Audience : Business Decision Maker

Wednesday 12:40 PM - 1:00 PM · Expo Innovation Theater

AI for BI: A Practical Guide to Avoiding Common Pitfalls

Marius Moscovici

Marius Moscovici

CEO

Every BI platform now includes AI—from Microsoft Fabric CoPilot to standalone chatbots. Yet without a unified strategy, these tools create fragmented user experiences and governance risks. This session introduces a clear Reference Architecture for implementing AI for BI at scale—helping enterprises eliminate silos, ensure control, and build a sustainable, scalable system.

Wednesday 12:40 PM - 1:00 PM · Expo Solution Theater

How to build a 360-degree view of customers, suppliers, or contacts across OneLake

Michael Destein

Michael Destein

VP, Technology Alliances, Quantexa

Learn how to create a 360-degree, contextual view across all your OneLake data in Microsoft Fabric. See how to perform high-quality data matching using Entity Resolution techniques across different entity types, eg. people, businesses and locations. Accurately link data across sources and enrich incomplete data. Break down silos and get your data ready for AI, powering better and faster decisions.

Wednesday 1:10 PM - 1:30 PM · Expo Innovation Theater

Brewing Better Decisions for a Dunkin Donuts Franchisee with Microsoft Fabric

Darren Goonawardana

Darren Goonawardana

Collectiv CEO

Dennis Carriere

Dennis Carriere

Collectiv, Head of Client Success

Learn how Bluemont Group transformed Data & AI across 100 Dunkin’ locations by replacing a vendor-controlled data warehouse with a modern, fully owned Microsoft Fabric platform. Learn how Collectiv helped them eliminate multi-day data delays, unlock historical insights, and empower managers with real-time, location-level visibility.

Wednesday 1:10 PM - 1:30 PM · Expo Insight Theater

Automate Decision Workflows in Microsoft Fabric

Kumar Thangamuthu

Kumar Thangamuthu

Senior Product Manager, Data Governance

Organizations must act on data fast—but speed without governance creates risk. SAS® Decision Builder on Microsoft Fabric automates governed decision workflows, uniting business rules, analytics, Python, ML, and compliance in one Fabric-native experience. Deliver AI-powered insights and actions with enterprise-grade transparency and control.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · TMB 2-3

CORENOTE: The Roadmap for Microsoft SQL: Ground to Cloud to Fabric

Anna Hoffmann

Anna Hoffmann

Bob Ward

Bob Ward

Principal Architect, Microsoft Azure Data

Priya Sathy

Priya Sathy

Partner Director of Product, SQL Databases at Microsoft

Join us for an in-depth session on the future of Microsoft SQL—from on-premises to Azure and into Microsoft Fabric. Discover our unified, AI-ready relational database that powers modernization and next-gen AI apps. See how SQL delivers consistency, performance, and innovation everywhere you need it!

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · B401-B402

Designing for the Right User: Why Personas Are the Secret to Better Power BI Reports

Elena Drakulevska

Elena Drakulevska

where Power BI meets UX Design and a little magic ✨ | Microsoft MVP

Reports don’t fail because you’re bad at design. They fail because they’re built for the wrong user. Learn how to identify the real “characters” behind your Power BI reports, from the big-picture strategist to the action-taker and the detail-obsessed analyst, and how to tailor layout, detail, and interactions so each user gets what they need to make confident decisions.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · B308-B309

CORENOTE: The Future of AI in Microsoft Fabric: Data Agents and Beyond

Markus Weimer

Markus Weimer

Engineering lead, AI @ Fabric

Nellie Gustafsson

Nellie Gustafsson

Microsoft, Principal Product Manager

This session will cover how Fabric brings AI to your data using interoperable Data Agents that work across the AI ecosystem to unlock deeper insights. You’ll also learn how AI-powered data engineering and data science capabilities help teams create intelligent, enterprise-ready solutions.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · B313b-B314

End-to-End Security for Data Warehousing in Microsoft Fabric

Shabnam Watson

Shabnam Watson

Data & Solution Architect

Learn how to secure Microsoft Fabric Warehouses end-to-end. Explore private links, conditional access, workspace roles, item-level permissions, and granular T-SQL controls for object, row, and column-level security. Plus, see dynamic data masking and OneLake security for SQL endpoints in action.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · B406b-B407

Two Architectures, One Data Source: Exploring Medallion and Real-Time Intelligence in Fabric

Ioana Bouariu

Ioana Bouariu

Data girl at Avinor

What happens when you use the same data source to develop 2 distinct architectures? We built two POCs: one lakehouse medallion and one RTI. Curious what we ended up with? In this session, we’ll explore how these differ, share lessons learned, and show how to align batch and RTI designs. One, the other, or both - we'll give you practical insights for you to decide the best approach for your needs.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · TMB 1

Building Next-Gen Apps with Power Platform and SQL Server 2025

Alex Rostan

Alex Rostan

Microsoft Business Applications MVP

Gaston Cruz

Gaston Cruz

MVP Data Platform & AI / Senior Director - Slalom USA

SQL Server 2025 introduces new capabilities that make it easier than ever to build secure, scalable applications with Power Platform. We’ll explore how to connect Power Apps to SQL 2025, take advantage of improved performance and security. You’ll learn best practices and architecture patterns that let you modernize your SQL-backed Bizz Apps with low code without rewriting your data layer.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · C211-C213

Decoding Fabric Licensing

Kristyna Ferris

Kristyna Ferris

Solution Architect at P3 Adaptive

Navigate the complexities of Microsoft Fabric licensing with real-world scenarios. Learn the differences between Pro, Premium, and Fabric licenses. We will compare pricing models, estimate costs, and avoid budgeting traps to enable smarter, cost-savvy decisions about your data environment.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · C101

Touch your data with Real Time Intelligence

Dominick Raimato

Dominick Raimato

Professional Troublemaker

Event driven data architectures are an easy way to drive quick insights and value. Enter real time intelligence within Fabric. This session will allow you to have a tangible experience by manipulating data within the room. Leveraging devices, you will learn how to build your own physical proof of concept that will help you get buy in from your organization to make this part of your environment!

