From Newcastle to DeepMind

Your Guide to the AI Big Leagues

Ever wondered what it’s really like inside the labs building the future of AI? Get ready to pull back the curtain!

Join us for a fascinating evening with James Cobon-Kerr, a machine learning research engineer who has worked on the front lines at Google DeepMind and Microsoft AI. He’ll give you the inside scoop on the culture and day-to-day life at the world's top AI labs, explore the cutting-edge research driving Large Language Models (LLMs), and share a practical roadmap for breaking into the field.

Discover what leading labs are focused on right now, learn about key technical breakthroughs, and find out how you can get involved—whether through university or by contributing to open source. Stick around for a Q&A session to get all your questions answered!

About Your Guide:

James Cobon-Kerr is an expert in LLM post-training and has the code to prove it, having contributed to foundational projects like Gemini during his time at Google DeepMind. He's now helping build a brand-new AI lab from the ground up at Microsoft AI. Best of all, James is a proud 2017 alumnus of The University of Newcastle, and he's excited to share his journey with us at the Hunter Innovation Festival.