We kicked off the day with the Women in Data & AI Breakfast, an energising and thoughtful panel discussion featuring:

• Emily Cornock — Suncorp Group
• Louisa Francis — NAB
• Neha Joshi — Databricks

The panel spoke candidly about their experiences in the industry, the challenges they’ve navigated, and how AI is shaping their organisations and roles.

Real Impact Through Applied AI

Emily shared the story of Haven, a digital tool built by Suncorp to help homeowners better understand their property’s exposure to extreme weather and improve resilience. It was a powerful example of AI-driven insights delivering real community value.

Louisa discussed the evolving world of AI agents in digital banking. While acknowledging that today’s agents aren’t perfect, she highlighted a future where customers could have 24/7 intelligent support across every aspect of their finances.

The Importance of Diversity

One theme strongly echoed by all three speakers was diversity in teams and thinking. They compared homogeneous feedback loops in AI to Instagram’s explore page — if we only ever see one type of content (diet-coke-and-bags energy), we lose perspective. Ensuring that AI systems — and the teams building them — reflect a wide range of experiences is essential for responsible outcomes.

Mentorship That Matters

The panel closed with reflections on mentorship. Each speaker highlighted the people who “believed in them before they believed in themselves,” emphasising how instrumental these mentors were in shaping their careers. It was an important reminder of the collective responsibility we have to support emerging talent in data and AI.

Keynote Highlights

The keynote was led by Adam Beavis, Vice President and ANZ Country Manager at Databricks. He was joined by several industry leaders who shared how Databricks is powering their data and AI transformation journeys.

Clearer Data Lineage & Responsible AI — Telstra

Dale Stephens from Telstra discussed how Databricks, and particularly Unity Catalog, has helped them achieve end-to-end data lineage. With a clearer picture of where data originates and how it flows, Telstra has strengthened trust and quality across the organisation.

He also touched on Telstra’s work with UNESCO on AI ethics, reinforcing the importance of using AI to enhance, not replace, human expertise.

Democratizing Data Intelligence

Craig Wiley, Global Head of Product AI, explored the concept of democratising data intelligence. His message:
Unified governance isn’t just about managing tables and access. It must extend across:

• Unstructured data
• AI and ML models
• Dashboards & notebooks
• Applications and agents
• Collaboration across domains

With Unity Catalog at its core, Databricks is building the foundation for truly unified governance across the entire data and AI stack.

Product Innovations We’re Excited About

1. Lakebase — Operational Postgres Reinvented

Lakebase, Databricks’ new Postgres-compatible OLTP engine, enables organisations to run transactional and analytical workloads in one place, eliminating the classic “dual-database” architecture. With <10ms latency, auto-scaling compute, and tight integration with the Lakehouse, Lakebase opens the door for real-time, AI-powered applications.

2. Agent Bricks — Intelligent Agents for Enterprise

Agent Bricks was a standout topic throughout the event. We saw a demo of a chatbot that could intelligently query a wide range of corporate data using Databricks-native governance, lineage, and logging.

The vision is clear: AI agents that are not just powerful, but governed, secure, and enterprise-aware.

3. OpenAI’s Latest Models, Directly in Databricks

Databricks announced support for OpenAI’s latest models, all integrated with native governance and auditability. This makes it easier than ever to build production-grade AI systems without compromising on oversight.

Looking Ahead

A huge thank you to Databricks for hosting such a thoughtful, future-focused event. Their continued investments in unified governance, real-time data, and responsible AI make the Data Intelligence Platform one of the most exciting ecosystems to build on.

We’re inspired by the conversations, the innovations, and the people we met — and we’re excited to continue delivering meaningful, data-driven solutions alongside Databricks.