TCS Summit North America Live blog
Welcome to our live coverage of TCS Summit North America 2026, coming to you from Monterey, California, October 28-30. Throughout the event, some of the region’s most senior business leaders, policymakers, innovators and global thinkers will consider the opportunities and challenges shaping business in the age of AI. After three years of experimentation and scaling, it is crystal clear that AI is not just a technology cycle, but a civilizational shift. Now, it’s time for enterprises to industrialize securely, responsibly, and at scale. Across fireside chats, panel discussions and keynote presentations, leaders will share how they are deploying AI to gain competitive advantage, scale their businesses and unlock true value. You can see the agenda here.
TCS Summit North America 2026 is done, and certain patterns kept surfacing among keynotes, fireside chats, panels and watercooler conversations. As AI moves from pilots into everyday operations, it’s self-evident that the organizations forging forward share distinct traits.
Recaps of each session are on our live blog.
Here’s what resonated with us:
That’s a wrap on TCS Summit North America 2026. The final day gave executives plenty to consider and cogitate on, as they steer their organizations through immense change. Here’s what stood out:
As AI ups capabilities by the day, what can humans still do that machines cannot? In the final session, Simon Sinek – renowned leadership expert, best-selling author and founder of The Optimism Company – sat with David Pogue for an expansive conversation on the possibilities and boundaries of Human+AI. Here’s what stood out:
A transformation journey doesn’t follow a set pattern. In an inspiring session Sanjib Sahoo, President, Global Platform Group, Ingram Micro, shared what his organization learned as it moved toward a total reinvention. His three big takeaways for leaders:
The conversation on AI shifted, over the past year, said Aarthi Subramanian, Executive Director, President, and Chief Operating Officer, TCS. It’s no longer about ‘How can we use AI?’ It now centers on ‘How do we deploy it at enterprise scale?’
What are leading organizations doing to stay ahead of the shift? They’re focusing on three areas: transforming operations, modernizing defenses and reimagining processes.
At TCS, Aarthi’s answer is deceptively simple: set bold goals. It can seem daunting, but it paints a clear picture of what success looks like, and gets everyone pulling in the same direction.
Her parting thought was on optimism. To her, belief, conviction and confidence matter. These, she said, are qualities that let enterprises move faster and push boundaries.
Welcome to day three – the final day of the TCS Summit North America 2026 here in Monterey, California. We’ve got a strong line-up to finish with!
TCS COO Aarthi Subramanian begins the day by exploring what it takes for an enterprise to become truly AI-native.
After that, Sanjib Sahoo, President, Global Platform Group of Ingram Micro, joins Stephanie Mehta on stage to talk about how businesses can unlock growth.
Simon Sinek, the renowned leadership expert, best-selling author and founder of The Optimism Company, will then chat with David Pogue about leading in the AI era – and what humans uniquely bring to the table.
Finally, Amit Bajaj, President, North America, TCS, will bring the summit to a close.
Previous days
As day one wraps and delegates reconvene for the opening reception, here are three key takeaways:
Tomorrow will be another day of insightful conversations and fresh perspectives. Explore the agenda here.
Geopolitical analyst Jacob Shapiro took the stage next, for a broad discourse on the interconnections between global affairs and technology.
He began by expostulating on the rise of multipolarity globally, characterized by increasingly decentralized authority and shifting power dynamics. Though these changes create a challenging backdrop to operate within, he noted that these times of flux have also historically driven significant technological innovation – with AI emerging as a defining force for this era.
AI is revolutionizing how the world works, and empowering individuals and organizations to realize new ambitions. But, as with any fundamental shift, its effects will sometimes be felt unevenly and new hurdles will disrupt deployment.
That isn't necessarily a caution to course correct by standing still or slowing down. Instead, in the face of infrastructure, cybersecurity, privacy, and data sovereignty challenges, Shapiro advised leaders to account for geopolitics, retain the flexibility to change course as needed, and crucially, invest in capabilities that will help humans deploy AI safely and effectively.
The TCS Summit North America 2026 is officially underway.
After an introduction from David Pogue and Stephanie Mehta, our masters of ceremony, Amit Bajaj, President, North America, TCS, welcomed delegates to the event.
He summarized some AI challenges and opportunities that will shape discussions over the coming days, including maintaining a competitive edge while deploying AI, building trust and security, and understanding the economics involved.
These are complex issues that are evolving quickly, fueling conversations about how frontier models continue to expand the boundaries of possibility. He encouraged attendees to take the time to celebrate the achievements of people, too - reflecting on how earlier this year at the TCS London Marathon, Sebastian Sawe became the first person to break the two-hour marathon barrier.
It was a timely reminder to look out for the uniquely human moments that propel the world even as AI shapes the conversations to come.
Hello and welcome to the TCS Summit North America 2026, coming to you live from Monterey, California.
Over the next three days, C-suite executives and leaders from government, sports, business and technology will come together to explore the rapidly evolving world of artificial intelligence and the future of enterprise.