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · C301

Connected Data Meets Business Context: Driving Outcomes with FabricIQ

Darren King

Darren King

Turn Data into Competitive Advantage: Leverage It as a Strategic Asset

EY’s work with FabricIQ and Ontology shows how enterprises can unify data across silos, embed agents into operations, and create a live, knowledge-rich view of the business. In this session, we’ll share EY’s own journey as “client zero” alongside client scenarios, focusing on real-world outcomes: improved responsiveness, reduced manual effort, and trusted governance at scale.

Wednesday 1:45 PM - 2:45 PM · C302

Planning & Writeback on Top of Semantic Models

Liran Edelist

Liran Edelist

Chief Product Officer, Lumel

Unlock hidden ROI by turning your existing semantic layer into a full planning engine. This innovation eliminates duplicate EPM systems, unifies actuals and plans, and delivers real-time, governed insights. By activating write-back directly to Fabric, organizations cut cost, boost agility, and transform planning into a seamless extension of analytics.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · C111-C112

CORENOTE: Power BI Roadmap: Strategy, Vision, and Demos

Nico Cristache

Nico Cristache

Microsoft, CVP of Power BI

Sara Vredevoogd

Sara Vredevoogd

Principal Product Manager at Microsoft

Power BI empowers organizations to turn insights into actions and deliver enterprise analytics at scale in Fabric. In this session discover why businesses standardize on Power BI, learn about building a data-driven culture, and get a first look at upcoming features that unlock your data’s potential.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · B401-B402

CORENOTE: Transform Your Business with Fabric Real-Time Intelligene

Tessa Kloster

Tessa Kloster

Principal Product Manager @ Microsoft

Yitzhak Kesselman

Yitzhak Kesselman

CVP - Messaging & Real-Time Analytics Platform

Real Time Intelligence helps businesses transform with real-time insights, analytics and actions built for the era of AI. This session will cover key features, capabilities, and the impact it has on operational efficiency and decision-making processes. We will also highlight customer success stories and showcase how you can revolutionize your data strategy and unlock new opportunities for growth.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · B308-B309

CORENOTE: Governing your data estate with Microsoft Purview Data Governance

Shafiq Mannan

Shafiq Mannan

Principal Product Manager, Purview Unified Catalog. Microsoft Purview

Sita Dontharaju

Sita Dontharaju

Principal Product Manager, Microsoft Purview

Learn how Microsoft Purview Data Governance empowers users to democratize data with its enterprise catalog. This session will cover:

  1. Key Data Governance challenges

  2. How Purview simplifies Data Governance

  3. New innovations within the Unified Catalog

  4. End to end demo of Purview

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · TMB 4

Make Managed Self-Service BI Work for You with Power BI and Purview (the BI Mullet Approach)

Lenore Flower

Lenore Flower

Consultant & Trainer - Data Plumber LLC

When designed well, a managed self-service BI approach strikes the perfect balance between centralized data discipline and flexible self-service reporting. This session will demonstrate how smart Power BI implementation (including centrally maintained semantic models, report templates, and administration) saves time, money, and headaches when paired with Purview's Unified Catalog.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · C108-C109

Unlocking Copilot in Fabric: Administration, Governance, and Beyond!

Dan English

Dan English

Microsoft, Principal Program Manager | Fabric CAT

Sandeep Pawar

Sandeep Pawar

Principal Program Manager

Join us for an engaging Copilot in Fabric session covering administration, governance, enablement strategies, and capacity management. We’ll also explore Data Agent, Standalone Copilot, Power BI Agent, and how Microsoft Purview Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) for AI helps monitor AI use. We will cover real-world scenarios and best practices turning governance into a strategic advantage.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · C101

Securing Your Data Estate with Purview

Marthe Moengen

Marthe Moengen

Microsoft Data Platform MVP | Managing Data Analyst at Sopra Steria

As AI adoption grows, so does the importance of strong governance and compliance. Let's explore how Purview can support you Fabric environment!

We’ll cover key features like Data Loss Prevention (DLP), sensitivity labeling, and data access governance. What they do, and how they work in real-world scenarios, and where there may be opportunities to further mature your implementation.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · C301

Agentic AI for data engineering and vibe analytics on MS Fabric

Prashant Dahalkar

Prashant Dahalkar

Senior Vice President

This session introduces how Agentic AI combined with MS Fabric transforms data engineering and vibe analytics. How autonomous, goal-driven agents automate ingestion, transformation, and data quality with adaptability and governance? With Fabric’s unified offerings and vibe analytics on sentiment and behavior, organizations gain a faster, scalable, intelligent data ecosystem for smarter decisions.

Wednesday 3:05 PM - 4:05 PM · C302

Performance Management with Fabric: The Next Frontier of Organizational Intelligence

Noah Mattern

Noah Mattern

Data & AI Solution Director

Richard Lamorena

Richard Lamorena

Practice Leader, Data & AI

This session will explore how the principles behind "Performance Management IQ"—an analogy inspired by Microsoft’s new "Work IQ," "Fabric IQ," and "Foundry IQ" products—can be realized using Fabric as the central data platform for AI-ready insights. Finance, operations, and HR data become harmonized in Fabric to enable powerful performance management insights for analytics, data science, and AI.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · B401-B402

Create a Single Source of Truth for Your Data, AI, and Actions

Yitzhak Kesselman

Yitzhak Kesselman

CVP - Messaging & Real-Time Analytics Platform

When business data, models, and AI agents operate in silos, your organization struggles with inconsistent insights and fragmented decision-making. Microsoft Fabric solves this by providing a unified semantic foundation that connects everything into a single intelligent framework. Explore customer stories and see how enterprise-wide semantic clarity improves AI agent reasoning. Learn to design semantic models that unify your data assets and enable your organization to operate with greater clarity and agility.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · B308-B309

