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Okupljanje ex-Yu tech stručnjaka i preduzetnika u Nemačkoj #7
Wed, May 6, 4:00 PM**Two talks. One founder story. One reality check on AI. No fluff.** **=== Please see the English version below ===** Vraćamo se sa 7. okupljanjem ljudi iz sveta tehnologije i preduzetništva iz bivše Jugoslavije (ex-YU), u organizaciji [Nemačkog kutka](https://nemackikutak.com/) i [Serbian Entrepreneurs](https://www.serbianentrepreneurs.com/). Događaj se održava na engleskom jeziku i otvoren je za sve - bilo da dolazite iz regiona ili ste deo šire zajednice. **\# Datum i lokacija** • Sreda, 6. maj 2026 • cognee.ai – Prilaz 4, 1. sprat, Paul-Lincke-Ufer 39–40 • Početak: 18:00 **\# Predavači i teme** Dva predavanja. Jedna osnivačka priča. Jedan ozbiljan pogled na veštačku inteligenciju. Sirovo, bez ulepšavanja. **Milica T. Jovanović** je senior istraživač korisničkog iskustva sa više od dve decenije iskustva u dizajnu, istraživanju i razvoju proizvoda. Bavi se razumevanjem stvarnog ponašanja korisnika i pretvaranjem uvida u bolje odluke u razvoju proizvoda, uz poseban fokus na ulogu veštačke inteligencije u istraživanju. U ovom predavanju, Milica govori o tome da li veštačka inteligencija treba da zameni istraživače korisničkog iskustva — gde daje rezultate, gde ne i šta se usput gubi. Takođe će pokazati kako se veliki jezički modeli mogu koristiti u istraživanju bez stvaranja lažnog osećaja sigurnosti. • **Tema:** Istraživač vs. mašina: Da li veštačka inteligencija može da zameni istraživanje korisničkog iskustva? **Jovan Stevović** je izvršni direktor i suosnivač kompanije Chino.io. Živi između Italije i Nemačke i radi u jednom od najzahtevnijih regulatornih okruženja — digitalno zdravstvo. Doktorirao je u oblasti inovacija u zdravstvu i ima više od deset godina iskustva u industriji, radeći na preseku veštačke inteligencije, usklađenosti sa propisima i razvoja proizvoda. U ovom predavanju, Jovan deli iskustvo izgradnje i prodaje kompanije. Od ideje, prvih odluka i obezbeđivanja finansiranja do toga kako zaista izgledaju prodaje kompanija iza kulisa. Iskustvo iz prve ruke koje nijedna knjiga ne može da prenese. • **Tema:** Od nule do prodaje: realna slika preduzetničkog puta **\# Program događaja** * **18:00 - 18:30** Ulaz i upoznavanje * **18:30 - 18:40** Uvodna reč * **18:40 - 19:00** Milica T. Jovanović: Istraživač vs. mašina: Da li veštačka inteligencija može da zameni istraživanje korisničkog iskustva? * **19:00 - 19:15** Pitanja i odgovori * **19:15 - 20:00** Umrežavanje uz hranu i piće * **20:00 - 20:20** Jovan Stevović: Od nule do prodaje: realna slika preduzetničkog puta * **20:20 - 20:35** Pitanja i odgovori * **20:35 - 20:45** Završna reč * **20:45 - 21:15** Umrežavanje uz hranu i piće * **21:15 - dalje** Prelazak u obližnji kafić na druženje i piće **\# Registracija** Ulaz je besplatan zahvaljujući cognee.ai, koji sponzoriše događaj i podržava zajednicu. Broj mesta je ograničen na 80 učesnika. Molimo vas da potvrdite dolazak kako bismo mogli da isplaniramo prostor, hranu i piće. Gradimo, delimo i podržavamo jedni druge. Vidimo se! **==================================================================** **======================== ENGLISH VERSION ========================** **==================================================================** We're back with the 7th gathering of builders, founders, and tech folks from the former Yugoslavia (ex-YU), organized by [Nemački kutak](https://nemackikutak.com/) and [Serbian Entrepreneurs](https://www.serbianentrepreneurs.com/). The event is held in English and open to everyone - whether you’re from the region or just part of the broader scene. **\# Date and Location** * Wednesday, May 6, 2026 * cognee.ai - Courtyard 4, 1st Floor, Paul-Lincke-Ufer 39-40 * Start: 18:00 **\# Speakers and topics** **Two talks. One founder story. One reality check on AI. No fluff.