Aarthi Anbalagan is a Senior Software Engineer at Microsoft with over 15 years of experience across large scale distributed systems, cloud data platforms, healthcare technology, and applied artificial intelligence. At Microsoft, she works at the intersection of cloud, data, and AI, with a focus on building reliable systems and exploring practical ways AI can improve engineering workflows.

Alongside her engineering work, Aarthi has a longstanding interest in learning and making technology more accessible. She is the founder and lead of AI Learning Champs, a grassroots AI learning initiative within Microsoft Azure engineering that helps engineers learn, experiment with, and apply AI responsibly in their everyday work. The initiative now serves more than 2,000 engineers, supported by more than 100 AI Champions across multiple geographies, through workshops, technical sessions, mentoring, and peer learning.

Her interest in accessible technology education extends beyond Microsoft. Aarthi is an editor of the Medium publication AI Simplified in Plain English, where she writes and works with contributors to make topics in AI, data, cloud computing, and emerging technology easier to understand. She particularly enjoys translating complex technical ideas into practical explanations that help people build confidence with new technologies.

Before Microsoft, Aarthi worked at GE Healthcare, contributing to digital mammography technology. She later earned her Master of Science in Computer Science from Brown University, where her interests included Big Data, artificial intelligence, and human computer interaction. Those experiences continue to shape her interest in both the technical and human sides of technology.

Aarthi is a fellow of the British Computer Society and a Senior Member of IEEE. She also contributes to the broader technology community as a reviewer, judge, writer, speaker, and mentor. She has served on the Program Committee for the International Conference on Big Data 2025, reviewing technical research in Big Data and related areas, and is returning as a judge for QS Reimagine Education for a second consecutive year.

Aarthi believes that the impact of AI will depend not only on what the technology can do, but also on how effectively people can understand, apply, and learn from it. She is particularly interested in the space where technology, AI, and human learning come together.

Learn more about Aarthi at www.aarthirocks.com.