CORENOTE: OneLake, the unified data lake for the era of AI

Dipti Borkar

Dipti Borkar

Josh Caplan

Josh Caplan

Partner Director of Product - Microsoft

Microsoft OneLake eliminates data silos with a single intelligent storage system and provides a unified access point for all your data. This session will show you the latest capabilities coming to OneLake designed to help you unify data across clouds, secure, govern, and improve data discoverability in the OneLake catalog, and enable data sharing across domains—ensuring all data is AI-ready.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · B406b-B407

Azure SQL MI Unleashed: Inside the Next‑Gen GP & What’s Coming Next

Vladimir Ivanovic

Vladimir Ivanovic

Principal Program Manager, SQL Managed Instance

If you plan to migrate and modernize your SQL workloads in the cloud, Azure SQL Managed Instance (SQL MI) is your best choice - now reimagined for speed, scale, and flexibility. In this session we will deep‑dive into the Next‑Gen SQL MI GP architecture and how it delivers faster performance, greater scalability and smarter resource tuning, making it a great choice for your key database workloads.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · TMB 4

Driving Cost-Efficient Data Architectures for SQL Server, Azure SQL and Fabric using FinOps

Hamish Watson

Hamish Watson

DevOps Alchemist

Learn how to optimise SQL Server, Azure SQL and Fabric costs using FinOps practices and AI-driven insights. We’ll explore key cost drivers, show how AI detects inefficiencies, forecasts spend, recommends right-sizing, and helps design smarter, cost-efficient data architectures across hybrid and cloud environments.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · C108-C109

Talk to Your Data: The Future of Data Interaction with AI

Danny Kruge

Danny Kruge

Data Platform MVP | Mission Critical Engineer from Schuberg Philis

In the evolving world of data, the ability to interact with your datasets and databases using natural language is a game-changer. This session will introduce you to the power of Azure OpenAI, Azure SQL, and Microsoft Fabric, showing you how to break down barriers that have traditionally required.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · C208-C210

From Transactions to Analytics: Transforming MySQL Data with Fabric Mirroring

Avnish Rastogi

Avnish Rastogi

Microsoft, Principal Product Manager for Azure MySQL

Stuti Singh

Stuti Singh

Partner Alliances- Quadrant Technologies

Fabric-enabled Azure Database for MySQL lets users replicate Azure MySQL Server data into Microsoft Fabric for real-time analytics and reporting - without ETL complexity. Discover its architecture, roadmap, and a live demo showing how Mirroring in Fabric unifies transactional and analytical insights.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · C301

AI-Driven MDM on Microsoft Fabric: Build the Intelligent Golden Record

Mehul Thacker

Mehul Thacker

Director at DynaTech Systems Inc

Discover how to build an AI-powered Master Data Management solution on Microsoft Fabric. Learn how AI models identify duplicates, enrich data, and create a reliable golden record. See practical patterns that improve data quality, downstream analytics, and enterprise operational efficiency.

Wednesday 4:25 PM - 5:25 PM · C302

CI/CD and DevOps for Power BI: Beyond the Happy Path

Amir Sarir

Amir Sarir

Senior BI Solutions Engineer at Motio

Edwin Van Megesen

Edwin Van Megesen

Delivering DevOps for a Safeguarded Power BI Experience

CI/CD is vital to efficient and governed Power BI delivery, yet Azure DevOps rarely follows the “happy path.” This session exposes the burden of manual steps, merge conflicts, and the limitations of GIT. Next, full-automated alternatives will be evaluated, covering zero-touch version control, enhanced lineage, advanced deployment workflows, and some of the associated pitfalls.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · TMB 2-3

Power BI Copilot Roadmap: What's New and Coming Soon

Anita Ambalavanan

Anita Ambalavanan

Senior Product Manager, Power BI, Microsoft

Lada Hill

Lada Hill

Microsoft, Program Manager

This session will cover recent updates and the roadmap for Copilot in Power BI. We'll chat about new and existing capabilities to help improve your Power BI Copilot experience so you get the most out of your data. Featuring lots of demos and cutting-edge information, this session is one you don't want to miss.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C113-C114

What’s new in Fabric capacities and capacity monitoring

Lukasz Pawlowski

Lukasz Pawlowski

Pankaj Arora

Pankaj Arora

Director, Microsoft

Capacities are the foundation for all Microsoft Fabric workloads. This session will provide an overview of what’s new in Fabric capacities including new capacity governance capabilities that help you get ahead of outages and improvements to monitoring experiences in the Capacity Metrics App and Real Time Hub. We will also share best practices to help you better manage your capacities at scale.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · B401-B402

OneLake for SharePoint – From list and documents, to AI

Miquella de Boer

Miquella de Boer

Principal Product Manager Lead, OneLake

Shireen Bahadur

Shireen Bahadur

Product Manager, Microsoft

Discover how OneLake brings SharePoint lists and documents into a unified data foundation, enabling seamless integration with Microsoft Fabric. Learn how to unlock AI-powered insights and analytics directly from your SharePoint content—transforming collaboration into intelligent decision-making.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · B313b-B314

Once Upon a Report: The Storytelling Power of Power BI

Julia Boe

Julia Boe

TruNorth Dynamics, Functional Consultant, Certified Power BI

Every great report has a plot, characters, and a message. In this interactive session, you’ll learn how to weave storytelling principles into Power BI design—using data to guide, persuade, and engage your audience. From color psychology to narrative structure, discover how to make your reports feel less like spreadsheets and more like experiences.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · B405-B406a

The Genesis of Fabric Warehouse: A Deep Dive into Its Foundations

Joanna Podgoetsky

Joanna Podgoetsky

Fabric Warehouse Product Leader

Join us for an inside look at the evolution of the Fabric Warehouse. Discover how we built the industry’s first SaaS cloud-scale data warehouse built natively over an open data format and born into Microsoft Fabric. Explore innovations that deliver out-of-the-box performance at scale and get an exclusive preview of the cutting-edge features we’ve recently launched and what’s coming next.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C108-C109

Get Proactive: Building Autonomous Operations Agents with Fabric IQ

Greg Nash

Greg Nash

MVP Data Platform | Power BI Unicorn | Power Platform & Power BI user group leader in Melbourne

Traditional monitoring and alerting is reactive and teams spend valuable time manually analyzing data and coordinating responses. In this session, we will learn how to configure operations agents to autonomously monitor real-time data, reason over business context using semantic ontologies, and take actions automatically to optimize outcomes before issues escalate.

