> Markdown version of [/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1836-application-defined](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1836-application-defined). Every page supports `.md` or `Accept: text/markdown`. Links point to the HTML versions so they work for humans too. Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md).

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# Application-Defined Compute: Rethinking Infrastructure for AI Applications


- **Event:** World Congress 2026 North America

## Description

AI applications don't have fixed infrastructure requirements. A single request can fan out into hundreds of long-running tasks with different runtimes, memory requirements, and execution times. The application is no longer just consuming infrastructure. It defines the infrastructure it needs at runtime.

In this talk, Render CEO Anurag Goel introduces Application-Defined Compute, a new infrastructure model built for AI-native applications. You'll learn why traditional serverless platforms and self-managed orchestration both break down at scale, and how developers can provision compute just in time, run long-lived stateful workloads, and execute tasks with the flexibility of real servers, without managing queues, worker pools, retries, or orchestration themselves.

Using Render Workflows as an example, the session explores the new infrastructure primitives emerging for AI-native applications and how cloud platforms are evolving to support them.

## Speaker

### [Anurag Goel](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/@anurag-goel)

Founder and CEO of Render


## Related talks at this congress

- [Designing High-Performance AI APIs: Lessons from Serving Millions of Real-Time Requests](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1846-designing-high) — Wayne Liu
- [A Computer Is All You Need](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1829-a-computer-is-all) — Steren Giannini
- [Edge AI: Running Agentic Intelligence Where Internet Can't Reach](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1805-edge-ai-running) — Nitin Eusebius
- [Autonomous Infrastructure: Building AI Agents for Global-Scale Capacity Efficiency](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1403-autonomous) — Tommy Tran

## Watch remotely

Can’t make it to San José? Watch this session live with Pro. You also get:

- All full videos, bookmarks, and playlists
- World Congress livestreams

[See pricing](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/pricing)

## Links

- [Get tickets](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/world-congress-north-america/tickets)