ATLANTA — Atlanta has long been on the global stage, and RenderATL is embracing it this year. The Atlanta tech conference’s motto this year is “The World Comes to Render.”
RenderATL Founder Justin Samuels tells 11Alive that year number three is about growth.
“We wanted to open up more tracks and more opportunities for people to connect to our partners and also learn more while they are here because the main thing we focus on is continuing education for our technology professionals,” said Samuels.
The tech conference is set to bring more than 5,000 attendees and more than 100 speakers to Atlanta. It’s a week focused on engineers, developers, designers, founders, executives, and everyone in between.
In addition to keynote speakers like Google engineer Kelsey Hightower and Sports Broadcaster Shannon Sharpe, attendees will have the opportunity to connect with some of the largest companies in and outside of Atlanta through the exhibition hall and several networking events.
Several large corporations, such as Amazon, Delta, Intuit, Zillow, The Home Depot, and Dropbox, are investing in the convention this year through sponsorships.
“Overall, you will see over 70 corporate partners this year trying to hire or doing demos, where they are going to show what new innovation is coming out of their engineering and overall general tech teams,” said Samuels.
Samuels tells 11Alive that this conference's setting is smaller than some of the larger tech conferences, giving attendees the chance to get closer to the top.
“That’s the thing that makes our conference unique. If you are an executive looking to network, we have other executives that you would usually only catch at those huge gigantic conferences, where the odds of you ever running into them are going to be low,” Samuels reiterated.
“You have people that are coming that are in the C-Suite, like the chief architect of Intuit, he is going to be at the conference. He’s also doing a presentation at the conference. Having people like that, that you can then go have a 1-1 conversation with, can be the thing that helps change your career, or even change your overall life,” he continued.
Atlanta Tech Week is an extension of RenderATL, expanding the networking and educational footprint to areas like Buckhead and Midtown. The main conference takes place at AmericasMart in Downtown Atlanta.
Since its start, RenderATL has challenged the norm of what a traditional tech convention looks like. It’s a multicultural space putting a big emphasis on the culture, with art, food, and music being big themes.
The conference’s music headliner, DJ Pee Wee, a.k.a. Anderson.Paak, will perform at “Render Haus,” the conference’s after-party concert.
With tech at its core, Render is continuing to create spaces for both upcoming and established tech professionals while striving to grow Atlanta’s tech presence on the global stage.
RenderATL takes place from June 12-14 at AmericasMart. For more information, click here.
Watch the full interview with Justin Samuels below.