Databricks Announces Machine Learning and Data Experts for Spark + AI Summit Europe 2018 Keynotes

London, UK – 6th September 2018 - Databricks, the leader in unified analytics and founded by the original creators of Apache Spark™, today announced the keynote lineup for the newly expanded Spark + AI Summit Europe 2018, taking place in London from October 2nd to October 4th, 2018. Spark + AI Summit is the leading event for data scientists, data engineers and business professionals to engage in discussions regarding data, analytics and practical applications of artificial intelligence (AI).

The conference, formerly Spark Summit, has expanded this year from its roots as the primary conference for Apache Spark to include related machine learning and data technologies (including popular deep learning frameworks such as TensorFlow, Keras, PyTorch, SciKit-Learn and Deep Learning Pipelines) and practical AI use cases. Keynote presentations will include data and machine learning executives from Nielsen, Shell, Co-op, Ordnance Survey, and Zalando. To lead discussions on innovations in AI, the Spark + AI Summit keynote lineup includes presentations from the founders of Databricks, who are the original creators of Apache Spark and MLflow, and a special guest from Facebook AI Research who is also the creator of the popular PyTorch open source deep learning framework. Microsoft and Pure Storage join Databricks as Diamond sponsors of the conference.

This year’s conference will be moderated by Kat Hawkins, a reporter for the BBC’s flagship technology programme BBC Click.  Kat will host this year’s keynote presentations, which include:

• Daniel Jeavons, General Manager, Advanced Analytics CoE at Shell Research Ltd
• Mainak Mazumdar, Chief Research Officer at Nielsen
• Caroline Bellamy, Chief Data Officer at Ordnance Survey
• Soumith Chintala, Researcher at Facebook AI Research and Creator of PyTorch
• Rob McKendrick, Head of Data at Co-op
• Kshitij Kumar - Vice President of Data Infrastructure at Zalando
• Rohan Kumar, Corporate Vice President of Azure Data at Microsoft

The conference will also feature these keynotes from Databricks executives:

• Ali Ghodsi, Co-founder and CEO, on the power of Unified Analytics
• Matei Zaharia, Co-founder and Chief Technologist, on MLflow innovations
• Reynold Xin, Chief Architect, on Apache Spark innovations including Project Hydrogen for machine learning
• Ion Stoica, Executive Chairman, on Unified Analytics in healthcare and life sciences
• Michael Armbrust, Software Engineer and Lead Developer SparkSQL, on Databricks Delta and bringing reliability to data lakes

Zaharia, the original creator of Apache Spark, will provide an update on the latest innovation to his more recent machine learning creation: MLflow. The end-to-end machine learning workflow was first introduced to the industry this year at Spark + AI Summit in San Francisco. MLflow is an open source, cross-cloud framework that can dramatically simplify the machine learning workflow.

“This is an exciting year because we’ve expanded the conference to include a range of machine learning technology topics and practical training, tutorials and real world use cases for operationalising AI,” said Rick Schultz, Chief Marketing Officer at Databricks. “The entire industry is eager to unify disparate data science and data engineering teams and this is really the one conference that brings those disciplines together. The Spark + AI Summit Europe is a one-stop-shop for all data experts to practically apply the best tools in data and AI.”

Visit Databricks.com/SparkAISummit/Europe for more information. Receive a 15% discount at registration by using the code: London2018 by September 21st, 2018.

About Databricks

Databricks’ mission is to accelerate innovation for its customers by unifying Data Science, Engineering and Business. Databricks’ founders started the Spark research project at UC Berkeley that later became Apache Spark. Databricks provides a Unified Analytics Platform powered by Apache Spark for data science teams to collaborate with data engineering and lines of business to build data products. Users achieve faster time-to-value with Databricks by creating analytic workflows that go from ETL and interactive exploration to production. The company also makes it easier for its users to focus on their data by providing a fully managed, scalable, and secure cloud infrastructure that reduces operational complexity and total cost of ownership. Databricks, venture-backed by Andreessen Horowitz, NEA and Battery Ventures, among others, has a global customer base that includes Viacom, Shell and HP. For more information, visit www.databricks.com.

Apache, Apache Spark and Spark are trademarks of the Apache Software Foundation.

© Databricks 2018. All rights reserved. Apache, Apache Spark and Spark are trademarks of the Apache Software Foundation.