Software Engineering Events in Manchester

Catch up with fellow tech founders, share ideas, and spark new collaborations face-to-face!

Join the Tech Founders Meet Up!

Are you a tech enthusiast or a startup founder? Come hang out with fellow innovators at our in-person gathering. It's the perfect chance to network, share ideas, and spark collaborations in a laid-back atmosphere.

Whether you’re launching your first app or scaling up, everyone’s welcome. Don’t miss out on meeting awesome people and exploring new tech trends together!

Network, learn, ask a question, meet other folks - these are all things that happen at user group events. These events are a really great opportunity to socialise in an informal learning experience.

Remember to tell your friends and the people you work with; make sure you register as soon as you can.

In-Person only event. Not being recorded.

Please complete the registration form with your full name and organisation you are from - we only collect this information to give to building security to let you into the event.

17:45 – 18:00 Intro and updates
18:00 – 19:00 Shubhangi Goyal - Evaluation of LLMs using prompt engineering.
n this session, I will discuss how prompt engineering can be leveraged to evaluate the performance, reliability, and limitations of Large Language Models (LLMs). By systematically varying prompts, we uncover model behavior across various tasks, including reasoning, summarization, and code generation. We’ll discuss prompt-based benchmarking methods, prompt sensitivity, and how to design effective evaluation frameworks.
Takeaways:
- Understand the role of prompt design in LLM evaluation.
- Learn techniques to test reasoning, bias, and robustness via prompts.
- Explore limitations of prompt-based metrics and how to mitigate them.
- Gain practical examples of evaluation setups across NLP tasks.

19:00 – 19:15 Break & Pizza
19:15 – 19:45 Ian Pike - FabCon Atlanta Databases Updates.
Looking back at the recent Atlanta FabCon event and the updates announced around Databases.
This includes SQL Server, Azure, and general Fabric Database updates.
What is new, what was made generally available.
There were some exciting updates to share and discuss so we will share in a short 30 min session.

Welcome, Manchester Data Intelligence Network!

Manchester Data Intelligence Network is a community-based networking event bringing people together to meet peers, share stories, and build meaningful relationships around data intelligence.

Hosted by Datacove, award-winning Brighton-based R, Python and Shiny experts, these events also offer inspiring talks, hands-on sessions, and open knowledge sharing, all in a friendly, inclusive environment. Whether you’re just starting out in data or a seasoned expert, there’s always something new to discover, spark your curiosity, and take back to the office.

We run four events each year in Manchester, offering fresh insights, lively discussions, and opportunities to connect with the wider Data Intelligence Network, anchored by the EARL Data Intelligence Conference, our flagship event held in Brighton each October.

The events are supported by the generous team at DiSH, Eagle Labs

For more information, sponsorship opportunities, or to get involved as a speaker, contact us at [[admin@datacove.co.uk](mailto:admin@datacove.co.uk)](https://datacove.co.uk/contact/) or visit https://datacove.co.uk

--- Talk Information ---

We’ll be joined by Rioch Brewer, Head of Data Insight at AJ Bell.

Lessons learned in delivering our first data science models

Rioch will draw on real-world experience from projects spanning portfolio risk measurement, churn modelling, and price anomaly detection.
In this session,
He’ll cover:

• Starting simple vs. designing a more complex solution
• Generating value even when data signals are weak
• Future plans: Analytics vs. Data Science vs. MLOps
• The importance of support structures, including project management, templates, and sprints

--- Schedule & Refreshments ---
Now, refreshments! Drinks and nibbles will be served from 6pm. Talks will commence at 6:30pm/6:45pm and the event will conclude at 8pm. The conversation will continue after the event at a local pub.

--- Sponsorship Information ---
Our event relies heavily on sponsorship from companies that attend. Please contact the organisers or [admin@datacove.co.uk](https://datacove.co.uk/) to get involved.

--- Arrival Instructions ---
There are several entrances for Heron House, however, to access DiSH you need to go to Lloyd
street reception. This is the same entrance used for the Registry office.
What3Words: mason.baking.dined

--- Registration Etiquette ---
At our meetups, the event is sometimes capped by the space. We’re committed to keeping these events accessible for everyone, but to make that possible, we need your help. Please ensure your registration is kept up to date. If your plans change, simply update your RSVP to reflect your availability. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.
Please feel free to spread the word.

We look forward to seeing you all again!

For our May meetup, we are thrilled to host a fantastic session hosted by Karam Kabbara, Lead Software Engineer from Kraken and Danish Javed, Senior Software Engineer from Codurance who will be discussing everything from cloud to culture via AI. Come along to learn, share and be inspired!

Details
From pricing up washing machines to customising coffins... and now saving the universe by controlling your electric vehicle while you sleep at Kraken Technologies. Unfortunately for you, you’ve probably run into code that Karam Kabbara has written at some point in your life.