Thursday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C208-C210

The instant insights pipeline: OneLake shortcuts + Dataverse + Power Apps

Alex Rostan

Alex Rostan

Microsoft Business Applications MVP

Gaston Cruz

Gaston Cruz

MVP Data Platform & AI / Senior Director - Slalom USA

What if your business apps could power real-time analytics without complex ETL? In this session, we’ll look at how Power Apps and Dataverse connect directly to Microsoft Fabric using OneLake shortcuts, so your data is available almost in real time. You’ll learn how it works and the key tips to build solutions where everyday business actions turn into insights within seconds.

Thursday 9:30 AM - 9:50 AM · Expo Innovation Theater

Transform your data platform into an AI-ready foundation for growth

Ravi Gunturu

Ravi Gunturu

VP of Data & AI @ Bitwise

Modernize your end-to-end data platform to Fabric and unlock AI/ML enabled potential in workloads, analytics, and collaboration. During this session, we will focus on agentic AI methods of automation during the migration process, achieving 60% improvement in productivity.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C113-C114

Accelerate Data Transformation with Dataflows Gen2 in Microsoft Fabric

Miguel Llopis

Miguel Llopis

Group Product Manager, Citizen Data Integration @ Microsoft

Mihir Wagle

Mihir Wagle

Principal Product Manager @ Microsoft Fabric

Dataflows Gen2 in Fabric Data Factory provides a low-code data transformation feature in Fabric that accelerates your time to production. The Dataflows Product Team will share future product plans and provide deep dive insights into how to take advantage of Dataflows Gen2 in Fabric.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · B308-B309

Fabric IQ: Unlock Enterprise AI with a Unified Semantic Layer

Chafia Aouissi

Chafia Aouissi

Group Product Manager

Jomit Vaghela

Jomit Vaghela

Product Lead

Without shared business definitions, AI agents give inconsistent answers and your teams waste time reconciling conflicting data. Fabric IQ creates a governed, shared semantic foundation that models your business spanning entities, relationships, and rules. See how Fabric IQ builds on existing assets like Power BI semantic models, binds with live data, and enables AI agents to answer richer questions. Learn to extend your semantic models, connect live data sources, and enable AI agents to drive intelligent, automated decisions.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · TMB 4

Building and Deploying Smarter Data Agents in Microsoft Fabric

Amir Jafari

Amir Jafari

Senior Product Manager

Misha Desai

Misha Desai

Principal Product Manager

Learn how to build and deploy smarter data agents in Fabric. We’ll show how to add richer context, connect new data sources, and use the latest intelligent capabilities. You’ll also see how to enable your agent in MCP, Teams, M365, Foundry, and more—making insights available to users wherever they work.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C108-C109

How Much is Fabric | Strategies for Managing and Estimating Fabric Capacity Expense

Jim Hill

Jim Hill

Principal Business Intelligence Engineer - BambooHR

Nathan Giullian

Nathan Giullian

EnterBridge - Engagement Manager

Learn how to accurately estimate and control Microsoft Fabric capacity costs in today’s cloud‑driven world. We’ll cover key drivers like workload patterns, utilization, and scaling, and walk through practical models, examples, and best practices to align Fabric spend with your organization’s performance and budget goals.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C202-C204

Best Practices for SQL Database Backup Configuration, Immutability, and Ransomware Protection

Dinakar Nethi

Dinakar Nethi

Principal Product Manager, Microsoft

Rajesh Setlem

Rajesh Setlem

Learn best practices for Azure SQL Database backup configuration and ransomware protection. Explore PITR and LTR strategies, backup immutability, and deletion safeguards to ensure compliance and resilience. Gain actionable insights to secure data, prevent tampering, and maintain business continuity.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C208-C210

Turn It On: The Power of Query Store for Rapid Performance Tuning

Monica Morehouse (Rathbun)

Monica Morehouse (Rathbun)

Denny Cherry & Associates Consulting

I rely on Query Store every day—it lets me uncover performance issues in minutes, even without knowing the app code. If you want real insight into plan choices, regressions, and control over execution plans, you need to turn it on. Learn how to configure it, use its DMVs, spot plan changes fast, and finally answer, “Why was my query slow?”

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C211-C213

Trusted Analytics: Data Quality in Microsoft Fabric & Purview

Shafiq Mannan

Shafiq Mannan

Principal Product Manager, Purview Unified Catalog. Microsoft Purview

Wolfgang Strasser

Wolfgang Strasser

data juggler

Unlock next-level data quality with the combined power of Microsoft Purview and Fabric. Discover how Fabric’s built-in governance creates truly trusted data assets, while Purview’s profiling, rules, scoring, and alerts deliver end-to-end visibility across lakehouses, warehouses, and semantic models. Leave with practical steps to confidently govern, monitor, and elevate your data quality.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C301

Unity in Action – Building Enterprise AI on a Unified Semantic Foundation

Chandler Stevens

Chandler Stevens

Vice President - Solutions Engineering

Subbu Muthukrishnan

Subbu Muthukrishnan

Democratizing Data to Drive Actionable Insights

Enterprise AI requires unified semantic foundations where governance and intelligence flow seamlessly. Learn to architect data platform that use Ontology as your semantic backbone, Data Agents for insights, and Operational Agents for action. Through real-world examples, discover how organizations use AI agents to reliably detect, contextualize, attribute, and act on governed data.

