Former NASA Astronaut Steve Smith Key Speaker at Global GenAI Conclave

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:
Former NASA astronaut and technology executive Steve Lee Smith will be the key speaker among a clutch of prominent experts in the country’s first International GenAI Conclave being hosted by the Kerala Government in Kochi in association with IBM on July 11 and 12.

A veteran astronaut, Smith flew in space four times at 28,000 KMH on the space shuttle during his stint in NASA, covering 16 million miles. He also performed seven spacewalks, including repairs of the Hubble Space Telescope.

Smith will speak on ‘Lessons Learned from A Skywalker’ at 4.15 pm on the opening day of the event which will get underway at 10.15 am on July 11.

Preparations are in full swing for the flagship event that will feature the state’s core strengths as an attractive destination for a wide range of enterprises driven by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and robotics. It will showcase Kerala’s commitment to fostering innovation and embracing transformative technologies.

The conclave, to be hosted at Grand Hyatt Bolgatty International Convention Centre, Bolgatty, Kochi, will bring together industry leaders, policymakers and innovators to explore the transformative potential of AI and its impact on society and the economy.

Prominent speakers on the inaugural day of the conclave are Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan; Minister for Industries, Law and Coir P Rajeeve; Chief Secretary, Government of Kerala, Dr V Venu; Principal Secretary, (Industries) A. P. M. Mohammed Hanish; Secretary, Electronics & IT Dr Rathan U Kelkar; KSIDC MD and Director of Industries & Commerce and Secretary, I&PRD, S. Harikishore and Senior Vice President of Products at IBM Software, Dinesh Nirmal.

Other speakers at the event include Chief Data Officer of Sevilla FC, Dr Elias Zamora Sillero; Comparus CEO Dmitri Gamarnik; IBM Research AI Vice President Sriram Raghavan; IBM Data & AI Fellow Trent Gray-Donald; Professor of Robotics, Edinburgh University, Prof. Sethu Vijayakumar; Kerala Digital University Vice Chancellor Dr Saji Gopinath; KSUM CEO Anoop Ambika; Partner, McKinsey, Ankur Puri; Chief Data Officer, S&P Global Market Intelligence, Abhishek Tomar; Managing Director &Partner, Boston Consulting Group, Amit Kumar; and Head of NASSCOM AI Ankit Bose.

The GenAI conclave aims to transform Kerala as an AI destination and showcase the state’s perspectives on industry 4.0, besides giving a thrust to the growth of economy.

As lead-up to the conclave, the state government, in association with IBM, conducted ‘Tech Talk’ in Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram; Infopark, Kochi; and Cyber Park, Kozhikode. Two pre-event hackathons on WatsonX platform—one dedicated to university students and the other to local startups—are underway.

Besides developers, universities, students, media and analysts, the conclave will feature demos, activations, interactions with industry experts, panel discussions and lectures. Participants will also get an opportunity to get a first-hand experience in the latest advancements in AI sector.