Our 12th industrial cybersecurity conference in velvet-season* Sochi.

Hi all!

As per my chokka, ongoing business-trip schedule, I recently found myself down in Sochi where we had our 12th conference dedicated to industrial cybersecurity. Every year the industrial topic gets all the more popular, while our exhibition gets all the more large. Nearly 450 guests were in attendance this time – meaning we wouldn’t have all fitted into last year’s venue; accordingly, the view out the window was a little different to the usual one:

I kicked things off to a packed hall (just how I like it) ->

Read on…

The Show Must Go On: our all-weather B-Day (sun, hurricane, and… hail the size of cherries)!

All righty. I told you about the preparations and rehearsals for our birthday blowout. Today let me tell you about the blowout itself – and I don’t use that term for a party without reason…

So, the roof of the main stage had been repaired (put back), and the day promised to be a warm and sunny one; however… ->

Yes – that huge mass of cloud was heading right our way. And despite our crossed fingers, it didn’t pass us by…

Read on…

Our 27th birthday bash – pt. 1: the (day-before) Rehearsals Must Go On!…

Hi folks!

Early July for us every year gives us something very special to celebrate here at K: our corporate birthday! For several years already we’ve held our all-day birthday party in Zavidovo out in the Moscow Region (here) (since it’s perhaps the only venue that can fit us all in). This year, suddenly – we’re 27 years old already, and to celebrate, we had more than 3300 guests attend the bash!…

In case you’re new to this here blog of mine, here are some posts on how things have gone down birthday-wise in recent years – 2023, 2022, 2021, and so on.

In today’s post – photos from the day before the shindig: a day of rehearsals and other preparations…

The main stage was up, everything so far going to plan ->

Read on…

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Beach-walking – Dominican style.

I’ve a great many different hobbies and favorite activities – just like anyone. But one of the more unorthodox is long-distance beach-walking. What that?! Easy: Take any sandy beach – and stomp along it barefoot for as long as possible…

Does that include walking back all the way barefoot too? It does indeed. And I’ve never needed alternative options, which are, btw: (i) take a cab; (ii) take a taxi-boat by sea; and 3) be carried in/on some kinda carriage by porters (no WAY!)!

As regards some of the folks who may want to join me on such a barefoot beach-hike, I often have to feel sorry for them! Like I did recently in the Dominican Republic where we had our regional (North, Central and South America) partner conference: in-between work some colleagues joined me…

So we headed on down to the beach, looked left – not much happening down there, and then right – and decided that was the better option. The main reason: there was a tangible destination > that far end of the beach (with the trees behind it) where it seems to just end. Endpoint decided, off we popped…

Read on…

A digitalization conference in Nizhny. I’m hardly not gonna be there…

With conference season still in full-swing, I’ve been busier than a bee of late. Just recently I only had two days at home and it was back on the road again. This time though it was a domestic business trip – albeit it a thoroughly important one …

It was for CIPR in the city of Nizhny Novgorod. CIPR?…

CIPR is a transliteration from the Russian ЦИПР, which stands for “Digital Industry of Industrial Russia”. That was a direct translation that came out clumsy in English (curiously due to the fact that there are two words for industry/industrial in Russian; only one in English:), but it’s now taken on the more modern and pertinent (in terms of content), and appropriate (in terms of English language sense) name of “Digitalization of Industrial Russia”.

CIPR: conference, exhibition, presentations, speeches, agreement signings, meets, greets, handshakes, chats. Never dull, and always a pleasure (it takes place yearly in Nizhny Novgorod – Russia’s sixth-largest city, 500km east of Moscow) ->

That fine historical building is where the talks and panel discussions take place, while the exhibition – needing a bit more room – is in the large, modern hangar-like building next door. That’s where we head first…

Read on…

Déjà vu in Thailand: partner conference, thunder, sunset and sand.

Hi folks – from sunny thunderous Thailand!

Been a while, I know – but I’ve been busy (as always). Of course I have – for it’s our partner-conference (both regional and global) season. We’ve already had Italy and Hungary; now it was Thailand’s turn…

After landing, we head on over to the venue, which turns out to be the same hotel where we put on another conference (SAS) late last year. Small world, and déjà vu, as they say…

But back to this year’s conference: it was the partner conference for the ~Middle Eastern and African regions, aka META (Middle East + Turkey + Africa). But enough already with definitions and demarcations! Let me simply tell you the conference was a 10/10!

  • Guests: 135 (140 were planning to attend, but five didn’t get their visas in time; we’ll take this into account for the future)
  • Countries represented: 24
  • Partner companies represented: 65

But enough of stats already! Let me simply repeat that the conference was a 10/10 :)

Read on…

Budapest-2024: jubilee fun with the Rubik’s Cube, then a leisurely cruise on the Danube!

The next stop on our whirlwind Euro-April-2024 tour – Budapest…

We’d had our Italian Partner Conference days before – in Milan, as mentioned (and the press loved it). Now it was time for our Global Partner Conference in the Hungarian capital. As per, we had guests fly in from every continent apart from Antarctica (of course) and also, alas – Australia (due to the geopolitical situation). The rest of the world however was in full attendance :) ->

…But I’ll come back to that topic. First, we needed to get from Italy to Hungary…

Read on…

No FOMO – @ Lake Como; much ardor – @ Lake Garda!

When you find yourself in Milan with a weekend to fill with non-work stuff – what do you? That is, if you’ve been there plenty of times in the past, the city’s parks and downtown highlights have all been strolled, and the top of Milan Cathedral has been climbed up to? When you fancy checking out Paternkofel in the Dolomites but the April weather just can’t be trusted – especially given the poor forecast (we attempted such a thing in 2021 and failed). Well, there are a few other options…

…One being – Lake Como! ->

And not just the lake, but the charming small towns along its shores too:

And that was that: decided. Time to rent a car and head on over there

Read on…

Our first global Cyber Immune conference!

Despite the extraordinarily uncharacteristic weather in Dubai, we still managed to hold our first ever international Cyber Immunity Conference there; hurray!

So, what is Cyber Immunity? (In case you don’t know; sorry if you do.) It’s our approach to building cybersystems that are secure-by-design and, as such, resilient against hacker attacks.

Actually, there’s a lot of talk about what it is. There’s talk about programming needing to be accurate and secure, and that we need secure processes of program code development, multilevel testing and cross-checks, and other such nonsense. But we believe that the main thing in security-by-design is the basic architecture of the operating system; specifically, its ability to protect even untrusted and vulnerable components/modules/applications, or, rather – block their abnormal behavior. We’ve lots more detailed information here, and those who want to dive even deeper into it are welcome to contact our experts, who can be reached at the same link.

As we hurtle ever deeper into the cyber-era, it’s clear that Cyber Immunity will be our savior. Alas, it’s still only one side of the coin in that cyber-era, for there are still the ever-increasing professionalism and numbers of hacker attacks from the other side of the barricades. However, I firmly believe that, out of the two, one side has no long-term future. Guess which one ). But for that scenario to materialize we need to learn how to build cybersystems that are secure-by-design to be able to fend off hacker attacks. That is the future of the cyberworld. And the other week, when we were down in the UAE, it was of course highly fitting to be able to talk about the cyberfuture in Dubai’s Museum of the Future ->

All righty. Off we pop to our conference…

Read on…