Thursday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · B404

Optimizing Workloads on Azure PostgreSQL Flexible Server: Best Practices for Speed & Scale

Surbhi Pokharna

Surbhi Pokharna

Charles River Development, Director, Global Cloud Data Platform & AI Solution Delivery

Explore how to get peak performance from Azure PostgreSQL Flexible Server. We cover compute tiers, storage tuning, autoscaling, connection management, and monitoring essentials to ensure your PostgreSQL workloads run reliably and efficiently at any scale.

Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · B313b-B314

Build Your First Digital Employee: A Guide to Operations Agent in Fabric

Italo Lima

Italo Lima

Senior Staff Data Scientist

Kati Iceva

Kati Iceva

Group Engineering Manager, Real-Time Intelligence Unified Experiences

Manually monitoring pipelines, handling incidents, and executing workflows doesn't scale and it burns out your team. Operations agents in Microsoft Fabric provide true autonomy by handling these tasks independently. Explore how to architect agents that monitor pipelines, respond to incidents, and execute complex workflows without human intervention. Learn to configure agent rules, establish governance guardrails, and scale your operations with AI-driven reliability.

Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · B405-B406a

Azure SQL Database vs. SQL Database in Fabric: Key Differences for Developers and DBAs

John Morehouse

John Morehouse

Principal Consultant

Curious about the differences between Azure SQL Database and SQL database in Fabric? This session is perfect for developers and DBAs looking to understand the core architecture differences of these two platforms. Whether you’re optimizing an existing solution or planning your next project, this session will help you make informed decisions & maximize the value of these services.

Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C105-C106

Microsoft Fabric AI: Copilots, Data Agents & Real‑World Extensions

Bradley Ball

Bradley Ball

Microsoft - Sr. Technical Program Manager

Build RAG patterns in minutes. We’ll show data agents, prompts, complex queries, and connecting to Microsoft Fabric data. Explore Copilots across services—what they are, how they differ—extend data agents from Fabric to Copilot Studio, to Microsoft Teams, M365 Copilot, Microsoft Foundry, and the Python SDK. After we build this out, let's test Row Level and Column level security in our agents!

Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C202-C204

Performance Tuning Tips for Fabric Data Factory

Chris Webb

Chris Webb

Principal Program Manager, Microsoft

Mohan Sankaran

Mohan Sankaran

Microsoft, VP Engineering

Join us for an in-depth session on Performance Tuning Tips for Fabric Data Factory, with a focus on the Dataflow Gen2, Pipeline, and Copy Job artifacts.

Discover strategies to optimize your data workflows, enhance efficiency, and maximize performance. Don’t miss out on expert insights that can revolutionize your data management practices.

Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C101

Busy is a Four-Letter Word

Jes Chapman

Jes Chapman

Cloud Solution Architect @ Microsoft

If I ask you, "How are you?", is your default answer, "I'm so busy!"? Why do we measure our worth by how much we are doing, rather than by the value of what we do? What does this have to do with a technical conference? Join me as I share with you how I, too, was too busy for too long, but am learning how to do less, be more productive, and have bigger impact at work, the community, and at home.

Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C302

Breaking Barriers: Unlock AI’s True Potential in a Data-Driven World

Anil Nagaraj

Anil Nagaraj

PwC, Principal, Data Engineering & Analytics

AI adoption comes with hurdles—from legacy systems to cultural shifts. This panel features executive leaders who have overcome major challenges to achieve AI-driven transformation and share their Data & AI breakthroughs. Learn how they tackled roadblocks, unlocked hidden value, and set their organizations on a path to sustainable AI success.

Thursday 1:10 PM - 1:30 PM · Expo Innovation Theater

Where Data Meets Opportunity: Drive Business Value with Location Insights

Sean McGinnis

Sean McGinnis

Esri Principal Product Manager, ArcGIS for Microsoft product family

Join Esri to see how location intelligence can revolutionize your data strategy and give your organization a competitive edge. Esri's ArcGIS technology brings interactive mapping and advanced location-based analytics to Microsoft Fabric. Discover real-world success stories and learn how organizations are using location intelligence to uncover patterns, predict trends, and make smarter decisions.

Thursday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · B308-B309

Unify your data estate across clouds and on-premises with Shortcuts and Mirrori

Maraki Ketema

Maraki Ketema

Principal Product Manager, Microsoft

Miquella de Boer

Miquella de Boer

Principal Product Manager Lead, OneLake

As data volumes grow, managing an organization-wide data estate is increasingly complex. This session will deep dive into the latest capabilities to unify your data in OneLake via shortcuts and mirroring. Join us to learn how to unify your data estate, streamline ingestion, and unlock new business insights using AI and analytics.

Thursday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · B406b-B407

Connect Your Data with Graph: Why Relationships Matter for AI

Igal Amster

Igal Amster

Microsoft - Group Product Manager

Justin Fine

Justin Fine

Microsoft- Principal Product Manager

AI makes poor business decisions when it can't see how things connect - customers to orders, assets to events, signals to root causes. Graph captures these relationships and lets you explore them with natural language, no queries needed. See how Graph surfaces hidden patterns and enriches AI reasoning. Learn to model entity relationships, query connections using natural language, and turn complex data into clear, actionable insights for your AI agents.

Thursday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · TMB 4

Leveraging Governance inside your Microsoft Fabric Tenant and Workspace

Heidi Hasting

Heidi Hasting

Consultant

Martin Catherall

Martin Catherall

Doing data since day dot!

