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Azure Dev Summit 2025

“Azure Dev Summit is the new premier community conference for Microsoft software developers in Europe, initiated and supported by Microsoft.”
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The legends of Novanet meets the legendary Scotts

The legends of Novanet meet the legends of Microsoft

This was the very first edition of Azure Dev Summit, and Novanet showed up in full force! Microsoft also brought their A-team, with many of the most well-known names attending the conference: Scott Hanselman, Scott Hunter, Amanda Silver, Mads Torgersen, Steve Sanderson, Seth Juarez, James Montemagno, just to name a few.

It was clear that Microsoft gave this event top priority. And equally clear that NDC was behind it, many speakers were familiar faces for those who’ve attended NDC before (like Dylan Beattie, Ian Cooper, and Liam Westley).

I attended Web Summit in Lisbon last year, a massive event with 75,000 participants. There I learned how Lisbon is betting big on becoming a European tech hub. The city invests heavily in startups and provides strong support for tech companies. It’s a beautiful city with comfortable October/November temperatures, making it the perfect spot for an international conference.

All things AI

Unsurprisingly, AI was front and center, with many sessions revolving around it. The two most-used words of the conference were “Agentic AI”. And there was a lot of vibing going on in the demos!

In addition to AI, there were updates on .NET / ASP.NET 10, MCP, Aspire, Architecture, Security, and more.

For me personally, James Montemagno’s sessions were a major highlight.
He showed how to set up agents in Visual Studio Code and get them to do your work for you(..) He had one agent create GitHub issues, and another open pull requests with the fixes!
By configuring chat modes, you can stitch together different prompts and MCP servers, letting AI perform tasks while still following best practices.

It was also really cool to see how you can assign work asynchronously.
In theory, you could ask AI to fix four GitHub issues before leaving the office and wake up to four PRs waiting for you the next morning.
After a talk with James, you just want to run back to your hotel room, fire up your laptop, and vibe!

It’s clear: instructions are the new gold!

(We didn’t attend all of them, but here are some standouts. I will add videos when available.)

  • “AI Coding Evolved – GitHub Copilot Tips, Tricks, & Spec-Driven Flows” – James Montemagno
  • “Practical Guide to Agentic AI: Building Smarter Systems for Technical Professionals” – Seth Juarez
  • “AI App Development Beyond the Basics” – Steve Sanderson
  • “The Great Circle: From Altair to Azure” – Scott Hanselman
  • “The Next 25 Years of Software Engineering” – Scott Hanselman & Scott Hunter
  • “Building Agentic UI with Blazor” – Daniel Roth
  • “From JSON to RCE: Modern .NET Serialization Attacks” – Hampton Paulk
  • “HTMX and ASP.NET Core – I Don’t Know How to React” – Maarten Balliauw
  • “The Undersea Cable Network” – Richard Campbell
  • “Memory in Motion: Supercharging AI Agents with Azure Managed Redis” – Roy de Milde & Mark Weitzel
  • “There’s No Such Thing as Plain Text” – Dylan Beattie

Food for AI thought

Scott preaching to the choir
Scott preaching to the choir

For me personally, Scott Hanselman is always a highlight, no matter the topic. He’s known as a mix of stand-up comedian and technical guru, but he also brings a level of experience and gravitas few can match.

AI is everywhere right now, and it’s easy to get swept up in the hype.
That’s why it was refreshing to have an adult in the room (Hanselman) saying:

«AI has gotten an unnecessary amount of hype.»

He took his time to express genuine concern for today’s young developers, those who don’t yet have the experience or the big-picture understanding that seniors do.
What happens when anyone can spin up an agent to complete a task just as well?
What happens if getting AI to do your work becomes too easy?
How will they gain the experience and depth if they never have to learn the small things along the way?

It was also liberating to see Seth Juarez remind everyone:

«LLMs are not a knowledge repository.»

He gave a basic but effective example: a model trained only with data up to 2023 would claim that the latest Eurovision winner is Loreen, while an updated one would correctly say JJ. A simple reminder that an LLM only knows what it’s been fed, nothing more.

Practical stuff

Venue

FIL, right next to MEO Arena, is a great location, just 7 minutes from the airport by Bolt or metro. Plenty of hotels and restaurants nearby, and about 20–30 minutes to downtown Lisbon by car.

There were six rooms in the venue. One was an igloo.
One of the rooms was an igloo. A hot igloo.

Food

The food was a bit disappointing. There was a great selection of sugary treats, but the main dishes were cooked on the spot which led to long lines. Small portions didn’t help either.
They could learn a thing or two from NDC Oslo, the gold standard of conference catering.

Dev Summit or Dev Sugar
Sugar was plentiful

Logistics

The venue is close to the Vasco da Gama shopping mall and the subway, which provides easy access. Or just grab a Bolt.

Party

A fun quiz hosted by Dylan Beattie, but the food wasn’t great and you had to fight for beers.
We left early and ended up meeting an Indian/Portuguese/Norwegian guy who gave us free beer and shots. Not a bad ending.

Recommendation

Would I recommend this conference? Absolutely!

My most important criterion for a conference is that it should be inspiring and Dev Summit truly delivered.
High professional quality, experienced and passionate speakers.
The smaller audience (approx 2000?) and room sizes made it feel intimate and personal.
You could easily meet speakers “on the floor” during breaks or at the party to continue discussions.

Some first-year growing pains are to be expected and I’m sure they’ll smooth those out next time.

This could easily become an annual tradition.

Scott Hanselman and Scott Hunter meets Novanet. only at Azure Dev Summit Lisbon
The legends from Novanet meet the legendary Scotts.