

Santa Barbara Tech Talk Series
Join us for an exciting double-feature Tech Talk on November 20th featuring two cutting-edge perspectives on modern software engineering. Craig Bennett, Senior Director of Engineering at NerdWallet, will share the behind-the-scenes story of preparing infrastructure to handle one of the biggest traffic spikes imaginable - a Super Bowl commercial. Learn about the architectural decisions, scaling challenges, and lessons learned from supporting millions of concurrent users during one of advertising's biggest moments. Then, Phil Gabardo, CTO of Gen.video, will share the agentic coding tools he's been building and working with, and what he's found useful (and not useful) in practice. Whether you're curious about high-scale infrastructure or want to hear real talk about AI coding tools, come grab some food and drinks and hear what these two practitioners have learned. Doors open at 6:00 PM with food and drinks, talks begin at 6:30 PM at 419 State Street.