RECAP - Kubecon 2025!

The Cloud Native Computing Foundation's annual flagship event, KubeCon + CloudNativeCon, lasted from November 11th to November 13th in Atlanta Georgia! This global conference convened developers, users, and technologists worldwide to share best practices for building, managing, and servicing cloud-native applications. The event was packed with hands-on workshops, technical talks, and valuable networking opportunities focused on the latest contributions to the open-source community! Some of the main focuses at Kubecon this year was the evolving needs of cloud-native computing, platform engineering and observability!

Ontario Tech's own Networking & IT Student Association (Netsoc) was proud to attend this year, as we were able to engage with key vendors like Chainguard, DDN, Cloudflare, Gmicloud, Harpoon.io, Ngrok, Heroku, Lambda, Tailscale and more! We shared the details of our unique academic program, which focuses not only on up to date technical concepts such as programming, AI, and machine-learning, but most importantly Computer Networking, IT, and Cybersecurity, crucial skills which are only in more demand as the need for skills in programming and AI continue to increase ! Furthermore, we sought the support for our upcoming annual CTF/Hackathon, TacOps! TacOps is recognized as one of the largest Capture The Flag events in the greater Toronto area which attracts over 200 students annually! This event offers the involved companies the dual opportunity to both support Netsoc and the program along with giving them the leverage to network and witness the skills of the emerging talent from the GTA with their own eyes, giving them the choice to recruit them as either interns or hiring them as new-grads after University! This year for TacOps, Netsoc is hopefully looking to go beyond hosting the event on campus and seeking to relocate it in the downtown core of Toronto, Ontario! The goal of this is to attract more students not just from Ontario Tech University, but also from across the GTA as a whole to make the event not only more available for a variety of students in the downtown core, but to also make the event more available for our sponsors for the upcoming CTF!

At the end of the day, Netsoc's primary goal at KubeCon was to forge stronger educational and professional partnerships—benefiting not only our school but also contributing to the strength of the Cybersecurity Market in Canada. Our presence at this premier event has been a tremendous asset in moving us closer to that objective, and we hope to return next year to connect with even more vendors and companies to expand our our school, our club, and our program as a whole!