** **Milica T. Jovanović** is a Senior UX Researcher with over two decades of experience across design, research, and product. She focuses on understanding real user behavior and turning insights into better product decisions, with a growing interest in the role of AI in research workflows. In this talk, Milica explores whether AI should replace UX researchers: where it works, where it fails, and what gets lost along the way. She shares how to use LLMs in research without falling into the trap of false confidence. * **Talk:** Researcher vs. The Machine: Should AI replace the UX researcher? **Jovan Stevović** is the CEO and co-founder of Chino.io, living between Italy and Germany and operating in one of the toughest regulatory environments: health tech. With a PhD in healthcare innovation and 10+ years in the industry, he operates at the intersection of AI, compliance, and product. In this talk, Jovan shares a raw perspective on building and selling a business: from day zero decisions and fundraising to how exit deals are actually structured behind the scenes. First-hand experience no book can teach. * **Talk:** Day Zero to Exit: The Founder’s Full Circle Reality Check **\# Timetable** * **18:00 - 18:30** Entry & networking * **18:30 - 18:40** Opening note * **18:40 - 19:00** Milica T. Jovanović: Researcher vs. The Machine: Should AI replace the UX researcher? * **19:00 - 19:15** Q&A * **19:15 - 20:00** Networking with food and drinks * **20:00 - 20:20** Jovan Stevović: Day Zero to Exit: The Founder’s Full Circle Reality Check * **20:20 - 20:35** Q&A * **20:35 - 20:45** Closing Note * **20:45 - 21:15** Networking with food and drinks * **21:15 - open end** Moving to a nearby café for socializing and drinks **\# Registration** Admission is free thanks to **cognee.ai for sponsoring the event and supporting the community**. Spots are limited to 80 participants. Please confirm your attendance so we can plan space, food, and drinks accordingly. Let’s keep building, sharing, and supporting each other - excited for what’s ahead!
Quiz Walk – Prenzlauer Berg #72
Sun, Apr 26, 12:00 PMWhat's a great way to **have fun**, **meet people** and **explore Berlin**? *Hint:* It's happening in **Prenzlauer Berg** on **Sun. April 26th**. *Answer:* The next **Quiz Walk!** Join a team, walk from clue to clue and answer ca. **15 questions** about music, sports, culture, movies/TV, history, geography, science etc.! ― It's a great way to **meet people** ― ― **Use your knowledge** and help your team **win** ― ― Get to know **a Berlin neighborhood** (Kiez) better at each event ― ― Learn exciting things at these **fun, interactive quizzes** ― ― Afterwards, **meet up to chat**, and find out the **answers** ― **How it works:** We meet at the corner of **Greifswalder Str. / Danziger Str.** (S-Bahn Greifswalder Str., M4/M10 - see **Start** below) and form **teams of 4** players. Then we **walk from clue to clue**. **Use teamwork** to answer the questions or **ask people for help**! See and answer the questions on one smartphone per team and **see your score** **as you play**! No rush – speed doesn't count. **Start:** **Danziger Str. 120, 10407 Berlin** Just 5 minutes from the S-Bahn ring at Greifswalder Str. and right on the M4 and M10 tram lines. We'll meet on the south side of Danziger Str., in front of the ***Willy Bresch*** pub and finish nearby. **Note:** Please bring a **2€** **donation** to cover the costs of organizing. And please be on time, as we leave the meeting point within 10 minutes. **Looking forward to seeing you!**
GenAI transforming Engineering
