TTC Global at CIO Summit 2025

TTC Global at the CIO Summit 2025: Testing for Trust in a World of AI, Quantum, and Cyber Threats

This week, TTC Global attended the CIO Summit in Auckland at the Viaduct Event Centre. Over two days, CIOs, technology leaders, and innovators came together to share ideas, challenges, and opportunities shaping the future of IT in New Zealand and beyond. The themes of security, AI, quantum, and testing for trust ran through many of the sessions - aligning closely with TTC Global’s mission of ensuring quality, resilience, and confidence in technology.

Lessons from NATO: Mission-Critical IT at the Frontline

One of the most compelling sessions came from Manfred Boudreaux-Dehmer, CIO of NATO, who shared his experiences of IT management in the most extreme environments — war and mission-critical systems.

• In the weeks before the Russian invasion, Ukraine moved its command-and-control application into the cloud — an extraordinary feat under extraordinary pressure.
• During this time, NATO saw cyberattacks from Russia surge by 800%, with threat actors from China also active.
• His advice to CIOs: identify your “crown jewels” and protect them, using AI to detect behavioural patterns for enforcement.

Manfred also pointed to technologies shaping the security future:

• Blockchain for tamper-resistant logs that intruders cannot alter.
• Quantum-resistant cryptography, because “Q-Day is coming” — bad actors are already stockpiling encrypted data, waiting for the day quantum computers can break it.
  
• Zero trust architectures that require a deep understanding of users and data.
  
• Cyber resilience, which comes not just from prevention but from simulations, recovery planning, and relentless testing.

His closing message resonated deeply with TTC Global’s values: the good guys will win — diversity and freedom of thought will triumph.

Quantum is Closer Than You Think

In another fascinating session, Professor Muhammed Usman, Head of Quantum Systems at Australia’s CSIRO, explored the rapidly approaching era of quantum computing. His talk, Leveraging Quantum Technology to Improve Innovation Opportunities, underscored how quickly current security methods will become obsolete once quantum scales.

He highlighted his recent paper in Nature, Towards quantum enhanced adversarial robustness in machine learning, which calls out the risks CIOs face and the need for robust testing frameworks. The message was clear: prepare now, test early, and don’t underestimate how disruptive quantum will be.

Building Ethical and Inclusive AI

Closer to home, Kate Kolich, Head of Data and AI at Contact Energy, delivered an important talk on Empowering Ethical AI. With 82% of New Zealand companies already adopting AI, she warned that AI solutions do not serve all communities equally.

Kate urged CIOs to embed ethics and inclusivity into their AI strategies:

• Establish a Risk Appetite Statement (RAS) to guide AI governance, balancing innovation with oversight.
• Regularly review, test, and align AI systems with organisational values.
• Involve domain experts and community representatives in AI testing.
• Ensure diversity, transparency, and accountability are non-negotiables.

Her emphasis on testing AI systems safely and inclusively is one TTC Global strongly supports, because trust in AI begins with rigorous quality engineering.

TTC Global at the Summit

Throughout the summit, the TTC Global team: Neil Fitzgerald, Mei Reyes-Tsai, Shane Ross, and Steve Wensel — connected with CIOs and technology leaders to discuss how testing, automation, and AI-driven quality engineering can address the very challenges highlighted in the sessions:

• How do you test for resilience against cyber threats?
• How do you validate AI for fairness, safety, and trustworthiness?

The conversations were lively, the networking invaluable, and the setting — overlooking a sparkling Auckland harbour — the perfect backdrop for discussing the future of technology.

Our Takeaway

The CIO Summit reinforced what TTC Global believes: technology moves fast, but trust moves business. Whether it’s cloud migrations under fire, AI shaping the new user experience, or quantum looming on the horizon, CIOs must embed quality and testing into every layer of their strategy. TTC Global is proud to partner with organisations to make that possible.