DevFest Addis - 2023

DevFest is the biggest annual event for Google Developer Groups (GDGs) around the world. It is a celebration of learning, sharing, and connecting with the local and global developer community. GDGAddis is proud to host DevFest 2023 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on December 31st. This year's theme is "Building for Everyone", and we have an amazing lineup of speakers, workshops, code labs, and networking sessions. Whether you are interested in web, mobile, cloud, machine learning, or emerging technologies, you will find something for you at DevFest 2023. Don't miss this opportunity to learn from experts, meet fellow developers, and have fun with the GDGAddis community. Register now and join us for a day of innovation and inspiration!

Agenda

9:00 AM: Check-in and Registration

10:00 AM: Solving the Global Shortage of Tech Talent

Mirafe Gebriel , Ethiopia General Manager - Sand Technologies | ALX | 📍 Track 1

10:00 AM: Monkey see Monkey do: Coding vs Developing

Dagmawi Bedilu | CSO @Efuye Gela | 📍 Track 2

10:00 AM: Seamless Payments, Endless Opportunities!

Kidus Yared, Engineering Lead, Chapa | Co-founder, Ke-massa | 📍 Track 3

10:30 AM: From Code Monkey to Career Architect: Building Your Personal Brand in the Tech Jungle

Yohannes Haile, iOS Developer, Kemer Habesha | 📍 Track 1

10:30 AM: Solving the Global Shortage of Tech Talent

Mirafe Gebriel, Ethiopia General Manager - Sand Technologies | ALX | 📍 Track 2

10:30 AM: AI: Neural Networks, "Attention" mechanism and "Transformer" architecture in Large Language Models

Nemo Semret, Chief Executive Officer, QRB Labs | 📍 Track 3

11:00 AM: Bitcoin: what is mining, how does it work in theory and in practice? A technical dive for computer scientists and engineers.

Nemo Semret, Chief Executive Officer, QRB Labs | 📍 Track 1

11:00 AM: Coding the Future, Without Coding: The Promise of Low-Code Solutions

Abdulfetah Jemal, Founder, CodePoint Creatives | 📍 Track 2

11:00 AM: Solving the Global Shortage of Tech Talent

Mirafe Gebriel, Ethiopia General Manager - Sand Technologies | ALX | 📍 Track 3

11:30 AM: Seamless Payments, Endless Opportunities!

Kidus Yared, Engineering Lead, Chapa | Co-founder, Ke-massa | 📍 Track 1

11:30 AM: How do you setup a company in Ethiopia and what are the benefits?

Ruth Enbakom, Founder, Upinvest Consulting PLC | 📍 Track 2

11:30 AM: Work and Earn in Bitcoin

Kal Kassa, Bitcoin Birr | 📍 Track 3

12:00 PM: How do you setup a company in Ethiopia and what are the benefits?

Ruth Enbakom, Founder, Upinvest Consulting PLC | 📍 Track 1

12:00 PM: Seamless Payments, Endless Opportunities!

Kidus Yared, Engineering Lead, Chapa | Co-founder, Ke-massa | 📍 Track 2

12:00 PM: Data protection law and it's impact on the current cybersecurity landscape of Ethiopia

Hencok Negash | Founder & community lead, Yekolo temari | 📍 Track 3

12:30 PM: Lunch 🍕

1:30 PM: Navigating Keras 3 - A Deep Dive Level - Intermediate to Advanced

Ngesa Marvin, GDE, ML | 📍 Track 1

1:30 PM: Contributing to Open Source

Bereket Engida, Software Developer | 📍 Track 1

1:30 PM: Design System: Building Scalable Design System

Abel Fikeryohannes, Product Designer, Safaricom Ethiopia | 📍 Track 2

1:30 PM: Large Language Models Uncovered: A Hands-On Workshop with Gemini

Henock Ademtew, ML researcher and engineer, EAII | 📍 Track 3

1:30 PM: 3D For Everyone

Gemmechu Hassena, Ph.D Candidate, Cornell University & Milky Hassena, Electrical Engineering Student, AASTU | 📍 Track 3

3:00 PM: Networking

📍 Track 1

3:00 PM: Lan Party

📍 Track 2

3:00 PM: Gugut Podcast

📍 Track 3

5:00 PM: Closing Remarks

Google Developers Group in Addis (GDGAddis)

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Speakers

Mirafe Gebriel Marcos

Mirafe Gebriel Marcos represents the African Leadership Group (ALG) in Ethiopia, managing an ecosystem of companies that includes ALX, a leader in technology talent development, building the fastest-growing pool of tech talent in the world, and Sand Technologies, a leading technology consulting company. ALX offers in-demand programmes in digital transformation (software engineering, cloud comp…

Nemo Semret - QRB Labs (Chief Executive Officer)

Nemo is a researcher, engineer, and entrepreneur. He is currently CEO of QRB Labs, a new venture he co-founded in 2021. QRB Labs provides data centers for location-agnostic high-energy computations such as Bitcoin mining and AI model training. Its mission is to accelerate the electrification of Africa by monetizing stranded energy, which helps finance the development of the grid, while facilit…

