NSW Monthly Wrap Up - November 24

 
 

Welcome to the October - November 2024 wrap-up from your NSW branch, highlighting the key activities and events that brought our community together and showcasing our shared achievements and memorable moments. 

NSW celebrates Ada Lovelace day

The New South Wales team hosted a full house event at the Sydney Hub on Thursday 3 October to celebrate women's major contributions in STEM, ably hosted by NSW BEC Vice-Chair, Lucy Lin, MACS (Snr). 

Named after mathematician and computer science pioneer Ada Lovelace, the Day is an annual event to celebrate and raise awareness of women's contributions across Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) fields. 

The event saw the panel taking a deep dive into the careers of the panel members, their challenges, successes and what they see as key to getting ahead in what is still a male-dominated industry.

The key take-aways included the need for women to support women. Also to just get on with it and run your own race. The boys club may remain, but it makes no difference to what you can achieve.

Along with celebrating female tech achievements and exploring the latest emerging technologies, the event was also an opportunity to announce the launch of the NSW ACS Women's Special Interest Group. If you'd like to get involved in the new group,  please contact the NSW team.

ACS Fellow retires after a fifty year career

The ACS Sydney team took the opportunity on 17 October to recognise Vijay Khandelwal, who is retiring after 17 years and 8 months with the Assessment Team. 
 
Vijay, who became a member in 1996 and was appointed a Fellow in 2000, joined the ACS team in 2007 after a long technology career with IBM in Australia, Indonesia and India before joining Western Sydney University as a senior academic.

After the event Vijay thanked the team, saying: "It was truly a wonderful party atmosphere filled with happy faces, plenty of food and drinks. Your thoughtfulness and effort made the occasion truly special and memorable.

"Thanks also for the plaque recognising my time with the ACS, and the wonderful farewell card with messages from the team.

“For me working with the MSA has been one of the highlights of my career. The friendships and experiences that I have shared will always hold a special place in my heart. Thank you for the kind words, and the memories.” 
 
We'd like thank Vijay for his work with ACS, his distinguished career and wish him well in retirement.

NSW Pearcey Awards

ACS was a proud sponsor of the NSW Pearcey Entrepreneur of the Year Award last week with state Chair Cindy Chung being joined by Branch Manager, Elana Huthnance, and National President, Helen McHugh, last Wednesday night.

The NSW Pearcey Awards also included a University Pitching competition showcasing rising stars and their startup ideas with the night’s prize being won by Sam Brew from Resmedou representing UNSW. Resdemou is a document security method  that uses micro-vaults to store documents individually. This method makes it more difficult for attackers to breach documents, as they must do so one by one.

Winner of the NSW prize was Q-Control CEO and Founder, Prof Michael J. Biercuk PhD, who will join the other state winners in contention for the national award to be announced in Brisbane on 19 November.

His business, Q-Control is a global business leading the development of quantum infrastructure software, delivering unique technology to accelerate the pathway to the world's first useful quantum computers.

InnovationAus Awards

ACS was pleased to once again be the Gold Sponsor of the InnovationAus Awards celebrating Australian ideas and research that have achieved commercial and social success at the Sydney event attended by the NSW Premier and Treasurer along with other leading lights from industry, startups, universities and government.

Represented by Troy Steer, Director of Corporate Affairs and Public Policy, ACS awarded the Cybersecurity Award to the Tide Foundation for its TideCloak identity, immunity and access management system. TideCloak enables platform developers to escape the constant battle with hackers, allowing them to focus on building new features instead of endlessly plugging security holes. With its “breach-assumed” approach, TideCloak introduces a straightforward yet radical cybersecurity solution that future-proofs defenses using “Ineffable Cryptography,” an academically validated scientific breakthrough.

 The peoples’ Choice prize went  to VueMotion for its artificial intelligence-driven movement analysis tool. VueMotion utilizes advanced AI and computer vision to provide detailed, objective analysis of athlete movements. Whether you’re analyzing acceleration, upright running, deceleration, change of direction or jumping, the VueMotion platform allows you to create athlete movement profiles with precise measurements so you can easily and objectively track interventions and performance over time.

ACS would like to congratulate all the winners on the night.

NSW Cybersecurity Masterclass

Last Tuesday the NSW Branch in partnership with a few ACS NSW members: Ken Fitzpatrick and Mac Moeun from Patterned Security and cyber-expert and author Deepayan Chanda, delivered a masterclass workshop on cybersecurity and the principles of Secure by Design and associated methodologies using security patterns.

The very engaged audience participated in theory and practical elements embedding cybersecurity risk management within project delivery and release frameworks, rather than looking at risk management at the end of a project. This approach ensures the potential risks are considered in early phase of planning and through the phases of implementation, testing and release.

The key takeaways from the session to get started with Security By Design included:

  1. Start with understanding the key stage-gates in your current (not desired) state for Secure by Design workflows and processes.
  2. Identify the opportunities for optimisation. Then evaluate how security patterns can be applied to address them.
  3. Each section of your template should have a clear purpose for how it facilitates the Secure by Design process.
  4. Let those efficiencies be the key driver to the adoption of security patterns across the teams.

Thank you for the presenters and Cindy Chung, NSW Branch Executive Chair, who facilitated the session.

Blockchain opportunities explored at Sydney Hub

The Sydney Hub was delighted to host the ACS Blockchain Committee’s Blockchain fundamentals to unlock career pathways event, designed to guide aspiring professionals and enthusiasts into the dynamic world of blockchain technology.

Led by Karen Cohen, ACS Blockchain Committee Chair, the evening offered valuable insights into the skills, opportunities, and industry trends that can help you break into the blockchain space.

The event covered understanding Blockchain Fundamentals, career opportunities in Blockchain, the technology's role in industry disruption, and navigating regulatory and Ethical Considerations.

We’d like to thank the other members of the Blockchain Committee – Danielle Marie, Dolly Brtan, and Rachael Jones – along with the other panel participants, and President Helen McHugh who also attended on the night.

We’d like to congratulate Jan on the latest achievement in her long and distinguished career.

ACS NSW Emerging Professional Event - ‘Your Application Toolkit’

ACS NSW Emerging Professional Committee (EPC) successfully delivered their third event this year on Monday 18 November at the Sydney Hub. The EPC were excited to deliver an event to support students and early career professionals with the role application process.

The event kicked-off with a presentation led by Natalia Tapia (CEO & Founder, Graduated.io), with support from Ksenia Tkachenko – grounding attendees with an health check on the highly competitive graduate job market landscape, while supporting with key insights and advice on navigating the application process; and sharing best-in-class example resume and cover letter templates; before the event format switched into four interactive masterclasses supported by professional mentors.

Special thanks to our awesome professional mentors for the evening – who created a welcoming environment through their strong people skills and deep industry knowledge – equipping and building-out attendees confidence to launch or accelerate their career.

Professional Mentors;

As we reach the end of 2024, we extend a formal invitation for you to engage more deeply with our upcoming events and community initiatives in the new year.  Your involvement is crucial in shaping the future of our branch, and we look forward to your continued participation in the year and months ahead.

Explore our upcoming events here. 

Until next time,

 

ACS New South Wales Team

Elana Huthnance, NSW State Manager
Cindy Chung, NSW BEC Chair

 

 

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