This week concludes the end of our third Navigate North America event, which took place in San Francisco, California 💙
Over the two days, we were joined by an incredible lineup of keynote speakers, including Steve Wozniak, Kelsey Hightower, and Solomon Hykes. Marino Wijay, Lisa-Marie Namphy, Kim McMahon, and Julia Furst also joined us as hosts on the main stage.
As always, we want to thank everyone involved in this event, including our sponsors, attendees, speakers, and, most importantly, the Civo team. Over the two-day schedule, we hosted over 50 talks and workshops, hearing from speakers on topics ranging from developer productivity to sustainability and future innovations.
Keynote sessions
Steve Wozniak on the future of tech
After an opening keynote from Mark Boost, CEO of Civo, highlighting the importance of purpose-driven impact, Marino Wijay and Lisa-Marie Namphy welcomed Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak to the stage. During this fireside chat, Wozniak shared his thoughts on the nature of innovation, the importance of curiosity, and the driving force behind groundbreaking ideas.
This wasn’t Wozniak’s first time joining us at Navigate North America. Back at our inaugural event in Tampa, Florida, he sat down with Mark Boost and Dinesh Majrekar, CTO of Civo, to reflect on his early years, his relationship with Steve Jobs, and the founding of Apple. He also shared his predictions on the future of AI, self-driving cars, and the evolving tech landscape—topics that remain as relevant today as ever.
👉 Watch Steve Wozniak’s session from Navigate North America 2023
In his latest session, Wozniak reflected on the challenges and triumphs of innovation, sharing how bold ideas can not only overcome obstacles but also reshape entire industries. He stressed the importance of fostering creativity, thinking differently, and maintaining relentless curiosity as the foundation for meaningful advancements in technology.
Keynote with Kelsey Hightower
Joining us as a returning speaker, Kelsey Hightower gave an incredible opening keynote session on what is next for the tech industry. Through this session, he outlined the link between technology and human potential by encouraging attendees to think beyond today and imagine the possibilities of tomorrow.
After being announced as a board director of Civo on day 1, Kelsey joined Mark Boost and Dinesh Majrekar on the main stage for a fireside chat about his thoughts on the industry. When asked about the creativity of AI, Kelsey spoke about how the ideas produced by AI are not thinking outside the box. He explained that humans are inspired to do things they have never done before, which doesn’t stem from AI. It was at this point that Kelsey said:
“I want to create a space where I can be creative and where I can produce something that is hard to do. Nothing is wrong with AI, but the real intelligence is the people sitting next to you.”
Keynote with Solomon Hykes
Another familiar face joined us for Day 2: Solomon Hykes, Co-Founder and Former CTO of Docker and Co-Founder of Dagger. Solomon joined us on the main stage following Kelsey Hightower’s keynote session to speak about what AI agents mean for the software factory. Solomon took the time to speak about the future and what is awaiting us, starting the session with a quote: “behind every great product is a great factory”. During this keynote session, Solomon did a live demo whereby he used LLM-based agents to iterate on containerized software using Dagger.
👉 Watch Solomon Hykes’ session from Navigate North America 2024
Civo’s Latest Innovations
Civo Flexcore
During the event, we launched Flexcore, a plug-and-play private cloud appliance, offering businesses an easy and rapid way to deploy private cloud environments while integrating with AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. With features like managed Kubernetes, GPU acceleration, and AI/ML support, Flexcore addresses the rising demand for private cloud solutions as enterprises seek greater security, compliance, and control over their IT infrastructure.
“The demand for private cloud solutions has grown over the past year, as enterprises look to balance the demands of sovereignty and security with the scale that cloud can offer. Our research clearly shows that organizations are taking a hard look at their cloud strategies, especially in light of Broadcom's take over of VMWare, and private cloud is stepping into the spotlight. Whether it's the need for greater data security, regulatory compliance, or support for AI workloads, businesses are recognizing the tangible advantages of private cloud solutions. It's no longer just about cost-saving—it's about future-proofing IT infrastructure and gaining more control over operations." - Mark Boost, CEO of Civo
If you are interested in learning more about Civo Flexcore, check out these resources:
Over the upcoming weeks, we can’t wait to share more information with you all about how you can get started with Flexcore.
relaxAI
We also launched relaxAI, a privacy-first AI assistant running on 100% renewable energy, designed to give businesses full control over their data while ensuring compliance with UK laws. Built on Meta’s Llama model with proprietary fine-tuning, relaxAI offers advanced AI capabilities, transparent data handling, and cost-effective pricing, making it an ideal solution for regulated industries like healthcare, finance, and government.
“Governance and compliance concerns are the number one reason we hear from customers hesitant to adopt AI workloads. relaxAI is our answer to this problem. It allows businesses to unlock the potential of large language models without compromising on security or compliance. With relaxAI, customers can focus on innovation, not legal hurdles.”
Learn more about this release here.