Tue, Apr 28, 3:30 PMJoin us for an in-person evening exploring how GenAI is transforming modern engineering — from low-code feature engineering and research workflows to agent-driven optimization and production ML systems. Please make sure you register with your full name, as it will be checked by security on arrival. \*\*\* 📅 **Date and Time:** Tuesday, April 28, 2026 Doors open: 17:30 Talks start: 18:00 Panel discussion: 19:20 Networking & pizza: 20:00 \*\*\* 📍 **Location:** Zalando Office BHW Warschauer S-Bahn, Auditorium Cinema \*\*\* 📝 **Agenda:** **17:30 – Doors Open** Arrivals and check-in \*\*\* **18:00 – Talk #1** **Research Harness Engineering** [Florian Hönicke](https://www.linkedin.com/in/florian-h%C3%B6nicke-b902b6aa/) — Elastic Every programmer is now a manager of coding agents — but human oversight quickly becomes the bottleneck. Florian will share how Elasticsearch built an agentic research harness to support their v5-omni model development, enabling structured experimentation and faster iteration cycles in applied AI research, and why building your own harness is the key unlock for teams serious about scaling agentic workflows. \*\*\* **18:20 – Talk #2** **Low code feature engineering in Zalando with Agentic support** Ola Wahab — Zalando Feature engineering at scale has traditionally been a high-friction process — days of infra setup, complex tooling coordination, and lots of boilerplate. Ola will walk through how Zalando is shifting to a low-code, configuration-driven approach where teams define pipelines declaratively, and how agentic coding has compressed the journey from feature discovery to production from weeks to days. \*\*\* **18:40 – Talk #3** **Ranking Logic Migration from Monolith — Using Code Agents for Iterative Performance Benchmarking** [Ivan Potapov](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ivan-sur/) — Zalando How Zalando’s Search and Browse Discovery team extracted a latency-critical ranking service from a monolith and validated it for production. This talk covers: * Migrating the ranking read path into a standalone Ranking API * Using AI-powered agentic loops with async-profiler to close the p99 latency gap * Practical lessons on allocation profiling, virtual threads, and production validation \*\*\* **19:00 – Talk #4** **Coding Agents for ML Pipelines & AI Systems (Hopsworks + Claude Code)** [Jim Dowling](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jim-dowling-206a98/) — Hopsworks Coding agents are rapidly reshaping software and ML engineering. This talk explores how prompt-driven development is changing how we build ML systems. We’ll cover: * ML problem decomposition and architecture optimization in an agent-driven world * Data-driven experimentation workflows * Building faster and higher-quality systems with Claude Code * Why building on top of AI infrastructure boosts productivity Based on Jim’s O’Reilly book: *Building AI Systems with a Feature Store* Format: 20 min talk + 10 min Q&A \*\*\* **19:20 – Panel Discussion** **Product Mindset in Engineering — The Evolution of the AI Engineer Role** \*\*Host: Ivan Potapov Jim Dowling — CEO, Hopsworks Leela Sharma — Director of Engineering, Zalando Alexey Grigorev — Founder, DataTalks.Club Florian Hönicke — Principal AI Engineer, Elastic A discussion on how GenAI is reshaping engineering roles, expectations, and the shift toward product-oriented thinking. \*\*\* **20:00 – Pizza, Drinks & Networking** Wrap up the evening with food, drinks and conversations with fellow engineers and speakers. \*\*\* Invite your friends and join us for an evening of learning and networking! **⚡️ Interested in giving a talk? ⚡️** Are you interested presenting on your Elastic use case? We welcome 5-10 minute lightning talks, 45-minute deep dives, and everything in between. If you're interested, please send an email to [meetups@elastic.co](http://meetups@elastic.co/?utm_source=luma)
Evening Worship Service
Sat, May 2, 4:00 PMJoin us for a welcoming and reflective Saturday evening worship service in Engish. This service follows a classic liturgical form and includes Holy Communion, offering a meaningful and grounding way to end the week. The liturgy is a bit shorter than our Sunday service. After worship, stay for fellowship and conversation. Whether you are new to faith, returning after a long time, exploring Christianity, or deeply rooted in the tradition — you are truly welcome here. And when we say *all*, we mean **all**. Come as you are. You belong. We celebrate open communion, meaing all are wecome to recieve Holy Communion.
