Tech Council of Delaware to reveal new strategic plan next week

As the end of Tech Council of Delaware’s three-year incubation period with Rodel draws near, we want to know: Will it spin out on its own? Continue under Rodel? Something else?

Zakiyyah Ali, executive director of the Tech Council won’t say, but she will during a strategic plan presentation at the Tech Ecosystem Conference on June 25 – 26 at Riverfront Events in Wilmington.

This is the second annual conference, but it’s very different this year compared to last year’s invite-only inaugural event.

“Last year, that one-day conference was really a culmination of the tech ecosystem committees’ work,” Ali told Technical.ly. “This year’s two-day conference is less about bringing the committees together to do collective work and more about bringing Delaware’s ecosystem together.”

That includes community members just starting out in tech or even aspiring technologists, as the Council’s expanding social media presence draws more individual members.

“That’s the population that’s joining the council faster than any other group,” she said. “While we have memberships for corporations, small businesses, training providers and community orgs,  we’ve been seeing an influx of current and aspiring tech professionals that are looking to connect.”

Two days of presentations and networking

Day one will celebrate the ecosystem’s diversity, including a Black tech startup symposium and the panel “Black Men Talk Tech.” This is a first step toward a potential standalone event proposed by Ayanna Khan, president of the Delaware Black Chamber of Commerce, who pitched the idea of a Delaware-based Black tech week.

The entire community — Delaware and Greater Philadelpia — is welcome to the symposium, and encouraged to share their own ideas for future events and other ideas related to supporting and growing the ecosystem in Delaware and the region.

AI will of course be a topic of discussion on both days. On day one, Innova Solutions will present a special session titled “AI everywhere in banking, from chatbot to chatGPT.” On Day two, CompTIA, General Assembly and Phenom will lead “How A.I. is Changing the Workforce and Business.”

Day two will kick off with a networking breakfast where Ali and Barthwell Group COO Walter Evans will present the Tech Council’s new three year strategic plan, which will go into effect on July 1. This will be followed by a quick session highlighting three current initiatives by Tech Council members and partners.

Each day will end with an industry networking lunch.

Ali stresses that the event is meant to include the voices of the community, who should not hesitate to bring questions and comments.

“The Tech Council doesn’t belong to me,” Ali said. “It belongs to its members and its sponsors. So we want them to be able to ask questions, because they also inform its direction.”

Check out the complete list of speakers here.

Disclosure: The Tech Council of Delaware is a Technical.ly client. That relationship had no bearing on this report.