Azita Martin,  Vice President and GM of AI for Retail, CPG and QSR at NVIDIA is our very special guest. She joins us to discuss the ways AI is beginning to transform the retail landscape, and how NVIDIA is helping accelerate retailers' journeys.

We start off by discussing how NVIDIA has grown to become the third most valuable company in the world, before focusing in on how they leverage their hardware and software solutions to power retail innovation. We dig into where GenAI is gaining the greatest traction and where new use cases are emerging that save retailers money and drive great effectiveness. In particular, we explore how "digital twins" can unlock previously unimaginable value.

But first we give our hot takes on the week in retail news, including a bit of good news on the grocery inflation front and strong quarterly results from Walmart and one of our favorite emerging remarkable brands On Running. But the earnings news is far less favorable for JC Penney and Home Depot. We end with a discussion of Wayfair's first big (and overdue) foray into physical retail.

Presented by Celonis.

Information from NVIDIA:

1. https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/lp/industries/state-of-ai-in-retail-and-cpg/
2. https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/industries/retail/driving-agility-in-retail-with-ai-ebook/
3. https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/industries/retail/

About Azita

Azita leads the Retail team at NVIDIA. She is responsible for global go-to-market strategy in the vertical. She advises senior executives on best practices of leveraging AI to improve operational efficiencies and identify new revenue streams. Prior to NVIDIA, Azita was the Chief Marketing Officer at Maana, an AI software platform used by industrial companies to accelerate building AI applications. Azita has been working with the Chief Digital Officers and heads of analytics/AI of F500 industrial companies and is intimately familiar with the top AI use cases that are demonstrating business value.

About Us

Steve Dennis is a strategic advisor and keynote speaker focused on growth and innovation, who has also been named one of the world's top retail influencers. He is the bestselling authro of two books: Leaders Leap: Transforming Your Company at the Speed of Disruption and Remarkable Retail: How To Win & Keep Customers in the Age of Disruption. Steve regularly shares his insights in his role as a Forbes senior retail contributor and on social media.

Michael LeBlanc is the president and founder of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc, a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and now, media entrepreneur.  He has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career. 

Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions and participated worldwide in thought leadership panels, most recently on the main stage in Toronto at Retail Council of Canada’s Retail Marketing conference with leaders from Walmart & Google.  He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience with Levi's, Black & Decker, Hudson's Bay, CanWest Media, Pandora Jewellery, The Shopping Channel and Retail Council of Canada to his advisory, speaking and media practice.

Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including the award-winning No.1 independent retail industry podcast in America, Remarkable Retail with his partner, Dallas-based best-selling author Steve Dennis; Canada's top retail industry podcast The Voice of Retail and Canada's top food industry and one of the top Canadian-produced management independent podcasts in the country, The Food Professor with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois from Dalhousie University in Halifax.

Rethink Retail has recognized Michael as one of the top global retail experts for the fourth year in a row, Thinkers 360 has named him on of the Top 50 global thought leaders in retail, RTIH has named him a top 100 global though leader in retail technology and Coresight Research has named Michael a Retail AI Influencer.  If you are a BBQ fan, you can tune into Michael’s cooking show, Last Request BBQ, on YouTube, Instagram, X and yes, TikTok.

Michael is available for keynote presentations helping retailers, brands and retail industry insiders explaining the current state and future of the retail industry in North America and around the world.