MnTech Tech Connect 2024
Today was Tech Connect 2024 hosted by MnTech at the Saint Paul RiverCentre. There were over 600 people this year and a number of good presentations.
Sessions I attended:
- Unleashing GenAI: 5 Real-Life Learnings with Jake Krings, Mikey Vu
- The Era of Quantum Utility with Kenneth Wood
- Three Keys to Building AI Products with Speed and Confidence with Patrick Wolf
- Beyond the Bat: Technology’s Impact on Baseball and Beyond with John Avenson, Lisa Moschkau, Sam Henschen, and Jeremy Raadt
- Scaling Cloud Governance through Developer Enablement led by TeamSPS members Troy Jordan, Nathan Carr, Jesse Lang, and Nate Anderson
- Leveraging Generative AI for Business Excellence led by TeamSPS member Jason Popillion
- CIO Leadership Panel with Jennifer Hartsock, Darrin Hebert, Mark Murphy, and Cris Ross
Overall observations:
- There were so many references to AI. Everyone still talking about it and starting to show real-world use cases. There is still more hype than substance here, but the substance seems to be showing up. Multiple companies shared that AI adoption isn’t automatic and you have to make sure you bring people along.
- The quantum computing session was more interesting than I expected and showed how far that technology has come. I think this is still a decade out and a big bet, but accessing quantum infrastructure via the cloud is an obvious go-to-market path to bring this esoteric tech to teams.
- It is super fun to watch the Minnesota Twins technology team because their content is so fun and very advanced stuff. Plus they have a whole production team that makes super high-quality visuals.
