Invercargill Test Professionals Meetup | July 2025

Cool Location. Hot Topic.

A chilly winter’s day didn’t stop a lot of hot conversation and information sharing around the production use of AI within the Quality Assurance environment. Invercargill people know how to come together and share!!!!

Held at the legendary Kelvin Hotel on 30th July, the Invercargill Software Test Professionals Meetup community represented a number of organisations and roles. We were pleased to host both SBS Bank and Invercargill City Council, with representation from not just the Quality Assurance community. We also had representation from the Business Analysis and Project / Programme Management community as well. A great mix of views on Software Quality Assurance which set us up for a great conversation on the use of AI.

The session was expertly led by Mei Reyes-Tsai of TTC Global. Having previously presented on the use of AI in testing and testing AI, Mei now focused on the *production* use of AI in testing and AI usage in production. This was an opportunity for the local Invercargill community to hear what was happening across other regions within New Zealand – leveraging the work that TTC Global does with testing communities across New Zealand. There was an update on the state of AI in testing – an update on the earlier presentation that was delivered. This time however some real-world examples were presented – from Tauranga City Council through to Otago University and Zespri International. All well-known New Zealand brands and all have been presented as Case Studies in the use of AI across earlier regional meetups that TTC Global has set up and facilitated. A copy of Mei’s presentation can be seen here <LINK TO PRESENTATION PDF>.

As is now the norm for AI based topics, the content kicked off a lot of discussion. Normally ending at 7:00pm (ish 😊), conversations continued well past 9:00pm. Given the range of roles in the room, the impact and benefit of AI to Developers, Business Analysts, Project / Programme Managers and Testers was well debated. It was comforting to see the level of interest in the use of AI and the genuine desire to see AI used to improve human production – not augment or replace human production. I’m always personally impressed with the way in which people come to these events prepared to participate and get involved in the discussions. This was certainly the theme at this event!!!

A huge thanks to the Kelvin Hotel for hosting us and so both SBS Bank and Invercargill City Council for being so committed to the conversation.