Developer conference hopes to boost KC’s tech profile
June 22, 2015 | Abby Tillman
A group of local tech talent is banding together to bring global exposure to Kansas City’s tech scene.
Set to kick off Wednesday, the two-day Kansas City Developer Conference hopes to engage techies with all aspects of software development. In addition to connecting developers, the seventh-annual conference aspires for a bigger mission: to put KC on the map.
“As we bring in speakers and sponsors from around the nation and the world, their interactions with our attendees makes them understand that KC is a tech community that really knows what it’s doing,” KCDC Founder Lee Brandt said.
Brandt further explained that Kansas City developers’ desire to learn and advance themselves impresses non-KC-based attendees. That interaction also promotes a positive feel of the pool of tech talent available in Kansas City.
This year’s conference will feature 1,300 attendees, 150 educational sessions and 120 speakers, including international leaders in software development. Sessions will cover all aspects of software development, including design, project management, development operations, JavaScript and more.
“We try to be a true software development conference,” Brandt said. “So anything that’s involved in that process around software development, we want to have content around that at the event. … We try to have something for everybody”
KCDC co-organizer Jonathan Mills said that the conference aims to be comprehensive in its approach and provide valuable professional development.
“We have a lot of speakers who speak at big events,” Mills said. “Instead of sending someone to a $3,000 conference, you can come see the same quality of speaker and the same session for $300 at KCDC. … We have top quality speakers from all over the world flying in — 2 or 3 are from London.”
The conference will run June 24 to June 26 at the Kansas City Convention Center. For more information on tickets, click here.

2015 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Tips for overcoming experience gap, building a diverse workforce
When Ariel Banks graduated from the University of Missouri at Rolla in 2014 with a chemical engineering degree, she felt qualified and eager to jump into her career. Unfortunately, Banks spent nearly two years without any luck in finding a job. She found herself being asked time and time again, the dreaded question: “What is…
Wonder no more: Ruby Jean’s taking juice to Troost
Thirty years after Chris Goode’s grandmother helped drop him off for daycare at Operation Breakthrough on Troost Avenue, the entrepreneur is expanding the juicery that bears her name — Ruby Jean’s — to a site less than a block away. “It’s crazy how life comes full circle,” said Goode, Ruby Jean’s Juicery founder. “I’m 33 now…
5 startups enjoy growth, connections with KCMO innovation partnership
Although the government may be pegged as resistant to change, Kansas City Mayor Sly James wants to flip the script. “On a city level, we aren’t having much help from the state and federal governments sometimes,” James said at the Innovation Partnership Program demo day on Monday at WeWork Corrigan Station. “But, we still have…
With fund now slashed, LaunchKC alumni say MTC vital to early success
PopBookings probably wouldn’t be in business today without the early support — and more critically the investment dollars — of the Missouri Technology Corporation, Erika Klotz said. “It really allowed us to do more quicker,” the PopBookings co-founder and CEO said. “For any startup, speed is everything. It allowed us to get credibility right out…