Microsoft Fabric's tenant and workspace settings are powerful governance tools often used in isolation. Discover overlooked Microsoft Fabric settings that collectively create a robust governance solution. Learn how to implement a strong data mesh architecture enabling business departments to self-manage governance and minimize IT dependencies. See live demonstrations of these powerful features.

Thursday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · C105-C106

Powering Data with AI Functions in Fabric

Rana Singh

Rana Singh

Virginia Roman

Virginia Roman

Senior Product Manager, Microsoft

Explore how AI functions in Microsoft Fabric can enhance the way you work with data. In this session, we’ll share the latest updates, highlight new capabilities, and walk through practical examples that demonstrate how AI functions can enrich datasets, surface insights, and streamline workflows.

Thursday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · C202-C204

Govern, manage, and protect your data in Microsoft Fabric

Iqbal Khan

Iqbal Khan

Product Engineer @ Microsoft

Yaron Canari

Yaron Canari

Product manager, Power BI, Microsoft

Learn how you can govern and protect your data at every step of its journey with powerful, built-in tools in Fabric. Plus, see how Fabric integrates with other industry-leading governance and security solutions like Microsoft Purview for estate-wide and advanced capabilities.

Thursday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · C208-C210

Fabric IQ + Foundry IQ: Unifying data and knowledge for agentic AI

Chafia Aouissi

Chafia Aouissi

Group Product Manager

Farzad Sunavala

Farzad Sunavala

Principal Program Manager, Azure AI Search - Microsoft

Join Microsoft experts for a strategic look at Fabric IQ and Foundry IQ—how they bring business meaning to data and unify enterprise knowledge to ground every agent. See roadmap updates across semantic modeling, multi‑source retrieval, governance, and observability that move you beyond basic RAG to trustworthy, scalable agentic workflows.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · C113-C114

What's new in Mirroring SQL to Fabric: The Fast Track to Modern Data Integration & Analytics

Ajay Jagannathan

Ajay Jagannathan

Principal Group Program Manager

Idris Motiwala

Idris Motiwala

Principal Product Manager

As organizations navigate the era of generative AI, advanced analytics, and rapid digital transformation, the ability to extract timely business insights is more critical than ever. This session deep dives into SQL Mirroring in Microsoft Fabric that enables organizations with near real-time data replication from source SQL databases to OneLake, all without building intricate ETL processes.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · B312-B313a

Simplify Geospatial Analytics with Maps in Fabric

Andre Terceros

Andre Terceros

Sr Technical Program Manager - Fabric Maps - Microsoft

Johannes Kebeck

Johannes Kebeck

Product Manager, Microsoft

Geospatial analytics traditionally requires specialized tools and expertise, creating barriers for teams that need location-based insights. Real-Time Intelligence in Fabric changes this by bringing "living maps" to everyone. Explore how to work with high-velocity, large-volume geospatial data from ingestion and processing to visualization and actions. Learn to create real-time map visualizations, process location data, and provide spatial context for your users and AI agents.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · B313b-B314

Master Eventhouse Patterns for Real-Time Intelligence at Scale

Brad Watts

Brad Watts

Principal Product Manager - Fabric RTI - Microsoft

Christopher Schmidt

Christopher Schmidt

Principal Program Manager, Microsoft

Processing millions of events while maintaining historical context and automating decisions is one of the hardest challenges in enterprise data. Eventhouse and Real-Time Intelligence solve this with proven patterns used in production today. See how organizations process events at scale, automate decisions, and combine real-time and historical data for business operations. Learn the architectures powering AI and analytics in production and patterns you can apply immediately.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · B406b-B407

Microsoft Purview Data Security protections in the Age of AI

Darren Portillo

Darren Portillo

Product Marketing for Microsoft Purview

Learn how Microsoft Purview Data Security helps you discover risks and protect data consistently across your entire estate, with a focus on your Fabric estate. This session will introduce newer innovations and cover capabilities such as Information Protection, Data Loss Prevention and Data Security Posture Management.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · TMB 1

Ignite Governance Insights Across Databases, Lakes, and Models

Karen Lopez

Karen Lopez

Data Evangelist for InfoAdvisors, Space Enthusiast, & TeamData Coach

Turn data governance into a productivity boost for Azure SQL Database, Fabric SQL Database, and Fabric Data Warehouse architectures and engineering. Gain efficiency and confidence in every deployment. Learn how cataloging, classification, lineage, and quality workflows integrate with databases and pipelines to improve trust, and enable secure, compliant data for engineering teams.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · C101

Talking about mental health - For you and for them

Traci Sewell

Traci Sewell

Tech-adjacent mind fixer

Looking after more than just 1's and 0's is important for us all.

Everyone experiences, or is adjacent to people who experience, challenges with mental health. In both the workplace and personal life, it can feel very difficult to talk with people about these challenges.

Thursday 4:15 PM - 5:15 PM · C102

The Agentic Data Estate - Make, Manage, Monitor

Jason Miles

Jason Miles

Solution Partner - Building Data and AI Solutions that work for you

Tom Eastlake

Tom Eastlake

Senior Solution Partner, Data & AI

Learn how digital workers, supported by the Agent Framework and digital workforce management best practices, can run your Fabric data estate. Discovery, Observability, Continuous Optimization, Quality & Drift are just some of the key workloads that can be automated using agents.

See how you can identify and implement the digital worker roles which make the most sense for your enterprise.

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · TMB 2-3

Unlocking the Spectrum of Data Questions with Power BI Copilot through Analysis Mode

Carly Newsome

Carly Newsome

Senior Program Manager | Power BI

Eun Hee Kim

Eun Hee Kim

Principal Product Manager - Power BI, Microsoft

Analysis mode offers deep functionality that uses a reasoning model to answer complex, layered analytical questions that go beyond data retrieval questions. Analysis mode produces rich explanations that highlight key insights and walk through how the answer was formed, giving you a powerful partner for informed decision-making. Join us to learn more about Power BI Copilot’s abilities to answer across the full spectrum of questions from simple to complex!

