🌟 DevFest Ahlen & Heilbronn 2025 - Gemma day🌟

🌟 DevFest Ahlen & Heilbronn 2025 - Gemma Day 🌟
DevFest 2025: Building Safe, Secure and Scalable Solutions with AI and Cloud.

🚀 Let’s wrap up 2025 with an event dedicated to exploring cutting-edge Google's Gemma! 

📅 Date: October 18th, 2025

📍 Location: Virtual

💻 What to Expect at DevFest 2025 Gemma Day:
Get ready for an immersive experience focused on empowering you to architect the future with AI and Cloud! This Gemma-focused DevFest will equip you with the practical skills to work with open-weight models, from local development to edge deployment. 🚀

You can expect:

🧑‍🏫 Insightful Tech Talks & Sessions: Learn directly from Google Developer Experts (GDEs) and industry leaders. Dive deep into the Gemma open-model family (Gemma, CodeGemma, PaliGemma), exploring its foundation, toolchain (Kaggle, Hugging Face), and advanced applications. 
💻 Hands-On Demos & Deep Dives into Practical AI: Move beyond theory and gain practical skills! Participate in sessions that include live code demonstrations on building a local Agentic RAG system, exploring Gemma’s performance on Cloud to Edge devices, and working through real-world AI projects. 🛠️
🛡️ Focus on Responsible Innovation & Privacy: Engage in crucial discussions and learn techniques for building ethically sound AI solutions. Explore topics like fairness, transparency, and the benefits of using locally-run open models for enhanced data security and privacy. ✅
🏗️ Cloud & Local Architecture: Understand how to design robust and efficient AI systems, whether you are deploying via Vertex AI or choosing to run quantized models efficiently on local machines and mobile devices.
🤝 Vibrant Networking Opportunities: Connect with hundreds of passionate developers from your local community and potentially beyond. Share knowledge, discuss challenges, collaborate on ideas, and build valuable professional connections. 💬
🔧 Exploring the Latest Tools: Discover the newest Google developer tools and platforms (like Gemma, Gemini, and the Keras API) designed to streamline AI development and Cloud deployment, enhancing your productivity and capabilities. 💡

#DevFest

This is a hybrid event. Join the event virtually at https://gdg.community.dev/events/details/google-gdg-ahlen-presents-devfest-ahlen-amp-heilbronn-2025-gemma-day/
or in person at

Initiative Bürgerzentrum Schuhfabrik e.V. - 7 Königstraße Ahlen, 59227

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Agenda

4:00 PM: 🛠️ Speaker Muzykina Anna : Introduction to Gemma

In this session, we will take a journey into the world of Gemma, starting with a foundational understanding of Large Language Models (LLMs). We'll then clarify the distinction between Google's family of models—Gemini and Gemma—and what makes the open-model approach so powerful.

Next, we'll dive into the core of Gemma's development, highlighting Google's commitment to building with responsible AI principles at every stage. We'll also provide a brief overview of Gemma's release timeline, from its initial launch in early 2024 to the latest advancements.

Finally, we'll give you a hands-on look at the tools you can use to start building with Gemma today. You'll discover how Google AI Studio provides the fastest path for prototyping and experimenting, and how Kaggle, Google’s hub for data scientists and machine learning practitioners, serves as a vibrant community and resource for all things Gemma.

4:30 PM: 🌟 Speaker Arpita Sarker : From Open Models to Trusted Collaboration: Deploying Gemma Securely on Forkit Dev

The future of European AI requires transparency, verifiability, and collaboration. Gemma, as Google's leading family of open models, is the perfect foundation. But where do you securely share your fine-tuned Gemma models, ensure they remain tamper-proof, and get rewarded for their usage?

In this closing session, Arpita Sarker, Founder of Forkit Dev, will bridge the gap between open-weight innovation and decentralized trust.

Arpita will use a real-world Gemma project (e.g., a RAG pipeline or a customized CodeGemma) to demonstrate:

Verifiable Model Provenance: How to securely upload and verify the integrity of your Gemma model weights on the Forkit platform.

Monetizing Open Source AI: Understanding the mechanism that allows developers to be incentivized and acknowledged for the usage of their open-source models—the "GitHub for models" with an income stream.