Today, Amit Bajaj, TCS’ President, North America, will open the summit alongside Stephanie Mehta, CEO of Mansueto Ventures. Together, they will discuss the state of North America's AI agenda and what's next for businesses navigating this transformation.
Then, analyst Jacob Shaprio will sit down with Emmy-winning CBS Sunday Morning correspondent, David Pogue, to explore how technological innovation is reshaping geopolitics.
Follow our live coverage on this page to see the key takeaways from each session.
When the conversations have been this scintillating, it’s impossible to pick a few insights to focus on. Here are a few themes that resonated through the day, with several speakers offering their outlook.
Join us tomorrow for our third and final day. Check out the agenda here.
What does it really take to lead when the ground is shifting beneath your feet? As day two at TCS Summit North America 2026 draws to a close, Nikesh Arora, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Palo Alto Networks, tackles that tough question with refreshingly pragmatic answers. Instead of canned platitudes and grand declarations, he served up straightforward suggestions on how to lead in the AI age.
Top of his list is knowing how to balance the appetite for innovation with the discipline of risk management. It’s a tightrope many leaders are walking right now, and his approach was two-pronged.
First, start with focused projects where AI can be put to work to drive clear business outcomes. These early wins matter, he explained, because they build confidence. Next, even as leaders focus on the nitty-gritty, they need to consider blue-sky applications with a clear-eyed assessment of whether the risks can be managed. If they can, they should go forth and experiment. The willingness to explore, he said, can lead to huge efficiencies and productivity gains.
Underlying it all is the willingness to learn – and Arora practises what he preaches. When ChatGPT launched, he appointed himself Palo Alto Networks’ Chief AI Officer, with a canny understanding that he needed to evaluate the tech himself before he could assess the approach others in the organization were taking.
Scaling AI is dominating the day’s discussions because it’s the defining challenge at this juncture of the tech cycle. In a panel moderated by Amit Kapur, Chief AI and Services Transformation Officer, TCS, leaders shared how they are driving AI adoption to scale across their organizations:
AI agents going rogue and infiltrating organizations? After the recent wave of high-profile incidents, cybersecurity in the AI age is front of mind for global leaders everywhere. How can resilience be improved?
With agents increasingly evading traditional cyber defenses, Rajat Taneja, President, Technology, Visa, rang the bell: a collaborative approach is essential to deploy AI and strengthen defenses.
Visa has just put that into practice, releasing the Visa Vulnerability Agentic Harness as an open-source tool available to all, helping enterprises identify weaknesses and take corrective action.
The path ahead lies in sharing solutions like these, he said, for every organization to have a firmer footing in collectively combating bad actors. From this foundation, each enterprise can focus on its own strengths – and gain competitive advantage.
Taneja also turned his attention to consumer impacts. As agentic shopping becomes more widespread, it marks a fundamental shift that raises important questions about trust, responsibility and control. For the technology to succeed, he believes businesses must create ways for users to clearly manifest their intent, pairing their human accountability and judgment with agentic actions.
Accessing AI tools is the easy part. Getting people to adopt them is where it gets tricky. In the day’s first panel, executives from across industries shared how they’re bringing their teams along. Three themes stood out:
How do you move AI from experiment to everyday operations? At our first fireside session, Thomas Kurian, CEO, Google Cloud, kept it simple: find clarity, then take it one step at a time.
Start with objectives that can be clearly targeted. This offers leaders a baseline and a way to measure what’s working. Next, get your data in order. Kurian’s caution: if models aren’t fed the correct information, they will not deliver the desired results.
He also advised leaders not to treat enterprise AI deployment as a traditional IT project. It cuts across departments and every level of the organisation, so it calls for a different mindset – an iterative one that lets business and technology teams both accomplish their goals.
No softballs to warm up; TCS CEO & MD, K. Krithivasan began day two of TCS North America Summit 2026, by pitching the poser on everyone’s minds – how do enterprises move beyond AI experimentation?
Anchored in real-world situations, he broke down the problem to its constituent parts and offered some practical advice on orchestrating enterprise intelligence and translating it into measurable outcomes.
Welcome to the second day of the TCS Summit North America. Our speakers today, with their vast array of experience and expertise, are here to consider, contemplate and converse on the many ways to unlock value with AI.
TCS CEO & MD K. Krithivasan begins the day by deliberating on what leadership needs when deploying AI at an enterprise level.
Google Cloud CEO, Thomas Kurian will sit down for our first fireside discussion, on how organizations can navigate the next era of AI and cloud technology.
Next up will be an unmissable panel discussion on how businesses can realize the true value of AI, where executives from Pearson, Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania and Maryland, and Huntington Bank, tackle the issue from their diverse perspectives. And after, Rajat Taneja, President, Technology at Visa will discuss turning the technology into competitive advantage.
Later in the afternoon, leadership from T. Rowe Price, GE Aerospace, McDermott International, and Cisco and TCS will pow-wow on the question that looms large at this stage of the technology cycle: how to scale AI effectively.
To close out an exciting day, we have a discussion with Nikesh Arora, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Palo Alto Networks, on leading with confidence.