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C111-C112

Resilience by design: how Fabric delivers business continuity

Dandan Zhang

Dandan Zhang

Product Manager, Microsoft Fabric, Security, Compliance, Governance

Rick Xu

Rick Xu

Product Manager, Microsoft Fabric, Security, Compliance, Governance

Discover how Microsoft Fabric ensures resilience from SLAs to geo-redundancy. Learn about built-in zone failover, cross-region backups, and our vision and roadmap for automated, customer-managed BCDR. See how Fabric keeps transalytics always-on—even during outages—through current capabilities and future innovations.

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C113-C114

Salesforce, SAP, Oracle, Google BigQuery, Dataverse - Unify the business data estate with OneLake

Matt Hicks

Matt Hicks

Senior Product Manager, Microsoft OneLake

Wilson Lee

Wilson Lee

Principal Product Manager

Join us to see how Microsoft Fabric and OneLake unify your business data estate with petabyte-scale data movement and Mirroring. Discover best practices for copying, replicating, and virtualizing data from Salesforce, SAP, Oracle, Google BigQuery, Dataverse, and more—leveraging enterprise proven patterns to accelerate analytics and unlock actionable insights.

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · TMB 1

SQL Server in Azure Virtual Machine: Configuring for price-performance

David Pless

David Pless

Principal Program Manager - Microsoft Corporation

When selecting a virtual machine to host your SQL Server workload in Azure, you need to choose a VM size that provides optimal performance and fits your organization’s budget.

In this session, we will cover topics such as the different VM types that are appropriate for SQL workloads, configuring storage, and features unique to Azure that can help boost your performance without breaking the bank.

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C202-C204

Proven Fabric Architecture Patterns to Minimize Refactoring

Matthias Falland

Matthias Falland

Trusted Advisor and MVP @ Corporate Software

Expensive refactoring from poor architecture is avoidable. Discover architecture patterns from 20+ implementations: workspace topology, medallion layers, and cross-workspace sharing. Learn how these strategies minimize refactoring by 60%, accelerating time-to-production.

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C211-C213

Modern Data Protection Strategies with SQL Server

John Sterrett

John Sterrett

I help people solve complex SQL Server problems

Today, we handle increasing volumes of sensitive data. DBAs and Data Engineers must protect their data from external attackers, employees, and privileged admins like themselves. This session will teach you how to protect your data while maintaining functionality and performance. The session focuses on using column-level encryption, row-level security, and auditing to secure your data.

Friday 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM · C102

Pairing Fabric AI Functions & Translytical Task Flows to Improve Jira Data Quality

Bob Nonnenkamp

Bob Nonnenkamp

Data Alchemist - Microsoft Innovation Hub DC

Brendon Colburn

Brendon Colburn

Microsoft Technical Architect

Learn how a Fortune 500 enterprise built a solution that paired Fabric AI Functions, Power BI Translytical Task Flows, Copilot Studio, and Microsoft Teams to improve Jira data quality for over a thousand project owners and drive better project visibility for the C-suite.

Friday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C111-C112

SQL Server 2025 is the AI-ready Enterprise Database

Bob Ward

Bob Ward

Principal Architect, Microsoft Azure Data

Kendal Van Dyke

Kendal Van Dyke

Senior Program Manager, Microsoft SQL Server

You may have heard the news that SQL Server 2025 has become Generally Available. But do you know why there has been so much buzz about this new version? Come learn from the team at Microsoft everything you need to know about why you should consider upgrading to SQL Server 2025. From AI to developer features to mission critical engine, SQL Server 2025 has more new features than you might realize.

Friday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C105-C106

Embedding Power Apps in Microsoft Fabric Power BI Reports

Paul Papanek Stork

Paul Papanek Stork

Don't Pa..Panic Consulting, Owner

Scott Shearer

Scott Shearer

Microsoft 365 Evangelist, MVP and MCT

In this talk we’ll show you how to embed a Power App in a Power BI report in Microsoft Fabric to enable real-time editing and interactivity. See how to update data directly from reports, trigger workflows, and leverage action-oriented analytics that close the loop between insight and execution.

Friday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C108-C109

Unifying Data Discovery: A Real-World Implementation of Microsoft Purview Unified Catalog

Anna Gebler

Anna Gebler

Senior Manager Data Governance @ Lufthansa Group

In a data-driven world, managing data assets effectively is vital. This session highlights Lufthansa Group’s successful adoption of Microsoft Purview Unified Catalog as its central data catalog. Attendees will learn key architectural decisions, best practices, challenges faced, and lessons learned.

Friday 10:10 AM - 11:10 AM · C102

Unstoppable Fabric: Capacity Planning, Smart Alerting & Workload Tuning

Iurii Iurchenko

Iurii Iurchenko

Sr Data Engineer at Life Line Screening

Learn how to make Microsoft Fabric unstoppable by combining capacity planning, smart alerting, and workload tuning. We’ll use the Fabric Capacity Metrics app and API to read CU usage and throttling, plan and schedule ETL/Spark/refresh workloads, configure alerts (incl. Data Activator), and apply Spark/Warehouse best practices so Fabric stays fast, predictable, and cost-efficient.

Friday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · TMB 2-3

Reporting with action: Visualizations with translytical task flows in Power BI and Fabric

Luis Bosquez

Luis Bosquez

Principal Product Manager at Microsoft Fabric

Zoe Douglas

Zoe Douglas

Product Manager at Microsoft

Join this session to learn about translytical task flows combining Power BI reports and Fabric user data functions together for actionable reports with a click of a button. We’ll demo how to set it up, the options you have, and specific examples of these reports in action. Interested in what this is or are you already using it today? We’ll have insights you don’t want to miss!

