Tech Legend, Jeff Barr’s visit to Manchester and Sci-Tech Daresbury

The day started with my daughter Hashini and I picking up Jeff from the hotel and grabbing a quick lunch at Ring O’ Bells in Daresbury. I was glad to see fish and chips on the menu, which Jeff loved.

We headed over to Sci-Tech Daresbury for a private meeting with Hartree Centre (STFC – it houses UK’s largest commercially available supercomputer) chaired by networking maestro Paul Treloar. The event was also attended by two local AWS team members.

When Jeff first visited us in 2007, there were no AWS employees in the whole of Europe. We tried our best to recreate the original picture of Jeff and me. Of course, the reception area has changed multiple times over the years.

Then we headed to Spinningfields to host the Tech Legend event at Squire Patton Boggs’ offices.

I took the opportunity to share how Techcelerate built Manchester’s Tech Ecosystem from 2006 to 2013, who took over from us and who the key players of Manchester today are.

click on the above image to access the slides

When you analyse, today, all the key players are big corporations from Barclays to Allied London and Natwest. Yes, there are others, but their efforts are morphed by corporate budgets.

Jeff then took the stage and explained his journey, how Amazon Web Services (AWS) came about and how they decides to build and release new AWS tools to the market. Everything seems to be customer driven when coming up with new tools.

We look forward to welcoming Jeff again in the future. This was the 4th time. The second time, Lancaster Business School made it compulsory for their students to attend – a bus load arrived at Sci-Tech Daresbury when we held the 2nd event there so many years ago. We had three students this time, one from Sheffield and two from the University of Manchester.

As I near my 55th birthday, one thing I realise is that life is all about these moments when we make memories. The 2007 visit is very much etched in my memory and I hope those who joined us will also remember this event. Thanks Jeff!

Big thanks go to Andrew Threlfall for chairing the fireside chat and the panel discussion.

Many thanks to our wonderful panelists, Safe Hammad, Amila Gamage (Techcelerate’s Fractional CTO) and Ant Chisnall (Techcelerate Member).

Until next time, enjoy the Easter break. Do get in touch if you want to grab the credits before 11th May.