This Year’s Sponsors
A special shout out to our sponsors who help make this event possible.
A special shout out to our sponsors who help make this event possible.


Register Now to Stay Ahead
We’re already building what’s next—and you won’t want to miss it. DCAF 2026 will bring together the brightest minds in data-centric architecture, semantic tech, and intelligent systems for three focused days of real-world insight, implementation strategy, and community connection.
💡 Why Register Early?
Get early access to tickets (this event sells out fast)
Be the first to hear about the 2026 theme and speaker lineup
Receive exclusive updates, early agenda previews, and hotel block info
Priority consideration for speaker and sponsor opportunities
Whether you’re a returning expert or curious newcomer, pre-registering ensures you stay in the loop as we shape another powerful forum.
👉 Add your name to the list.
We’ll notify you as soon as details drop.
Lunch each day and happy hour drinks on Tuesday and Wednesday are covered by the registration fee.


CEO | Franz
Jans AasmanCEO | Franz
The Knowledge Graph as an Agentic Control Plane for Data-Centric Architecture
AI agents need more than access to tools and APIs; they need a governed understanding of what enterprise data means, where it lives, how it is related, and what constraints apply. This session presents the knowledge graph as a semantic control plane for agentic systems—capturing enterprise metadata, ontologies, relationships, access rules, provenance, and queryable context. The talk would examine how agents can use this semantic layer to reason across databases, documents, APIs, and analytical systems without creating another silo.

Founder | Summit Knowledge Solutions
Forrest Hare, PhDFounder | Summit Knowledge Solutions
IDs That We Establish for Defense Intelligence for Entity Resolution
How do intelligence systems decide when an observed entity becomes a “real” tracked object? This paper tackles that high-stakes question at the heart of Object-Based Intelligence (OBI), introducing a clear and practical distinction between Enterprise Object Identifiers (EOIDs) and Non-Specific Object Identifiers (NSOIDs). Drawing on foundational theories of reference and cutting-edge ontology design, the authors present a rigorous framework for handling uncertainty, identity, and data fusion across intelligence environments. With concrete implementations using Common Core Ontologies, SPARQL queries, and a maritime intelligence case study, this work shows how making identifier distinctions explicit can significantly improve trust, transparency, and reasoning across complex, federated data systems.

Founder | GraphCentric
Malcolm SparksFounder | GraphCentric
Options and Strategies for Access Control in Data-Centric Systems
Application-centrism often bypasses access control by restricting who can use which application or system. As we centralize data, we can no longer rely on such ad hoc measures. Instead, we must integrate comprehensive and explicit access control measures to prevent unauthorized access to restricted data. This talk will introduce and compare the available options and strategies for achieving this.

Enterprise Architect | JPMorgan Chase
John VernonEnterprise Architect | JPMorgan Chase
Operationalizing Enterprise Data Products with Semantic Interoperability and Ontology-Driven Automation
This presentation explores how semantic interoperability, ontology-driven automation, and graph-assisted metadata management can help operationalize industry data product models across enterprise platforms such as Databricks, Snowflake, and Atlan. It examines the role of semantic models, entity resolution, and AI-assisted metadata harvesting in aligning heterogeneous physical data assets to a shared conceptual model and publishing them consistently across the enterprise data ecosystem.

Principal DevRel Engineer | Senzig
Paco NathanPrincipal DevRel Engineer | Senzig
How to Get Started in Money Laundering
What if you wanted to understand how money laundering actually works — not to commit fraud, but to detect and stop it? This hands-on tutorial takes a “train like we fight” approach to anti-fraud and financial crime investigation using graphs, entity resolution, semantics, and AI.
Working from transaction data tied to a real-world $3B money laundering case, attendees will use Python, Polars, and NetworkX to uncover suspicious patterns hidden among thousands of transactions and shell companies. The session then expands into building an evidence-linked knowledge graph using open investigative datasets and entity resolution techniques, followed by lightweight ontology modeling to enrich the analysis and provide additional investigative context.
Finally, participants will explore how AI assistants can interact with graph-based fraud data to audit, explain, and investigate complex financial crime patterns. The workshop provides an end-to-end introduction to modern fraud investigation workflows using open-source tools, Docker, and Jupyter notebooks, with all code and setup instructions provided for reuse in real-world applications.

Founder | Hyperion Vector Systems
Christopher GrantFounder | Hyperion Vector Systems
Cutting Through the Black Box: An Ontological Framework for AI Performance
What do we actually mean when we say “AI” — and why does it matter for getting better results?
Christopher Grant breaks down the anatomy of an AI interaction from first principles, stripping away black-box narratives to reveal what’s really happening inside these systems. Drawing on ontological distinctions of effective action, he walks through a practical framework for classifying AI systems and practitioners by capability, and explores how grounding those distinctions in system design leads to measurably better performance — across the full spectrum of AI capability classes.
Expect real examples, concrete use cases, and a discussion that challenges how you think about building with and deploying AI.

A data-centric architecture drives accurate business results. This conference keeps you updated as the lighthouse of insight on this topic.
Dave McComb is one of those remarkable visionaries who sees the future before others and is able to capitalize on that knowledge through his skills in building great teams and his willingness to collaborate and build with others.

The talks greatly succeeded in combining detailed technical discussion with implementation guidance and advice on communicating the value of data centricity.
The data-centric systems being built today demand more architectural support than the current ecosystem provides. Maybe you offer part of the solution. Maybe you’re looking for the rest. Either way, DCAF is where real progress happens—through shared insight, live demos, and candid conversations that move the field forward.
DCAF attracts experts rethinking how systems are built. Participating here shows you’re shaping the future—not just following it. Sponsoring DCAF helps you share real results and experiences with peers who understand the significance of the work.
DCAF draws senior architects, data leaders and technical stakeholders from top organizations. As a sponsor, you will share your stories and connect directly with people who influence big decisions and budgets.
No booths. No drive-bys. DCAF is intimate by design, giving sponsors time for focused, one-on-one conversations that go deep—without the noise of a typical tech expo. Our sponsors have opportunities to host short, intimate discussions in an environment of their choice while supporting the forum itself.
DCAF is known for cutting through hype and speculation. Align your brand with real innovation, real results, and the people who are building what’s next in data-centric architecture. Sponsoring the forum signifies your commitment to the future of data-centric architecture.