Venkat Tirupati is Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), where he leads enterprise technology, data, and AI strategy, as well as the Grid Research, Innovation, and Transformation (GRIT) program. His work focuses on advancing responsible AI adoption, enterprise data governance, and IT/OT modernization to help the grid keep pace with rapid transformation and growing complexity. Prior to joining ERCOT in 2020, Venkat held leadership roles at the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) and earlier served in power systems software engineering roles at Siemens. Venkat holds an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Illinois Institute of Technology and an M.B.A. from MIT, with certificates in data analytics and sustainability. He is a registered Professional Engineer in Texas and a Senior Member of IEEE.