unique ability to mediate C-C bond forming reactions serving as either electrophiles (by direct nucleophilic addition to the carbonyl) or nucleophiles (by virtue of enolate or enamine formation) remains one of the cornerstones of the past 4 decades of organic synthesis. An overabundance of ketone syntheses rely on the direct, one-step 1,2-addition of organometallic reagents to suitable electrophilic carboxylic acid derivatives. Unfortunately, these nucleophilic substitutions can suffer from a number of limitations including overaddition, poor chemoselectivity regarding the presence of other carbonyl groups, excessive use of acylating reagents or tedious procedures. The advent of the venerable Weinreb amides and related derivatives offered a robust solution to the overaddition issue and triggered the development of related procedures relying on amide activation/organometallic addition. The recent breakthrough of Garg, Szostak and others on achieving ketone synthesis from activated amides via Ni-catalyzed cross-coupling is perhaps the corollary of these developments. Nevertheless, both the Weinreb family of reactions and these elegant cross-coupling processes still rely on stoichiometric amounts of main group organometallics or organoboron reagents. Alkenes would constitute highly appealing alternatives to conventional organometallic reagents for addition to carbonyl groups en route to ketone synthesis. Hydroacylation of olefins has therefore emerged as a robust method for the preparation of ketones, typically achieved by the atom-economical, catalytic addition of an aldehyde C-H bond across an alkene. However, contemporary transition metal-catalyzed hydroacylation presents several challenges, the most notable of which is the competing decarbonylation of the aldehyde partner prior to coupling with the alkene counterpart. Therefore, while intramolecular olefin hydroacylation has reached high levels of efficiency and selectivity, intermolecular hydroacylation still typically relies on (a) aldehydes equipped with directing groups designed to minimize decarbonylation as well as on (b) activated alkene partners.