Friday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C111-C112

SQL Performance Supercharged: Strategies for Azure SQL Performance Optimization

Mukesh Kumar

Mukesh Kumar

Microsoft/Partner Director, Engineering & Architecture

Naveen Samba

Naveen Samba

Naveen Samba

Discover how the Azure SQL PG Engineering team tackles complex, mission-critical performance challenges across Azure SQL DB and Managed Instance. Through real customer cases and practical demos, learn sharp diagnostic techniques, hidden optimization opportunities, and the most common pitfalls to avoid when tuning workloads pre- or post-migration.

Friday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C113-C114

Mastering Fabric Data Engineering Admin and Capacity Management

Christopher Finlan

Christopher Finlan

Principal PM Manager

Santhosh Kumar Ravindran

Santhosh Kumar Ravindran

Senior Product Manager, Microsoft Fabric Data Engineering

Optimize Microsoft Fabric Data Engineering for production. Learn about governance controls for Notebooks, Lakehouses, and Spark Job Definitions. We'll cover administrative roles, capacity management for cost and performance, and scaling best practices.

Friday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · TMB 1

Chaos to Clarity: Governance and Adoption Lessons from Rolling Out Power BI and Fabric

Chris Aleman

Chris Aleman

Data Analytics Manager

Power BI + Fabric at scale? Chaos looms—fragmented workspaces, messy permissions, frustrated users. Join us to see how we turned disorder into a governance playbook that accelerates adoption. Learn role-based access, streamlined workspace/app strategies, and AI-ready best practices to avoid pitfalls and win enterprise buy-in.

Friday 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM · C208-C210

Smart Routing: Real-Time Transport Optimization with Fabric

Robert Leal

Robert Leal

Robert Leal – Microsoft Data & AI Consultant, KPMG NL

Discover how Microsoft Fabric enables real-time transportation optimization. Learn to ingest GPS data with Eventstream, visualize routes on live maps, and integrate linear optimization models to minimize cost and emissions. Explore how data agents and AI Foundry can help in identifying EV-ready routes based on charging infrastructure.

Friday 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM · C301

Herding Fabric Cats: Administration and Governance Guidance

Jerid Fortney

Jerid Fortney

Data Architect at Insight | Microsoft Fabric, Power BI, Data Engineering & AI

Fabric governance is challenging: users create workspaces fast, data sprawls, and costs spike. This session will help you "herd the cats" using Microsoft's tools.

You will leave with a practical, battle-tested governance framework and real-world strategies. (No actual cats were harmed.)

Friday 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM · TMB 2-3

Delivering Insights Where Your Users Work

Dustin Askins

Dustin Askins

Product Manager

Sara Vredevoogd

Sara Vredevoogd

Principal Product Manager at Microsoft

Learn practical strategies for sharing Power BI content across your company. We’ll cover distributing insights through apps (including organizational apps), and how business users can access Power BI directly from their M365 tools and Copilot to boost productivity and make informed decisions. You’ll get a deep look at current capabilities as well as what’s coming next.

Friday 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM · C113-C114

Automate at Scale with Event-Driven Architectures and Business Events

Ajeta Singhal

Ajeta Singhal

Senior Product Manager at Microsoft Fabric Real-Time Intelligence | Defini ‘What’ and ‘Why’ of the product. Driving ‘How’ of the product. Delivering the vision and iterating on the delivered product.

Roberto Cervantes

Roberto Cervantes

Sr. Product Manager (Azure Messaging)

Disconnected systems and manual processes slow your business response time. Event-driven architectures solve this by enabling real-time responsiveness across your organization. Discover how Activator orchestrates event flows and integrates diverse sources, while Business Events provide instant visibility and trigger automated workflows. Learn to configure event-driven pipelines, set up Business Events for monitoring, and enable AI-driven decisions at scale.

Friday 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM · TMB 4

Building modern data architectures with Microsoft Fabric

James Serra

James Serra

Big Data/Data Warehouse Evangelist at Microsoft

Learn how Microsoft Fabric can be leveraged with the architectures: Data fabric, data lakehouse, and data mesh. Get a tour of each architecture and explore their pros and cons. By the end of the session, you’ll have a clear understanding of how to use Microsoft Fabric to build and optimize these diverse data architectures.

Friday 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM · C105-C106

Fabric Sprawl - Techniques to Optimize Your Fabric Capacity

Curtis Stallings

Curtis Stallings

Sr. Architect - Baker Tilly

Marcus Radue

Marcus Radue

Baker Tilly US, Senior Architect - Data and AI Solutions

Learn how to address a sprawling Fabric environment with ungoverned items across multiple workspaces and capacities. Extend FUAM to gain valuable insights that drive decision-making and backlog prioritization. Design the right balance between autonomy and security in your Fabric environment to deliver an optimal experience for both end users and developers.

Friday 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM · C208-C210

Vibe Coding a Power BI Embedded Portal - From Zero to Hero in 60 Minutes

Peer Grønnerup

Peer Grønnerup

Technical Architect & Community Advocate at Tabular Editor

Power BI Embedded isn’t just for developers.

In this fast-paced vibe-coding session, we’ll demystify it by building a real custom portal in 60 minutes, using AI to speed things up.

See how to set Power BI Embedded up quickly, craft a user-centric experience, improve navigation beyond the service, and unlock powerful opportunities without heavy coding, giving you a fresh view of what’s truly possible.

Friday 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM · C101

Architecting Zero ETL: Real-Time Analytics from Azure Database for PostgreSQL using Fabric Mirroring

Guy Bowerman

Guy Bowerman

Group Program Manager, PostgreSQL on Azure

Paula Berenguel

Paula Berenguel

Principal Program Manager @Microsoft

What is new with Azure Database for PostgreSQL Mirroring in Fabric? Explore the latest enhancements that simplify data movement and integration. We’ll take a deep dive into the zero-copy, live replication architecture—showing how PostgreSQL data flows seamlessly into OneLake without ETL. Plus, see it in action with a live demo!