#450 Peter Bonney on How AI Is Disrupting the RFP and B2B Sales Process

“My grand vision is to make the RFP obsolete — and I believe AI can make that happen.” — Peter Bonney, CEO & Founder of Fastbreak In this episode of The CTO Show with Mehmet, we’re joined by Peter Bonney, CEO and Founder of Fastbreak, to discuss how AI is transforming one of the most painful processes in enterprise sales: responding to RFPs. With over 9 years of experience navigating the procurement landscape from both buyer and seller perspectives, Peter shares his bold vision for eliminating inefficiencies, empowering sales teams, and ultimately making the traditional RFP obsolete. We dive deep into how Fastbreak uses AI to semantically understand complex company knowledge, automate responses, and allow human teams to focus on what truly matters. We also touch on the future of SaaS, defensibility in the AI age, and how to scale efficiently in uncertain times. 🔑 Key Takeaways • The inefficiency in RFP processes is still a major pain point for enterprises. • Fastbreak’s AI engine builds a semantic understanding of company content to generate smart, relevant responses. • The goal isn’t to replace people but to empower them — AI handles repetitive tasks, humans focus on high-value work. • Peter’s ultimate vision: make RFPs obsolete by using AI on both buyer and seller sides. • In a world where “every company is now an AI company,” finding a defensible moat is more important than ever. • Scaling AI-driven SaaS is easier than ever thanks to API access to foundation models — but maintaining differentiation is critical. • AI helps in shortening B2B sales cycles by optimizing responses, follow-ups, and internal coordination. ⸻ 🎓 What You’ll Learn • Why enterprise procurement is still stuck in a legacy loop • How AI changes the way sales teams and proposal managers operate • What the future of “robot-to-robot selling” could look like • The risks of building on top of foundational models — and how to stay ahead • How founders should think about scalability, support, and customer trust in the AI age 👤 About the Guest – Peter Bonney Peter Bonney is the CEO and Founder of Vendorful, a SaaS platform designed to simplify and accelerate complex engagements between B2B buyers and sellers. Peter's leadership has helped Vendorful become a key player in the B2B tech space, focusing on making complex procurement processes more efficient and transparent. He is also the CEO and Founder of Fastbreak, a spinoff from Vendorful focused on helping sales and pre-sales teams leverage their company’s knowledge and collaborate seamlessly with internal subject-matter experts (SMEs) to make complex deals faster and easier. https://www.linkedin.com/in/peter-bonney-nyc/ https://vendorful.ai/ https://fastbreakrfp.com/ 🕒 Episode Highlights & Timestamps 0:00 – Welcome and introduction 1:05 – Peter’s background and the founding of Fastbreak 3:30 – Where AI fits into the RFP response process 6:50 – Why procurement remains one of the most outdated processes 10:00 – AI’s impact on sales roles: AEs, SDRs, and proposal managers 14:30 – Reducing repetitive work with AI and improving quality of responses 18:00 – Are buyers using ChatGPT to write RFPs? Signs you can spot 21:00 – Peter’s “wild idea” to eliminate RFPs using dual-sided AI 24:30 – Robot-to-robot selling and how customers use AI to choose vendors 26:00 – Shrinking B2B sales cycles with AI-enabled efficiency 29:00 – Virtual sales engineers and the future of sales collaboration 32:00 – Is every SaaS company now an AI company? 34:30 – The challenge of defensibility in a world of rapid AI evolution 37:00 – Scaling SaaS in the age of APIs and democratized infrastructure 39:30 – Fundraising, angel investing, and Peter’s honest outlook on the future 42:00 – Final thoughts on Lean Startup principles, failure, and staying adaptive