customer experience.
• The value must also reach the branches, helping individual stores understand their customers and suppliers better.
• Sandvei reframes the CIO question from 'What can we do with AI?' to 'Do we have the data, trust and governance in place to make AI genuinely useful across the business?'

For brands planning a campaign

A ready-made spine for an AI readiness report aimed at CIOs: foundation first, then capability. The decentralised-cooperative detail also offers a non-obvious example for audiences where centralised rollouts are the assumed model.

Steel is NTM's raw material, and Sandvei's summary of Pontus Blomberg's view is that data is becoming just as fundamental.

• The ambition is a digital thread running across the enterprise, connecting engineering and product development with production, service and the customer lifecycle.
• In Sandvei's reading, the notable point for AI is what happens when that foundation becomes more than a source of reporting: with a trusted shared context, people, systems and AI coworkers can operate from the same information, affecting decision-making, quality and agility, not just efficiency.
• The post raises the programme's recurring question: how much data-foundation work is still needed before AI and AI agents can scale?

For brands planning a campaign

Best fit for manufacturing or industrial briefs, and for content about agentic AI that needs a grounding example. The digital-thread framing translates directly into a report section on preconditions for agent deployment.

Sandvei's summary of Peter Maarssø, CIO for Project, IT and CSR at Schou Company, makes the case that ERP, financial and supply chain data are more than back-office support: bringing those streams together underpins planning, transparency and continuous optimisation.

• The same foundation is increasingly critical for corporate responsibility and sustainability — 'you cannot manage what you cannot see' — because detailed sustainability reporting depends on connecting operational activity to reliable data.
• Sandvei argues that the CIO role has moved beyond supplying technology, since the digital foundation now determines both how well the company operates and how well it understands its impact.
• They ask whether operational performance and sustainability are two agendas or two outcomes of one data strategy.

For brands planning a campaign

Useful for ESG or finance-adjacent audiences rather than purely technical ones, or when a brief needs to show that the data-strategy case holds up beyond an AI framing.

They introduce guests including Steen Villumsen at XL-BYG, Nicolas Skovmand at BESTSELLER, Peter Maarssø at Schou Company and Pontus Blomberg at NTM Group, and describe the program: qualitative CIO interviews combined with quantitative research, with findings shared at Nordic CIO Pulse Dinners in Copenhagen, Stockholm and Oslo in November and December. One post says the early signals are provisional and the full picture will emerge when survey data and interviews are combined.

Interview series and quantitative survey, with in-person dinners to share findings with the CIO community.

For brands planning a campaign

A research or advisory vendor can join an existing program with a defined audience and calendar rather than propose a standalone sponsored post. Contributing a theme, question set or dinner topic is easier to scope against the schedule than a single placement.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2 · Source 3 · Source 4 · Source 5

Steen Villumsen at XL-BYG is described as resisting the temptation to start with the newest AI capability, focusing instead on trusted data, unified infrastructure, and security and governance around AI.

• That foundation can help automation improve supply chain, gross margin, personalisation and customer experience.
• Pontus Blomberg at NTM Group describes building a digital thread across engineering, product development, production, service and the customer lifecycle so people, systems and AI coworkers work from the same information.

The posts present these as guests’ perspectives, not findings from completed research. Ask for the quantitative data promised to support the argument.

For brands planning a campaign

Data management, governance, integration and infrastructure vendors have a direct hook: the posts frame the data layer as a prerequisite for AI, not a competing budget line. A campaign built around readiness assessment or governance fits the recurring question posed to CIOs.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2 · Source 3

It also carries the principle “if you build it, you own it”: teams are responsible not only for delivering technology but for ensuring it is adopted and continues to create value. The closing question asks whether AI is being used to improve how work is done today or change how it will be done tomorrow.

For brands planning a campaign

Change management, enablement and platform vendors can build on the ownership and adoption angle, which stands out from a generic productivity message. A campaign asking buyers who owns adoption and measured outcomes maps onto the post’s argument.

Examples: Source 1

Another asks how much work remains on the data foundation before organisations can scale AI and AI agents.

For brands planning a campaign

Agentic AI and automation vendors can connect their offer to the readiness-before-scale question.

• The timing also aligns with 2027 planning and the November–December dinner dates.
• A readiness framework or benchmark for that planning window has a natural fit.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

The post’s line “you cannot manage what you cannot see” and its closing question ask whether operational performance and sustainability are separate digital agendas or two outcomes of the same data strategy.

For brands planning a campaign

ESG reporting, ERP and supply chain data vendors can position around a shared data foundation for both agendas. This suits campaigns aimed at CIOs asked to fund reporting separately from operations.

Examples: Source 1

Posts credit both the interviewee and interviewer Manoj Chandra Jha by name and end with a consistent hashtag set. One post adds a direct commercial note inviting technology companies that value the Nordic CIO community to get in touch about joining the dinner conversations.

A consistent, repeatable post template built around a named practitioner’s perspective and an open question to the audience.

