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Innovate@UCLA is a dynamic community of innovators, made up of top drivers in SoCal’s tech space, world-renowned educators and impact driven students at the University of California, Los Angeles.
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september
Event Details
In a hyper-accelerated digital era, to succeed today, technology professionals can no longer operate in silos. Across industries, focusing only on solving the problems that have been handed
Event Details
In a hyper-accelerated digital era, to succeed today, technology professionals can no longer operate in silos. Across industries, focusing only on solving the problems that have been handed over by business partners is solving just one piece of the puzzle. With technology being a key enabler of transformation, employees have to scale up on critical business skills to be effective partners to functional leaders across their organization. This interactive session will address following questions:
- What critical business skills do tech professionals need to scale their business?
- At which levels within an organization are these business skills needed?
- What strategies are needed to implement business skills training programs within an organization?
- What challenges do we foresee in training our workforce?
Featured Speaker:
Abhisek Rath is a technology leader who works at the forefront of new initiatives to enable companies to meet evolving customer needs and business model changes. His hallmark of success is being an effective translator and his ability to combine a strategic mindset with excellence in execution to deliver measurable benefits to the business. Abhisek began his career in quality assurance management with Wipro Technologies. He was assigned to the Sony Pictures account in 2005 and joined Sony as a Project Manager in 2009. Since then, he was progressed rapidly through the Information Technology organization, taking on some of the company’s most complex technology challenges.
Today, as a Vice President, he heads up the marketing technology portfolio of global applications. His team’s focus is on identifying and executing on opportunities to build more robust and scalable solutions, enable highly efficient business operations and deliver highest level of customer satisfaction.
Abhisek is committed to developing and mentoring the next generation of technology and product management leaders. He is passionate about inspiring his teams to perform at the highest level and pursue opportunities for continuing professional and personal development. He has served as a mentor with STEM Advantage and the UCLA Alumni Mentor Program, and currently President of Sony Pictures Employee Business Resource Group (EBRG) for DESI and sits on the supplier diversity subcommittee of Sony Pictures Action Initiative.
Abhisek earned his MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Management and Master of Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology and Science in Pilani (India). He lives in the Los Angeles area with his wife, daughter, and son.
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(Thursday) 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
Event Details
The bandwidth delivered by 5G coupled with renewed investment in AR hardware and edge compute has the potential to deliver innovative experiences to consumers. We will discuss how
Event Details
The bandwidth delivered by 5G coupled with renewed investment in AR hardware and edge compute has the potential to deliver innovative experiences to consumers. We will discuss how the spatial web will allow these experiences to be placed in the real world and experienced in real time. This session will address following questions:
- An overview of the technologies (5G, AR, & Edge Compute)
- The Spatial Web, what is it and why its important
- The opportunity, how these combine to deliver new experiences
- Potential challenges
Featured Speaker:
Andy Wright leads SADA’s Telecom, Media & Entertainment and Gaming efforts. SADA is Google’s No.1 Global Cloud Partner. Prior to SADA Andy spent 8 Years at the Walt Disney Studios Leading multiple Product Teams, worked at Amazon on their Fire Devices and Gaming services. Former CTO and Co-Founder of a mobile gaming startup with over 20 years experience across Telecom, M&E and Gaming.
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(Thursday) 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
october
06oct4:00 pm5:00 pmeSports’ Control of the Content EcosystemInnovate@UCLA 2021 Virtual Series #10
Event Details
With more than 3 billion gamers at large worldwide, gaming content has become a predominant force in media and entertainment. At the tip of that gaming spear lies
Event Details
With more than 3 billion gamers at large worldwide, gaming content has become a predominant force in media and entertainment. At the tip of that gaming spear lies esports, a global phenomenon that’s only seen accelerated growth throughout the pandemic era. Understanding that the increasingly critical Gen Z audience is nearly 2x as esports-oriented than all adults in the U.S., brands, publishers and, of course, individual creators by the droves have embraced a future of entertainment with gaming at its forefront. As this future comes into focus, this session will explore the following questions and more:
This session will address following questions:
- How has consumption of gaming and eSports content evolved in the past 18 months?
- What roles do the planet’s biggest platforms play in the growth and proliferation of live esports content?
- What trends will impact the immediate trajectory of eSports and what critical role does Gen Z play?
Featured Speaker:
Head of Content Strategy
Electronic Arts’ Competitive Gaming Entertainment (eSports) division
Craig Tello is a leader in content and audience engagement for global entertainment brands. He is the current head of content strategy for Electronic Arts’ Competitive Gaming Entertainment (eSports) division. Prior to joining EA, Craig led content and programming for WWE, meeting the demand of more than a billion social followers worldwide, one of the most watched channels on YouTube and the award-winning WWE Network premium video service.
Craig bridges creative with insights, having woven success in the strategy, storytelling and operations of global content groups, in partnership with the biggest platforms on the planet. He’s also a NY Times bestselling author and has contributed to major brands such as Mattel and Marvel Entertainment.
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(Wednesday) 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
november
Event Details
The Innovate@UCLA Executive Leadership Award (ELA) recognizes the exceptional creation of value to achieve a company’s vision via application of innovative, forward thinking and disruptive technologies and operating
Event Details
The Innovate@UCLA Executive Leadership Award (ELA) recognizes the exceptional creation of value to achieve a company’s vision via application of innovative, forward thinking and disruptive technologies and operating models. The award is given to a CEO/Founder and CIO/CTO (or top Technology Executive) who has led and promoted the use of digital technology and expertise as a critical component of the company’s decisions, fueling improvements in brand and bottom line.
This year, the primary focus is on organizations that have excelled in the face of adversity, illustrating the power of innovation in times of uncertainty and ambiguity.
To learn more about past honorees and award categories, click here.
Registration
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(Thursday) 5:30 pm - 9:00 pm