Why we’re focusing VB Transform on the agentic revolution – and what’s at stake for enterprise AI leaders

Tomorrow in San Francisco, VentureBeat’s Transform 2025 kicks off. For years, this has been the leading independent gathering for enterprise technical decision-makers — the hands-on builders and architects on the front lines of applied AI. 

Our mission has always been to cut through the hype and focus on the most critical, execution-oriented challenges our audience faces, and this year, one conversation towers above all others: the agentic AI revolution.

We’ve all been captivated by the potential. But a chasm has opened between the jaw-dropping demos from research labs and the messy reality of enterprise deployment. While agents are poised to become the new engine of the enterprise, a recent KPMG study found that only 11% of companies have actually integrated them into their workflows. 

This is the “Agentic Infrastructure Gap,” and closing it is the big challenge this year. It’s not about the agent itself, but about building the enterprise-grade chassis – the security, governance, data plumbing, and orchestration – required to manage a digital workforce.

That’s why we’ve dedicated this year’s VB Transform agenda to being a real-world playbook for navigating this new frontier. It’s the event for leaders who need to move from concept to reality, and here’s how we’re tackling it.

Architecting the new enterprise chassis

The “Agentic OS” requires a new orchestration, both at the application level but also below it, lower in the stack. This about orchestrating the right compute for the right task. At Transform, we’re mapping this new landscape with the architects building it.

• The Great Re-routing: Influential analyst Dylan Patel will join Groq CEO Jonathan Ross and Cerebras CTO Sean Lie to debate the future of the AI inference stack, breaking down the architectural shifts that are reshaping enterprise AI economics. 
• The Visionaries: We’ll get crucial context from the leaders of the foundational platforms, including the pragmatic and grounded Andrew Ng, Google Cloud CTO Will Grannis, OpenAI’s Head of Platform Product Olivier Godement, and Anthropic‘s product lead Scott White, among many, many other notables (too many to list here).

Learning from the doers

Theory is easy; execution is hard. The heart of Transform is dedicated to the real-world practitioners deploying these systems today.

We’re going beyond the canned success stories to hear directly from the leaders in the trenches at Walmart, Bank of America, Expedia, American Express, LinkedIn, Chevron, Intuit, Capital One, and General Motors.

They’ll share the unvarnished truth about what it takes to build, secure, and scale agentic systems in complex, regulated industries.

This isn’t a spectator sport

Transform has always been for builders, and this year is no exception. We’ve designed the event to be deeply interactive, ensuring you leave with applicable knowledge.

• Hands-on workshops: Learn how to actually construct agents and train models with experts like Nathan Lambert and agent-building pioneer Sam Witteveen. 
• Writer-led roundtables: Join intimate, off-the-record discussions led by VentureBeat’s own journalists. These are forums for you to solve shared challenges with your peers in real time, on topics from AI red teaming to navigating multi-agent complexity.

Finally, we’ll continue to champion the leaders building a more inclusive AI future at our 6th annual Women in Enterprise AI Awards.

VB Transform has always been about empowering enterprise AI leaders. This year, we’re trying to debating the playbook for the agentic revolution. The stakes are high, and the opportunity is immense. We hope you’ll join us to build the future.

See the full agenda and register for VB Transform here while tickets still remain.