WeAreDevelopers World Congress Brings the Who’s Who of the Software Industry to San José in Its North America Debut
More than 10,000 attendees and hundreds of industry-leading speakers and opinion leaders at the San José Convention
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San Jose, CA, Sept. 25, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — WeAreDevelopers held its first World Congress in North America this week, bringing more than 10,000 developers, AI builders, and technology leaders to San José for three days. The program was built around the question of how AI-powered software gets out of the prototype phase and into production.
WeAreDevelopers World Congress North America
“Two years of demos and pilots have shown what the technology can do. Getting it into the systems that businesses actually run on is the work the industry faces now, and it dominated the stages in San José,” said Sead Ahmetović, CEO and Co-Founder of WeAreDevelopers. “That shift is why we bring the whole industry into one room. The labs, the platforms, and the enterprises do not get to production alone, and three days together move things further than a year of everyone working in their own corner.“
The program covered building and deploying agentic systems, running AI-written software in production, securing systems that take actions on their own, testing behavior that is not deterministic, and the data and infrastructure underneath it all.
Docker opened the Main Stage program with an in-depth keynote from its president, Mark Cavage, on manufacturing trust and delivering speed and safety in the age of agents. Cavage also used the keynote to announce the launch of Docker Cloud Sandboxes, a new solution for secure, isolated AI agent execution, and the publication of the next generation of Kits, the company’s open specification for packaging an agentic sandbox.
“Few companies share the kind of connection and commitment to the developer community that Docker does,” said Terri Avnaim, Chief Marketing Officer at Docker, Inc. “That’s why WeAreDevelopers isn’t just a stop on the calendar for us, but a chance to connect deeply and have real conversations with the people who make this industry so special. There’s no better place than WeAreDevelopers for Docker to show the developer community what’s next, and to deepen a relationship that we’ve never taken for granted.”
Speakers included Thomas Dohmke, CEO and Co-Founder of Entire and former CEO of GitHub; Amjad Masad, CEO of Replit; Milin Desai, CEO of Sentry; Erran Berger, CTO of Engineering at LinkedIn; Leigh-Ann Russell, CIO and Global Head of Engineering at BNY; Justin Boitano, VP of Enterprise AI at NVIDIA; Kelsey Hightower; and John Romero, co-creator of DOOM and Quake. OpenAI, Anthropic, GitHub, AWS, SAP, Atlassian and Microsoft were among the hundreds of companies represented on the program.
Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal, hosts of Acquired, the top technology podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, held a series of live interviews on the Main Stage. Guests included Sri Shivananda, CIO of Payments and Global Banking at JPMorgan Chase, along with Masad and Boitano.
WeAreDevelopers closes its 2026 program with WeAreDevelopers Conference India in Bengaluru on November 25-26, its first event in the country.
“With San José we added North America to a conversation we have hosted in Europe for years, and in November it continues in Bengaluru,” said Benjamin Ruschin, Executive Chairman and Co-Founder of WeAreDevelopers. “Building software with AI needs a global conversation, and it needs to happen at the technical level, between the people doing the actual work and the leaders who decide the future of their enterprises. That is the conversation we host.”
More than 10,000 builders, and technology leaders gather in San Jose
About WeAreDevelopers
WeAreDevelopers is the global platform for tech talents to advance their careers in the age of AI. Every year, millions of tech professionals use the platform to build skills, share knowledge, and connect with peers and employers. Companies benefit from access to a unique community to strengthen their employer brand, attract talent, and showcase innovative products – online and at industry-leading events in Europe, North America, and India.
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