Durham College to host artificial intelligence summit in June

Durham College’s (DC) Hub for Applied Research in Artificial Intelligence for Business Solutions (AI Hub) is pleased to announce plans for the inaugural Enable AI Summit, a one-day conference to be held on Thursday, June 6.

Using experiential learning to upskill attendees, the conference will provide a platform for community members to converge around core applications and empower businesses to solve complex operational problems through applied research and AI. Attendees will hear from industry experts, participate in master classes, and receive certification in specialized applications, while an awards ceremony and gala will take place at the conclusion of the summit, allowing for rich networking opportunities.

The announcement came during the AI Hub’s third Tech Talk on November 30, which featured a presentation from Mohsen Azari, senior cyber security lead at Walmart Canada, and a panel discussion with Farooq Naiyer, chief information security officer at ORION, and Danish Arshad, executive director at the International Council of E-Commerce Consultants, the world’s largest cyber security technical certification body. The sold out event, part of a larger speaker series that occurs throughout the year, explored cyber security and AI’s disruption of the threat landscape. Azari, along with other thought-leaders in the AI sector, will work alongside DC to develop the upcoming summit.

Customized for attendees at every level of the AI knowledge scale, the conference aims to showcase the potential nestled within the Durham Region and across the Greater Toronto Area. With the AI Hub celebrating its first anniversary this December, the summit will be an exciting event on the horizon as it continues to offer small and medium-sized enterprises a much-needed access point to the rapidly growing field of AI.

Operationally situated within the Office of Research Services, Innovation and Entrepreneurship (ORSIE), the AI Hub is an extension of the college’s success in applied research, utilizing AI techniques and methodologies to solve complex business problems. The AI Hub began as an internal exploration of AI within the college and gradually mobilized into a community-facing, industry-focused application of AI across Ontario’s ecosystem.