Thank you, SSW. Hello, Avanade.

On my first day in SSW's Sydney office, nobody was there.

I'd met SSW at the Xamarin Hack Day in Ljubljana in 2015, then started working remotely from Slovenia in January 2016. On 13 June, I turned up at the Sydney office.

It was a public holiday. My timing could've been better.

In June 2017, I moved to Brisbane. It became home.

I started as a Windows Phone and XAML developer, then grew into a Senior Software Architect and a Solution Architect. In 2020, I became a Microsoft MVP. Writing those titles down is easy. Thanking everyone who helped me get there is harder.

In my seven-year post, I said I was looking forward to many more years at SSW. I got a few more. On 2 June 2025, I became an Australian citizen.

My last day at SSW was Monday, 9 November, after ten years and ten months. The photos in my farewell film make it hard to separate the work from the rest of my life.

There are the stages: NDC Sydney, Oslo, Porto and London. The user groups. The AI Hack Days in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, which William Liebenberg and I created with SSW behind us. Thanks, William, for building them with me.

There's also lunch on the SSW TV sofa. Random brainstorming. Baking cookies and cheese breads to share at the office. Those moments belong in the story just as much as the conference ones.

Adam, thanks for giving me a chance. I thanked you in my seven-year post, and I still mean it. Penny, thank you for everything.

A special thank you to everyone in the Brisbane office. Brisbane became home in 2017, and you're a big part of why.

If I thanked everyone properly, this post would turn into a book. So, to everyone who shared what they knew, worked alongside me or became a friend: thank you. I'm grateful I got to spend those years with you.

So, what's next?

Today, I'm starting at Avanade as an AI Architect.

I want to focus more on solutions: taking the things we're learning about AI and building something people can actually use.

I also want to keep making room for people to learn together, because I've had so much help myself. I'm one of the organisers of Codex Community Brisbane and City Lead of Build Club Brisbane.

Tonight, I'm speaking at the Codex Community Meetup in Brisbane. A first day at work, then a room full of people learning and sharing. It feels like a good way to begin.

PS: My farewell email ended with me leaving to answer my true calling: becoming an AI mad scientist. I was only half joking. I'm exploring physical AI and robotics, and a few things may come from that in 2027. It's too early to say more.

The film comes back to that empty Sydney office: "Then I met all of you."

Here's my farewell to SSW. Here's to the next first commit.