Sudesh Girdhari

Solutions Director, North America Akamai

Sudesh Girdhari is the Solutions Director for North America at Akamai, leading partner and solution initiatives across system integrators, software vendors, and strategic partners supporting Akamai Compute Services. He works closely with engineering teams to design and deploy distributed, edge-enabled solutions spanning hybrid cloud, on-premises, and SaaS environments.

Currently, Sudesh is pioneering "Agentic Engine Optimization" strategies, helping global brands re-architect their edge infrastructure to serve the emerging "machine customer" economy. With more than 20 years of experience across cloud, edge, media, and compute technologies, Sudesh brings a practical perspective on building and operating performance-critical digital platforms. He holds an MBA from Georgia Tech and certifications in ITIL, Six Sigma, and TOGAF.

Monday, February 23: Summit Day

4:00 PM AI: Panel: Readying Your Employees for The Future Reality: Getting People Bought in to Using AI Everyday

As AI becomes an integral part of daily retail operations, employee adoption is essential to unlocking its full potential. The future of work depends on preparing teams to confidently embrace AI tools that enhance productivity, decision-making, and customer experiences. During this panel, hear from leaders who have successfully driven AI buy-in across their organizations, sharing practical strategies to engage employees, overcome resistance, and foster a culture where AI is seamlessly integrated into everyday workflows by:

Learning strategies to build employee trust and enthusiasm for AI adoption
Discovering effective training programs and resources
Understanding how to address common fears and resistance
Exploring change management best practices

Tuesday, February 24

4:45 PM Track 6: Client Case Study: The Agentic Revenue Shift: Optimizing Your Site for the "Non-Human" Customer

Your next high-value customer isn't a human; it's an AI Agent. While traditional SEO optimizes for eyeballs, the new revenue battleground is Agentic Engine Optimization (AEO). This deep-dive session moves beyond chatbot hype to the technical reality of "Scrunching" transforming heavy 99k-token pages into concise 1k-token payloads that agents can actually read and act upon. We will explore how leading travel and retail brands are playing "offense" to reclaim direct bookings from OTAs and reduce cart abandonment by curating exactly what AI agents see. Stop blocking bots and start optimizing for the machine economy.

Audience Learning Objectives:

Master "Scrunching": Learn why reducing token payload (99k → 1k) via edge transformation is critical for AI readability and latency.
Play Offense vs. Defense: Distinguish between scraping bots you must block and retrieval agents you must woo to reclaim direct revenue.
Metrics that Matter: Move beyond traditional sessions to track Source-of-Voice and Agent Citation Rates as your new KPIs.
Real-World Tactics: Case studies on how edge-enabled "markdown" versions of your site drive higher conversion in Travel and Retail.

Check out the incredible speaker line-up to see who will be joining Sudesh.

Download The Latest Agenda