Melbourne hosts international big data conference

RMIT’s Professor Timos Sellis will chair the world’s premier information and data management conference, which kicks off in Melbourne on Sunday, 31 May.

More than 600 academics and professionals from across the globe, with expertise in areas such as big data, data mining, social networks and databases, are expected at the five-day 2015 ACM SIGMOD/PODS conference.

Held annually since 1975, this is the Association of Computing Machinery’s main conference for its Special Interest Group Management of Data (SIGMOD).

Professor Sellis, a leader in the field of data management, said hosting the conference is a coup for both Melbourne and RMIT University.

“This is the flagship of conferences in the database community,” Professor Sellis said. “It’s the first time it has come to Australia, thanks mainly to the strong international profile of RMIT’s database group.”

With keynote speeches, tutorials and industry sessions featuring 30 demonstrations in new areas, Professor Sellis said the conference will show how data research and innovation is driving technological change.

“Hundreds of people are coming from all over the world to share new theories, new techniques and new technologies, so this really is a great opportunity for local professionals to find out more about big data and its impact in new technological development in the area of data management.”

Image courtesy Kevin Krejci under CC