Embodied Consent
Sun, Apr 26, 9:00 AM**Embodied Consent** mit **Kuem** für **LGBTIQA+** Kostenlos mit **[Anmeldung](https://wearevillage.org/shop/embodied-consent/w17-2026-2/)** **Lernen über Grenzen und Kommunikation** Wenn Sie noch nicht an einem Workshop zum Thema Consent im Village teilgenommen haben, ist es jetzt an der Zeit! Dieser Workshop ist sehr zu empfehlen für alle, die unser Projekt regelmäßig besuchen oder an einem unserer Workshops teilnehmen möchten. Diese Erfahrung wird Ihnen nicht nur helfen, sich in der we.are.village-Community zurechtzufinden, sondern sie wird Sie auch dazu befähigen, diese Werte in Ihr Leben zu übertragen. Sich seiner Grenzen bewusst zu sein und sein Einverständnis oder Nicht-Einverständnis auszudrücken, sind wichtige Fähigkeiten im Leben, aber wir haben nicht oft die Gelegenheit, die Fähigkeit des Einverständnisses auf die gleiche Weise zu üben wie andere Fähigkeiten, wie Singen, Sport treiben oder eine Sprache lernen. Bei Consent geht es um viel mehr als ein einfaches Ja oder Nein. Wenn wir die Zustimmung dekonstruieren, entdecken wir, wie wir unsere wahren Wünsche kommunizieren können, und hören auf, Dinge zu wählen, die wir nicht wollen. Durch Diskussionen, Bewegung und Partnerspiele werden wir Werkzeuge entwickeln, um körperliche Wünsche auszudrücken und zu verhandeln und durch praktische Übungen Grenzen zu setzen. Dieser Workshop ist für Menschen aller Körpergrößen, Geschlechter und Hintergründe offen und einladend. Es handelt sich um einen nicht-sexuellen Workshop bei dem, ohne Druck, Kommunikation und Berührung geübt werden können. Es geht genauso darum, wirklich Ja zu sagen und es auch so zu meinen, wie es darum geht, Nein zu sagen! Wenn Sie noch nicht an einem Workshop zum Thema Consent im Village teilgenommen haben, ist es jetzt an der Zeit! Diese Erfahrung wird Ihnen nicht nur helfen, sich in der we are village Community zurechtzufinden, sondern sie wird Sie auch dazu befähigen, diese Werte in Ihr Leben zu übertragen. Gemeinsam wollen wir eine auf Consent ausgerichtete Gemeinschaft mit gemeinsamen Werten aufbauen und dabei die Verantwortung des Einzelnen für die Einhaltung dieser Grundsätze betonen. Unser oberstes Ziel ist es, gesunde Beziehungen zu fördern und eine integrative Community für eine bessere, vernetzte Zukunft zu schaffen. 🔵 **Embodied Consent** with **Kuem** for **LGBTIQA+** Free **[Registration Required](https://wearevillage.org/en/shop/embodied-consent/w17-2026-2/)** **Learning about boundaries and communication**. If you have not yet attended a workshop on Consent in the Village, now is the time! This workshop is highly recommended for anyone wishing to visit our project on a regular basis, or to attend one of our workshops. This experience will not only help you navigate within the we.are.village community, but it will also equip you to carry these values into your life. Being aware of your boundaries and expressing your consent or non-consent are essential skills in life, but we don’t often get a chance to actually practice consent skills in the same way we practice other skills, like singing, playing sports or learning a language. Consent is about much more than a simple yes or no. When we deconstruct consent, we discover how to communicate our true desires and stop choosing the things we actually don’t want. Through discussion, movement and partner games, we will build tools to express and negotiate physical desires and set boundaries through the use of practical exercises. This workshop is inclusive and welcoming to individuals of all body sizes, genders, and background. This is a non-sexual workshop, and great, low pressure situation in which to practice communication and touching. It’s as much about how to truly say yes and mean it as it is about saying no! If you have not yet attended a workshop on Consent in the Village, now is the time! This experience will not only help you navigate within the we are village community, but it will also equip you to carry these values into your life. Together, we aim to nurture a consent-centered community with shared values, emphasizing individual responsibility in upholding these principles. Our ultimate goal is to foster healthy relationships and create an inclusive community for a better, more connected future.
Sunday Service 10:45am
Sun, May 3, 8:45 AMYou are welcome to join Sunday services at our church location. Feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
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