Vancouver-based Korean technology community KDD will hold its sixth annual KDD Tech Conference on August 29 at UBC Robson Square, bringing together technology professionals, students and job seekers to examine how artificial intelligence can be translated into practical value.
Held under the theme “Build for Impact in the AI Era: Beyond Uncertainty, Build What’s Next,” the conference will move beyond introducing AI technologies to consider how they are reshaping products, businesses, organisations and individual careers. The event is co-hosted by the Consulate General of the Republic of Korea in Vancouver and KDD, with KDD serving as organiser.
The programme will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Morning workshops will offer separate tracks for working professionals and for students and job seekers. The afternoon conference will feature keynote sessions on generative AI, multimodal analytics, developer growth and leadership, followed by a Q&A and panel discussion.
Moving AI from discussion to deployment
The first keynote will be delivered by Gene Moo Lee, a professor at the University of British Columbia. In “Generative AI & Multimodal Analytics for Business Innovation,” Lee will examine how generative AI and multimodal systems that combine text, images and other data formats can support corporate decision-making and product innovation.
The second keynote, “Many Starts, Many Lessons — There Are Still Problems Worth Solving in the AI Era,” will be presented by Chae-sang Jung, founder of Ieum Tech. Drawing on more than two decades of development experience in South Korea and Silicon Valley, Jung will discuss how developers identify meaningful problems and build new products and organisations amid rapid technological change.
The afternoon programme will conclude with a Q&A and panel discussion addressing the changes practitioners are encountering in the workplace and the evolving role of developers. The sessions are designed to connect technical advances with the organisational and professional decisions required to deploy them effectively.
A notable feature of this year’s programme is that it treats AI adoption and career development as interconnected issues. As companies integrate AI into their operations, the skills they seek, the way they recruit and the responsibilities assigned to developers are changing at the same time.
By combining practical career workshops with discussions on AI-driven business innovation, the conference reflects a broader shift in the technology sector. The emerging divide is no longer simply between those who have access to AI and those who do not, but between those who can use it to solve concrete problems and those who remain at the level of experimentation.
Practical workshops for professionals and job seekers
In the professional track, Michelle Kim, founder and CEO of The Way Company, will lead a workshop on elevator pitches and networking skills. The session will focus on how participants can communicate their expertise and professional value clearly and turn brief interactions into employment, business or collaboration opportunities.
A separate track for students and job seekers will examine how recruitment is changing in the AI era. Jeongeun Lee, an HR consultant in City Learning and Development at the City of Calgary, will explain how to develop a LinkedIn profile that can be more readily discovered by recruiters.
Harrison Lee, senior data engineer II at Greenhouse Software, will lead a workshop on rewriting résumés with an understanding of applicant tracking systems, or ATS. The workshop will help participants assess how automated recruitment systems read and classify application materials. Both sessions will be conducted in a practical format, allowing participants to review and improve their profiles and résumés during the event.
Founded in 2017, KDD, or Korean Developers & Designers, is a Vancouver-based Korean technology community whose members include developers, designers, planners and students. Through its annual conference and other programmes, the organisation provides a platform for sharing technical knowledge, workplace experience and career opportunities.
The structure of this year’s conference underscores a central challenge of the AI era: competitiveness increasingly depends not on familiarity with the largest number of AI tools, but on the ability to connect technology to real problems and redefine one’s role as products, organisations and labour markets change.
KDD Tech Conference 2026 will take place from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on August 29 at UBC Robson Square in Vancouver. Morning workshops will be held in rooms C400 and C440, while the afternoon conference will take place in the C300 Theatre. A full-day ticket costs CAD 26, and admission to the afternoon conference is CAD 16. The event will be conducted in Korean without English interpretation.
