October 20th, 2026 · Leeds, England
DevOps & Platform Leaders Summit
A senior summit for platform, DevOps and engineering leaders shaping internal platforms, delivery models and engineering capability across the UK.
About the Summit
The DevOps & Platform Leaders Summit brings together engineering leaders, platform teams and DevOps practitioners responsible for building and operating modern software delivery capability.
The summit focuses on the real decisions and trade-offs involved in running internal developer platforms, improving engineering productivity, shaping delivery models and operating production systems at scale. Talks are practitioner-led and vendor-neutral.
Date
October 20th, 2026
Location
Leeds, England
Venue
Accenture, Aspley House, Wellington Street, Leeds LS1 2EQ
Nearest Station
Leeds City Station (5 min walk)
Full Day Agenda
Day schedule
A single-track summit with practitioner-led talks, ignite sessions, and a closing recruitment panel.
Opening Welcome
Ethan Sumner
Founder & CEO, Community Stack
Keynote
Accenture
Speaker to be announced
Building a Future-Ready Cloud Centre of Excellence
Keith Moyo
Senior Technical Specialist, NHS
Andy Shepherd
Senior Cloud Architect, Microsoft
AI in Engineering
Sam Cunliffe
Head of Cloud Engineering & Architecture, Howden Insurance
Data DevOps as we Transform
Rachael Morgan
Head of Data Engineering, Lloyds Banking Group
Supabase: Stop Building the Database Platform, Start Using It
Kate Gawron
Principal Data Solution Architect, DoiT
Who Owns the AI Bill? Rethinking FinOps and DevOps Together
Ian Watson
Director of Engineering, ArisGlobal
Ignite Talk
Speaker TBC
To be announced
Ignite Talk
Will Dewhurst
Lead Platform Engineer, Connells Group
Women in Tech Mythbuster
Jessica Parkinson
Cloud Engineer, Skipton Building Society
Recruitment Panel
An open conversation about how organisations build technical teams where women thrive, from first application through to senior leadership. Panellists from engineering, leadership and specialist recruitment share what works in practice: inclusive hiring and interview processes, mentorship and sponsorship that leads somewhere, flexible working that holds up under pressure, and progression paths that keep women in technical careers rather than losing them mid-way. The session is for everyone. Hiring managers, team leads, recruiters and colleagues all shape whether these things happen, so expect practical steps that people at any level and in any size of organisation can take away and use.
Moderator
Ethan Sumner
Founder & CEO, Community Stack
Panellists
Jessica Parkinson
Cloud Engineer, Skipton Building Society
Rachael Morgan
Head of Data Engineering, Lloyds Banking Group
Matthew Coney
Director, Ada Meher
Expert Practitioners
Speakers
Practitioners and leaders from across platform engineering, data, AI and engineering leadership.
Ian Watson
Director of Engineering
ArisGlobal
An experienced technology and people leader deeply enthusiastic about delivering better software in a better way, for both platforms and applications.
LinkedIn
Will Dewhurst
Lead Platform Engineer
Connells Group
A Lead Platform Engineer with 9 years of experience building scalable, secure, and cost-efficient cloud platforms across large enterprises and startups. Specialises in Azure, Kubernetes, Terraform and developer experience.
LinkedIn
Keith Moyo
Senior Azure Cloud Engineer
Cloud Centre of Excellence
Senior Azure Cloud Engineer with 7+ years designing and operating secure, scalable cloud platforms in complex, highly regulated environments. Specialist in Azure landing zone and platform architecture, governance, identity, networking, and DevOps enablement aligned to CAF and Azure Verified Modules.
LinkedIn
Rachael Morgan
Head of Data Engineering
Lloyds Banking Group
Technology leader with over a decade of experience in data engineering, transformation, and digital leadership. Based in Leeds, leading teams delivering large-scale data programmes across private and public sector. Founder of Leadership Spark.
LinkedIn
Kate Gawron
Principal Data Solution Architect
DoiT
Database cloud architect with 12+ years bridging on-prem and cloud-native systems. Led large-scale RDS migrations, tuned PostgreSQL and Neptune at billion-row scale. AWS Ambassador, Community Builder, and Oracle Certified Professional.
LinkedIn
Andy Shepherd
Senior Cloud Architect
Microsoft
Senior Cloud Architect at Microsoft, co-presenting on building a future-ready Cloud Centre of Excellence alongside Keith Moyo.
LinkedIn
Matthew Coney
Director
Ada Meher
Director at Ada Meher, specialising in recruitment across Development, DevOps, Data Engineering and AI. Joining the recruitment panel to discuss hiring and retention in the current market.
LinkedIn
Sam Cunliffe
Head of Cloud Engineering & Architecture
Howden Insurance
Microsoft Cloud, AI and Platform Engineering Leader. Exploring the practical impact of AI tooling on engineering productivity, the art of the possible, and how to demonstrate ROI in tokens.
LinkedIn
Jessica Parkinson
Cloud Engineer
Skipton Building Society
Azure Cloud Engineer with 10 years in IT, and Chair of Women in Tech at Skipton Building Society, creating a supportive community and helping the next generation of technology professionals.
LinkedInSponsors
Partner with us to reach the North's platform engineering and DevOps leadership community.
Our Audience
Who attends
Join platform leaders and practitioners from across the UK. From CTOs defining strategy to engineers building the platforms that power modern software delivery.
80
Capacity
30+
Companies
Attendee Roles
Conference Themes
Previous Event
Northern DevOps & Platform Conference 2026
Hosted at CGI Leeds on May 19th, 2026. 156 attendees exploring platform engineering, DevOps culture, and engineering excellence across the North of England.
Featured Speakers
Matthew Skelton
CEO/CTO, Conflux (Team Topologies)
Holly Jukes
Head of Engineering, Lloyds Banking Group
Alexandra Moore
DevOps Strategic Advisor, CGI
Adam Wilbraham
Director of Technology, Flutter UK and Ireland
Brian Walker
Infrastructure Specialist, HSBC
Andy Burgin
Principal Platform Engineer
May 2026 Sponsors
Watch the talks
Team Topologies as the Infrastructure for Agency with AI
Matthew Skelton, CEO/CTO, Conflux
Stop Building. Start Deciding.
Holly Jukes, Head of Engineering, Lloyds Banking Group
Next Up From Community Stack
Northern DevOps & Platform Conference 2027
The flagship practitioner conference for platform engineers and DevOps professionals across the North of England. Real-world implementations, hands-on talks, and a full day of engineering content.
Date
May 18th, 2027
Location
Leeds, England
Format
Single-track
Focus
Platform & DevOps