Dagmawi Bedilu - Efuye Gela (Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer)

A game thinker, a tech and innovation consultant, a community builder, and a serial entrepreneur with an appetite for both science and the arts, Dagmawi Bedilu has one vision: to sell joy in jars, and he believes the ultimate way to do so is by investing in the development of meaning-seeking, service-centered, and fully engaged youth and youth communities. He describes himself as a deep genera…

Henock Negash - Yekolo temari (Founder & Community Lead)

Yohannes Haile - Kemer Habesha (iOS Developer)

With more than 2 years of working experience under his belt, Yohannes is one of the few iOS Developers in the Ethiopian tech space, carving his path with both code and creativity. But Yohannes is more than just lines of Swift – he's a multifaceted tech enthusiast who thrives at the intersection of development and expression.
While his days are spent building innovative iOS apps, his eve…

Abdulfetah Jemal - CodePoint Creatives (Founder)

Kidus Yared - Chapa (Engineering Lead)

Software Engineer with a demonstrated history of working in the industry. Skilled in Software Development (PHP, Java), Data Analytics, Agile Methodologies, Research and Leadership. Engineering professional with a bachelor degree focused in Software Engineering from Addis Ababa Science and Technology University.

Ruth Enbakom - Upinvest Consulting PLC (Founder)

Ruth is a law graduate from AAU. She established her company, Upinvest Consulting plc, in 2022 with her partner and has been working on HR, legal consulting, company administration, and setting up ever since.

Kal Kassa - Bitcoin Birr (Bitcoin Advocate)

Kal Kassa is a Bitcoin advocate, leading open-source education initiatives at BitcoinBirr. His mission is to see Ethiopians learn about Bitcoin and its various functions and features as a tool.

Ngesa Marvin

Ngesa is an GDE in Machine Learning Engineer specializing in signal processing and computer vision. He started his Cloud ML journey as an Intel AI Innovator and later joined Liquid Telecom as an IoT Solutions Engineer. He is currently a Device Manager at Safaricom PLC and an Arm AI Ambassador. When not building products, he loves to teach and share knowledge with others. He believes ML educati…

Bereket Engida

Bereket Engida is a software developer, an open source contributor, and a cofounder of loglib, a privacy-first open source web analytics platform. Over the past couple of years, he has been deeply involved in the ts/js ecosystem. Around a year ago, he embarked on my open source journey, contributing to different projects.

Abel Fikreyohannes - Safaricom Ethiopia (Product Designer)

Abel Fikreyohanes is currently a Product Designer at Safaricom Ethiopia, focusing on M-PESA. He has been in tech and design for more than 4.5 years and has worked in different startups and enterprises as a UX/ Product Designer.

Henok Ademtew - EAII (ML Engineer)

Henok is an ML researcher and engineer. He works on natural language processing (NLP), text generation, and large language models. He currently works at EAII. and has also worked for various international clients.

Gemmechu Hassena - Cornell University (Ph.D. Student)

Gemmechu is a second-year computer science Ph.D. student at Cornell University, working at the intersection of computer vision, machine learning, and graphics. His research focuses on 3D computer vision, where he tries to answer the question "how to understand the 3D world from a collection of images." Prior to Cornell, he worked as a research intern at the University of Michigan and Ecole Pol…

Milky Hassena - AASTU (Electrical Engineering Student)

Milky is an Electrical Engineering student at AASTU with experience in 3D animation, game development, and UI/UX design. His journey in the gaming industry began during his first year as an intern at Qene Games, where he honed his skills in game development for three years. He also worked as a UI/UX designer for 6 companies on various projects. Milky became a student at A2SV (Africa to Silicon…

Hosted By

Daniel Nigusse, GDG Organizer

Retired Superhero

Mariamawit Alemu, Co-Organizer

An ambitious problem solver that would like to join team of like-minded developers.

Nabil Mohammed, Co-Organizer

📝 Tech Writer/API Specialist @SallaApp | 🙇DevRel @GDGAddis & @SallaPartners |🎙Podcaster @YemenisInExile

Bereket Wijore, GDG Co-organizer / Product designer & event manger

I am a Product designer, Web developer, Product Manager, Event Account Manager, web3 enthusiastic , crypto trading

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Partners

ALX Ethiopia (https://www.alxethiopia.com)
ALX Ethiopia is a leading technology training provider that offers fully sponsored programs to young Ethiopians. Our programs are designed to accelerate the careers of our learners and equip them with the skills they need to thrive in the digital economy. If you are a young Ethiopian who is passionate about technology, then ALX is the right place for you. Apply today and start your journey to a successful career in tech!

Chapa (https://chapa.co/)
Chapa is the leading online payment gateway that enables businesses in Ethiopia to accept digital payments from anyone and anywhere at any time.

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Complete your event RSVP here: https://gdg.community.dev/events/details/google-gdg-addis-presents-devfest-addis-2023/.