Karam will lead a lively discussion alongside Senior Software Engineer Danish Javed from Codurance to share the hard-won lessons that only come from working on systems at a massive scale. This isn't a lecture; it's a candid discussion about what happens when good intentions meet bad production realities.

What to expect
We’ll be hosting a facilitated Q&A and group discussion, where Karam will be opening up about his journey through some of the UK's biggest tech platforms, starting with the infamous story of how he once came home to a $750 AWS bill... and how you can avoid the same fate.

We’ll be diving into:

• The True Cost of Cloud: Why "serverless" and "on-demand" can be a double-edged sword without the right guardrails.
• Building for Scale: Lessons on managing millions of connected devices and high-concurrency environments.
• Engineering Accountability: How to foster a culture where developers take ownership of the infrastructure they trigger.
• Modern Tooling: A frank discussion on the tools we use today (including the hype vs. reality of AI assistants) and whether they are making us better engineers or just faster at breaking things.

Who should attend?
This meetup is for software engineers who care about the "Craft" in Software Craftsmanship. If you’re interested in architectural patterns, cloud cost-optimisation, or just want to hear some honest war stories from a Lead Engineer at one of the UK’s biggest tech success stories, this is an event not to be missed.

What to bring

• Your curiosity: This is an open-floor discussion.
• Your own "war stories": We’ll be sharing reflections as a group, so bring a time you broke something (and what you learned from it).

Note: This is a discussion-based event. While you’re welcome to bring a laptop if you’re taking notes, no live coding or specific software is required to participate.

A big thank you to Codurance for hosting the event at their fantastic office in Bonded Warehouse and sponsoring the pizza and drinks.

More detailed directions (a picture of the front door)

We're having another Code Night!

It's a bi-monthly event, to collaborate with like minded Rustacians.
If you already have a project your working on - Awesome! Bring it.
If this is your first time using rust and you want to learn - Sweet! Please bring a laptop.
If you can get Rustup installed beforehand that will help speed things up, if not we will help you get setup on the day.

This month we will be at Hackspace Manchester. Be sure to check the meetup event for any updated details on the day (we are a little limited on space please update RSVP if you are unable to come).

The venue will open at 6:30pm and will run until 8:30pm

HOW IT WILL WORK
Event Starts (18:30) - Come down and join us for some food and drinks. You'll have an opportunity to share any problems/questions you're working on with other attendees.

During Event - Put any questions or conversation topics you want to discuss to the Rust community, it's likely someone will be interested and have an opinion!

Event Closes (20:30) - After the event we'll all head somewhere local for some post-event socialising.

If you have any dietary requirements please supply them when signing up to the event and we can make sure you feel welcome too!

Under 16s are welcome with a responsible guardian.

Looking for a Rust course
Our survey is still open to find people interested in a multi-session course
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeaQGwdxeNPPMZ51A778N7hqN2XHl9C8zaukZ5Fj22vfT-qUQ/viewform?usp=sf_link

Sponsors

Codethink is a world-class provider of critical, high-performance software projects and solutions for international-scale companies in a range of industries including Automotive, Finance, Medical, and IoT. Headquartered in Manchester, UK, Codethink has pioneered software industry thinking around concepts of trustable software, working to improve the quality of software engineering.
Visit Codethink

Join us for May's PBIMCR meet-up

When: Thursday 28th of May 2026
Time: arrive for 530pm with talks starting from 6pm start prompt
Location: Canopius, 100 Barbirolli Square, Manchester M2 3AB
Session will not be streamed over MS Teams but uploaded to our YouTube channel in early Feb
Complimentary drinks & pizza provided by our hosts Canopius & sponsors Robert Walters

David Johnston - Power BI Developer working mainly in logistics

Topic Power BI Custom Visuals - have always been possible, but difficult. I'll share the workflow I use with VS Code, GitHub Copilot to create pbiviz custom visuals of your own.

About David:
Business Intelligence Consultant with broad experience across multiple business sectors, HR, Public Sector, Private, Start-ups, Freight & logistics, Outsourcing . Power BI, Power Query, Power Pivot, Power Apps, Power Automate, Trend Analysis, Data Analytics and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA).

Rebekah Holderness – Portfolio Reporting & Information Specialist at Network Rail

Title: I’ve got the Power! Utilising Power Platform with Power BI to take your reports to the next level.
Often numbers on a page and pretty graphs aren’t enough to answer business questions but how do we address this and retain interest in our reports?
- Power Automated emails to subject matter experts (SME’s) to provide periodic commentary
- Embedded Power App into our Power BI report to capture these commentary insights
- Feeding commentary back into the PBI dashboard to compliment visuals for end users