Hot Topics from Navigate North America 2025
At Navigate North America 2025, we were lucky enough to be joined by industry leaders from organizations such as Netflix, Adobe, Mercedes-Benz, and Cisco. From almost 50 sessions, we were able to learn more about topics ranging from developer productivity to sustainability and future innovations. Here, we have outlined some of the hottest topics discussed at Navigate North America and where you can learn more 👇
Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML)
Each year, we release a blog highlighting some reflections and predictions for the upcoming year surrounding AI and ML:
- The Year of AI: Reflections and Predictions for 2024
- The Year of GPUs: Reflections and Predictions for 2025
This year, our Chief Innovation Officer, Josh Mesout, outlined how the growth of AI is not slowing down any time soon, which was showcased throughout a range of sessions at Navigate North America 2025. A highlight of this was from the main stage, where Josh Mesout, Jimil Patel, Nami Baral, Tristian Cormier, and Gaurav Bharaj took part in a panel discussion on the transformative trends, emerging challenges, and groundbreaking opportunities within AI and ML. Throughout this session, panelists shared the latest advancements in the industry, from the intricacies of neural networks to the complex ethical considerations and governance needed to guide responsible AI growth.
Other speakers such as Justin Garrison, Amit Kesarwani, and Manasa Hari also took on the topic of AI and ML in the AI and Emerging Tech Room. Manasa Hari’s session, Unlocking the Future: Harnessing AI and ML for Innovative Solutions, provided practical insights, essential tools, and real-world applications to help attendees become proficient in AI and ML. Through interactive discussions and hands-on exercises, attendees gained the confidence and skills needed to implement AI/ML solutions in their projects and industries.
Other sessions explored AI implementation from different angles. Justin Garrison’s talk, Edge AI from Nothing to LLM, focused on the complexities of building AI solutions for edge environments. He guided attendees through the hardware, architecture, and deployment steps necessary to build a Cloud Native Generative AI stack. Meanwhile, Kunal Kushwaha’s session, Simplifying ML Operations with GitOps: Deploy Your Own Private ChatGPT, showcased how GitOps can streamline ML operations, with a live demo deploying a private ChatGPT using Llama 3.
Developer Productivity
Developer productivity was another theme at Navigate North America 2025, with sessions exploring how teams can work smarter, ship faster, and deliver high-quality results without compromising sustainability or resilience.
A panel discussion with Benjie De Groot, Nathen Harvey, Irina Nazarova, and Solomon Hykes tackled the challenges of fostering developer productivity within organizations. They shared practical advice on launching productivity initiatives, assessing current developer experience (DevEx), and scaling improvements across teams. The panel explored frameworks like DORA metrics, best practices for measuring and enhancing productivity, and the importance of “shift-left” strategies in release processes.
Sustainability
Since the first Navigate event took place, we have been continuing to share information on the impact of sustainability in the tech industry. To check out some of our past sessions on this topic, check out these recordings:
- Sustainable Futures: Revolutionizing Data Centers and Tech Practices
- Future of Our Planet: Isabella Boost's Urgent Message to the Tech World
- Unlocking the Secrets to Sustainable Data Centers
This year was no different as Dinesh Majrekar, Suleiman Mirzad, Dr. Thomas McDonald, Simon Hansford, and Hui Wen Chan took to the stage to address the tech industry’s responsibility to reduce its environmental impact. Panelists explored strategies to enhance energy efficiency and lower carbon emissions across various technology sectors. They examined how energy-intensive technologies like GPUs contribute to a growing carbon footprint and discussed innovative solutions to mitigate these effects.
The panel also highlighted how sustainable practices in software development can make a difference, from optimizing code to choosing energy-efficient programming languages. Beyond technical strategies, the conversation extended to industry-wide initiatives, questioning the effectiveness of current sustainability metrics and the need for stronger governance.
Community and Sponsor Highlights
We had the pleasure of being joined by an amazing group of sponsors, such as Pure Storage, New Relic, StackGen, Konstruct, Defense.com, Dagger, Firefly, and Codezero. For 2 days, our sponsors joined us in San Francisco for some great conversations and live demos of their product offerings 👇
Once again, we want to say a massive thank you to all of our sponsors who made this event possible. Over the upcoming weeks, we will update our website with more event information and upload all recordings. Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram, X, and Bluesky to keep up with these announcements.
Upcoming Navigate Events
During this event, we announced our upcoming Navigate event: Navigate Local Texas 2025.
Navigate Local Austin 2025
After the success of Navigate North America 2024, we will be returning to Austin, Texas, for a one-day event on May 14th, 2025. We are now offering tickets for this event at just $50. Secure your spot to join us in Austin, Texas, and be a part of this unique experience in the cloud native world > https://www.civo.com/navigate/local/austin-2025
If you’re interested in learning more about this upcoming event, check out our announcement video with highlights from our time in Austin, Texas 👇