Enterprise-Ready Security: Why enterprises trust Forkit to select and use models like Gemma, ensuring auditable compliance and secure deployment.

This session is a crucial look at how to take your AI development beyond just code, making it transparent, collaborative, and financially rewarding.

4:55 PM: Break

5:00 PM: 🛠️ Speaker Tarun R Jain : Local Agentic RAG using Gemma and Qdrant

Running AI inference locally, processing AI models on an organization’s own hardware, such as on-premises servers or devices, rather than relying on cloud-based services, has become an increasingly popular choice across various industries. The primary appeal lies in the enhanced control and security it offers over sensitive data.

In this workshop session, I will demonstrate how to build a completely local Agentic RAG without any external APIs using Google Gemma-3n and Qdrant Vector Database, both of which run locally on Google Colab. We will also trace and monitor the application using Comet OPIK, which is completely open source.

5:55 PM: Break

6:00 PM: 🌟 Speaker Vasudev Maduri : Unleashing the Power of Gemma: From Cloud to Edge

Gemma, Google’s new family of lightweight, state-of-the-art open models. Built on the same research and technology as the groundbreaking Gemini models, Gemma empowers developers to create innovative applications across various platforms. We’ll cover the types of models available and how to customize them to tune for new tasks.

This session will explore the multifaceted capabilities of Gemma models, providing practical insights, demos, and code demonstrations for:

Kaggle: Building engaging chat applications using the Keras API and the Kaggle Model Hub.

Hugging Face: Leveraging the open collaboration between Google and Hugging Face for seamless integration and deployment.

Mobile: Experimenting with Gemma on-device using MediaPipe and TensorFlow Lite for cross-platform compatibility.

Local Machines: Running Gemma efficiently on laptops with Llama.cpp and quantized models.

Vertex AI: Streamlining AI development and deployment with Vertex AI’s comprehensive platform.

Whether you’re a seasoned AI developer or just starting, this session will equip you with the knowledge and tools to harness the full potential of Gemma models. The session will conclude with a series of live demos showcasing the practical applications of these technologies.

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Speakers

Anna Muzykina - GDG Ahlen (GDG Ahlen Organizer | GDG Heilbronn | NASA Space Apps Ahlen Lead Organizer | Flutter Developer | WiDS Ambassador)

I’m a dedicated Developer with a strong focus on community building and empowering women in technology. As the GDG Organizer for Ahlen and Heilbronn, I actively foster tech communities and mentor women entering the industry. As a Women in Data Science (WiDS), I provide guidance and support to aspiring women technologists.
With a deep expertise in Dart, Firebase, and AI ecosystems, I spec…

Tarun R. Jain - Stealth Startup in FinTech (Founding Engineer)

Founding Engineer, GDE in AI and YouTube Content Creator at AI with Tarun

Vasudev Maduri - Admiral Group (GDE on Cloud , Staff Data Engineer)

Vasudev is a Google Developer Expert (GDE) in Google Cloud and seasoned professional serving as a Staff Data Engineer at Admiral Group. With a wealth of experience in the realms of Google Cloud Platform (GCP), big data, and data architecture, Vasudev has consistently demonstrated his prowess in implementing industry-leading products recognized by Gartner.
His journey in the world of tech…

Arpita Sarker

Arpita Sarker is a researcher-turned-founder working at the intersection of ethical AI, decentralization, and system design. She served as a researcher and system architect on the government-funded Lucii and TrustChain projects at Heilbronn University, where she developed privacy-preserving and consensus-driven AI architectures.
Arpita is also a Google Women Techmakers Ambassador and the…

Host

Denys Doroshev - GDG Ahlen (Organizer)

I'm a Product Manager and Organizer for Google Developers Group (GDG) Ahlen, where I work to foster innovation, collaboration, and growth within the developer community.
In my professional career, I serve as a Senior Regional Sales Manager at Metal Work Pneumatic, focusing on B2B sales in industries like metallurgy, machine building, and agriculture across Ukraine. I also work as a Tec…

Complete your event RSVP here: https://gdg.community.dev/events/details/google-gdg-ahlen-presents-devfest-ahlen-amp-heilbronn-2025-gemma-day/.