For brands planning a campaign

The format can be repeated for a themed series, with a partner supplying the question or theme around which a named CIO voice is framed. The commercial invitation appears in the post about the dinner series, not in every post; confirm what the partner receives before committing to a specific deliverable.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2 · Source 3 · Source 4 · Source 5

The post says they are speaking to CIOs and senior technology leaders in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland, combining quantitative research with CIO interviews, and continuing the discussion at Nordic CIO Pulse dinners in Copenhagen, Stockholm and Oslo. It invites technology companies to get in touch about joining those conversations but names no participating partner companies.

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The post highlights teams moving from Takers to Shapers to Makers and the principle "if you build it, you own it," with teams accountable for adoption and value, not just delivery. BESTSELLER appears as an interview subject.

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The post frames the case around a decentralised wholesale and retail cooperative where technology must create value for independent local stores.

• It quotes the argument that AI depends on trusted data, unified infrastructure and governance underneath it.
• XL-BYG appears as an interview subject.

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The post describes an ambition to build a digital thread linking engineering and product development with production, service and the customer lifecycle.

• It highlights the argument that a shared data foundation lets people, systems and AI coworkers work from the same information.
• NTM Group appears as an interview subject.

View example

The post covers bringing ERP, financial and supply chain data together for planning and transparency, and the claim that the same data foundation increasingly underpins corporate responsibility and sustainability reporting. Schou Company appears as an interview subject.

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Both write for enterprise technology leaders weighing how to move beyond pilots and deliver operational impact.

Mehra writes from inside an operating role in heavy industry, describing AI scaled into core workflows such as predictive maintenance, yield optimisation, energy efficiency and supply chain planning in steel, pulp and paper, and industrial chemicals. Sandvei's posts come from a Nordic interview and research programme, presenting named guest CIOs' positions that they frame and comment on rather than their own operating experience.

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Both address CIOs and their advisers.

Fachler draws on leading an in-house information services organisation at a high-tech company and now advises CIOs as a partner, bringing the perspective of both practitioner and adviser. Sandvei's posts come from a Nordic convening and research programme built around interviews with other CIOs, with a regional enterprise focus rather than a single company's account.

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Their overlap is mainly format and region.

Ling focuses on startup ecosystems and the Vaasa and Kvarken region, including an energy-transition focus and a Silicon Valley connection.

• His posts are event announcements and programme listings.
• Sandvei focuses on enterprise CIOs, AI, data and governance through interviews with named CIOs; the ideas themselves largely differ.

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The two posts are event work: a Sunday Walk & Talk kickoff for the Wasa Future Festival, and a festival programme post covering a panel on the Vaasa startup ecosystem, a session on the Vaasa-to-Silicon-Valley connection, and a startup showcase. If the report needs a host who can bring founders, regional development bodies, universities and investors into a room, and connect a Nordic region to Silicon Valley networks, these posts show that capability.

Christian Peter Sandvei's posts do not address CIO agendas, AI readiness, data foundations or governance—the substance of a campaign aimed at CIOs.

• They focus on festival framing and programme promotion, not reported enterprise insight, so a readiness chapter would need a different author.
• Their visible network is founders and ecosystem organisations rather than CIOs and technology partners, and the posts offer no enterprise-adoption material for building a readiness argument.
• Replacing the host also means giving up the interview-and-survey programme and dinner series a sponsor could otherwise attach to.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

The posts describe their work on a cross-functional leadership team at U.S.

• Steel, scaling AI under the CEO, and name concrete use cases: predictive maintenance, yield optimisation, energy efficiency and supply chain intelligence across steel, pulp and paper, and industrial chemicals.
• Both posts argue that the differentiator is the operating model, not the model itself, and that the CIO role is moving from system steward to business value architect.
• For a chapter that needs someone who has embedded AI in core operational workflows and aligned leadership on cost, yield and productivity outcomes, this is closer to first-hand operating experience than interview summaries of other people's programmes.

The frame is US industrial and single-employer.

• The posts offer commentary on McKinsey and Gartner reports alongside their own company's programme, with no Nordic CIO research, multi-company interview series or convening mechanism for a sponsor.
• Choosing Mehra trades the Nordic audience, survey findings and dinner infrastructure for deeper plant-floor credibility.
• That changes what the report can promise at launch and where the follow-up conversation happens.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2

The posts cover six years as CIO at AppsFlyer, building an Information Services organisation across IT, security, business applications and business data, then leading AI adoption there.

• They give a specific figure—more than 500 of 750+ Make scenarios built outside IS on governed tooling—and a clear position on shadow AI: enable, don't block.
• The second post adds current advisory work with CIOs on AI strategy and a seat at a Delafeld Partners roundtable that discussed transparency on use cases, token costs and converting proven pilots into deterministic code.

The context is one high-tech company, not a spread of Nordic enterprises.

• Delafeld Partners hosts the roundtable around its own AI accelerator, rather than an independent research programme.
• There is no Nordic CIO survey, multi-country interview series or documented Nordic audience, so the sponsor loses the regional convening and research findings the current host's programme supplies.
• The adoption story also comes from a single employer, limiting how far it generalises to a Nordic enterprise readership.

Examples: Source 1 · Source 2