🚀【Sydney】AI Engineering: Agents, Harness & Production

What does it take to turn an AI demo into reliable software—and keep it working in production?
​Join Sydney’s AI and engineering community for an evening of practical talks, technical demonstrations, and conversations with industry practitioners. We’ll explore how AI systems move from early prototypes to real business applications, with a focus on engineering reliability, data integrity, and accountable decision-making.
​🔴 You may also hear about job openings and potential referral opportunities from our speakers. Meet engineers from leading tech companies, learn about their work, and make connections that could support your next career move.

## ​🎤 Featured Talks

​1️⃣ From Demo to Prod: Building Reliable Software with AI
​2️⃣ Governing AI in Investment: From Data Integrity to Decision Accountability

## ​💻 Event Format

• ​90 minutes: Welcome, speaker presentations, and technical demonstrations
• ​30 minutes: Live Q&A and technical networking
• ​Language: All sessions will be delivered in English
• ​Food and drinks provided

## ​✨ Event Highlights

​🎯 Start with Real Business Problems
​Explore how to identify practical AI use cases from real user and business needs, then translate them into clear, testable product and engineering goals.
​🛠️ Focus on Production Engineering
​Understand the challenges involved in moving from a prototype to a live application, including system architecture, data pipelines, model integration, evaluation, business workflows, and reliability.
​📈 Build for Long-Term Operation and Scale
​Launching an AI application is only the beginning. Learn how ongoing monitoring, cost management, performance optimisation, and iteration help systems support more users and evolving business needs.
​🤝 Connect with Sydney’s Tech Community
​Meet engineers, developers, product leaders, and AI practitioners from the local community. Exchange project experiences, discuss technical challenges, and explore opportunities to collaborate.

## ​🎙️ Meet the Speakers

​Mark
​Senior Data & AI Engineer @ Rainmakr.AI & Savana ETFs
​Mark focuses on AI and data-driven applications in financial technology, designing and optimising data pipelines, cloud infrastructure, and AI-powered investment systems. He drives internal research and innovation, integrating large language models, agentic AI, and advanced analytics into investment research and operational workflows to improve automation and support better investment decisions.
​Junyi Men
​Founder & Engineer @ Proairesis
​Junyi combines a founder’s product perspective with an engineer’s technical approach to bring ideas to life. Her work connects product discovery with software development, bridging user needs and technical implementation to build useful products and applications.
​Jignesh (Jiggy) Kakkad
​Principal AI Engineer / Software Engineering Lead @ Quantium
​Jiggy brings experience across software engineering, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity, with a focus on robust, scalable enterprise systems and cross-team technical leadership. His current work centres on large language models and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), using Azure and the OpenAI API to integrate AI capabilities into enterprise platforms.
​Blaise Paradeza
​Senior AI Software Engineer @ Quantium
​Blaise focuses on production AI applications and full-stack systems. His current work includes conversational AI systems built with LangGraph and the Model Context Protocol (MCP). He also works across frontend and backend development, Kubernetes deployments, LiteLLM, Langfuse, cloud infrastructure, and CI/CD, bringing hands-on experience in deploying and operating AI systems in production.

## ​🔍 What You’ll Learn

​Through the talks and discussions, we’ll explore:

• ​How to identify valuable, practical AI use cases
• ​How to turn loosely defined AI ideas into clear product and engineering goals
• ​What it takes to move from prototypes and proofs of concept to production
• ​How to build AI systems that are reliable, maintainable, and robust
• ​How to integrate AI into existing products, platforms, and enterprise workflows
• ​How to establish evaluation, quality control, and feedback mechanisms
• ​How to balance accuracy, response time, operating costs, and user experience
• ​How to address performance, reliability, and scalability challenges
• ​How to improve AI applications through monitoring, feedback, and continuous iteration

## ​👥 Who Should Attend?

​This event is for:

• ​AI and machine learning engineers
• ​Software engineers and solutions architects
• ​Data engineers and data scientists
• ​Technical leads and engineering managers
• ​AI product managers and digital transformation leaders
• ​Founders exploring practical AI applications
• ​Technology professionals interested in AI engineering and production systems

​Whether you’re already building AI applications or exploring a move into AI engineering, join us for practical perspectives and conversations with people working in the field.

## ​💬 More Than a Technical Talk

​This meetup is also a space for open, practical conversations within Sydney’s AI and engineering community.
​Bring a project you’re building, an engineering challenge you’re working through, or a question about applying AI. Connect with others facing similar challenges and explore how AI can be applied across different products, teams, and industries.

## ​📌 Event Details

​📅 Date: Wednesday, 23 September 2026
⏰ Time: 5:30 PM–7:30 PM AEST
📍 Venue: Nutanix Sydney Office
🏢 Address: Level 10, Maritime Trade Towers, 201 Kent Street, Sydney NSW 2000
🌐 Language: English
🍽️ Refreshments: Food and drinks provided

## ​🎟️ Register Now

​Join us for an evening of AI engineering insights, practical discussion, and connections with Sydney’s tech community.
​Register to secure your place.