AWS Community Day Switzerland | Zürich

AWS Community Day Switzerland 2024 — Zürich

There’s something unique about the AWS community in Switzerland. The atmosphere in Zürich was calm, focused, and deeply technical - the kind of environment where conversations don’t stay on the surface. People came ready to learn, ask, question, compare, and build.

AWS Community Day Switzerland is fully community-driven - organized by volunteers, supported by local user groups, and shaped by the builders who attend. The event brought together engineers, architects, researchers, students, and leaders from companies all across the region, with a shared mindset:
“Let’s solve real problems. Let’s make this practical.”

The Talk: Plug-and-Play AI with Amazon Q Business

I spoke about Plug-and-Play AI - specifically, how to use Amazon Q Business and other pre-trained AWS AI services to bring intelligence into workflows without building everything from scratch.

This session focused on a question I hear often in real consulting work:
“How can we adopt AI without committing to a full ML platform or long development cycles?”

We explored:

• Where pre-trained AI models make sense - and where they don’t
• How to start with Q Business for knowledge retrieval & assistant workflows
• Using Amazon Rekognition and SageMaker selectively, when needed
• How to evaluate data readiness realistically (not idealistically)
• How to scale without losing cost control or maintainability

The goal wasn’t to “add AI everywhere” - it was to show how to introduce AI responsibly and intentionally, based on real business needs and existing systems.

Why Community Days Matter

Events like this remind me why community is so important in the world of Cloud and AI:

• Because knowledge grows when we share it
• Because no single company can hold all perspectives
• Because learning accelerates when we learn together

Community Days are where new ideas start - in hallway conversations, not slide decks.

Grateful for This One

Thank you to Rinon, Gloria and all the organizers of AWS Community Day Switzerland for creating a space where learning feels genuine - and thoughtful.
Thank you to everyone who came to the talk, asked questions, challenged assumptions, or continued the discussion over coffee.

I’ll definitely be back.