Kim Pallister, director of Intel’s virtual reality center of excellence, will moderate a fireside chat with science fiction writer and Magic Leap game maker Austin Grossman our upcoming GamesBeat Summit 2017: How games, sci-fi, and tech create real-world magic. They’re yet another pair of speakers who show how our theme captures the crossover between realms of science, science fiction, and games.

GamesBeat Summit 2017 will take place on May 1 and May 2 at the historic Claremont resort hotel in Berkeley, California, just a short distance from San Francisco. You can secure your seat here. Register today and receive 20 percent off current ticket prices. Use the code Deantak.

Image Credit: Intel

Pallister leads Intel’s virtual reality (VR) project lab in Hillsboro, Ore. His team is working to improve the state of VR technology and to bring VR to mainstream audiences. In his current role, Kim forecasts the progress of VR and the ingredient technologies responsible for driving VR experiences.

Assisting Intel’s original equipment manufacturer (OEM) partners, from Microsoft to HTC and Oculus, Kim works closely with the underlying solutions making VR possible. Prior to rejoining Intel in 2007, Kim worked on Microsoft’s business development team conducting deals for MS Casual Games services, including MSN Games, Xbox Live Arcade and Windows Live Messenger. From 1998 to 2005, he served as games technical strategist at Intel.

Image Credit: Austin Grossman

Austin Grossman straddles the lines between books and games, as he is both a novelist and game designer.

His novels include Soon I Will Be Invincible, YOU: a novel, and Crooked. Soon I Will Be Invincible was nominated for the 2007 John Sargent Sr. First Novel Prize. His writing has also appeared in Granta, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times.

His game credits include Ultima Underworld 2, System Shock, Trespasser, Deus Ex, Epic Mickey, and Dishonored, which received the 2012 BAFTA award for Best Game.

Other speakers include Adam Gazzaley of UCSF; Listen.com founder Rob Reid; Tim Chang of Mayfield Fund; science fiction writer Eliot Peper; tech writer Violet Blue; Thomas Geffroyd, brand director at Ubisoft; Michael Condrey and Glen Schofield, founders of Sledgehammer Games; Rod Chong, chief commercial officer of Slightly Mad Studios; Laszlo Kishonti, CEO of AImotive; Ted Price, CEO of Insomniac Games; Mike Gallagher, CEO of the Entertainment Software Association; John Underkoffler, CEO of Oblong Industries and science advisor for Minority Report; Gary Whitta, the screenwriter for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story; Richard Marks of Sony PlayStation; Akshay Khanna of the Philadelphia 76ers; Greg Richardson of Team Dignitas; Megan Gaiser, CEO of Spiral Media; Guy Bendov, CEO of Side-Kick Games; Rami Ismail, cofounder of Vlambeer; Asra Rasheed, executive producer at Disney; Asi Burak, founder of Power Play; Tim Sweeney, the CEO of Epic Games; Owen Mahoney, the CEO of Nexon; Rich Hilleman of Amazon Game Studios; Chris Roberts, CEO of Roberts Space Industries; and Jamil Moledina of Google Play.

Image Credit: Cloud Imperium Games

Inspiring moments lead to disrupting the worlds of gaming, tech, and entertainment. Who hasn’t been influenced by great novels like Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, which gave us virtual worlds, or Tom Cruise’s data gloves and gesture-controlled computer in Minority Report? Now those things have become real, and we want to see what’s coming next.

Our theme is about what inspires game developers, executives, and investors to be creative. Part of the event will focus on the inspiration cycle that is accelerating as the walls between science fiction, video games, and real-world technology come down. We don’t think there’s another conference that focuses on the seams between these industries.

This event will focus on inspiration and creativity. So much of what used to be science fiction is coming true, and it is inspiring even more accelerated visions of the future in games and other entertainment. We hope to inspire you by taking you to the moments that led to great ideas across multiple industries. You’ll leave refreshed and ready to change the worlds of gaming, technology, and more.

We think this conference will offer a rare chance for cross-pollination and networking between high-level people in different industries, and we believe that insights in one place can lead to inspirations in another.

This conference is for high-end gaming executives, startup CEOs, developers, investors, publishers, marketers, tech experts, entertainment industry professionals, sci-fi experts, AR and VR executives, and other professionals. I should also point out that this is where we try to create an actual GamesBeat community with our supporters, readers, and attendees. We gather the right people in the room and encourage everyone to get to know each other. Join us.

If you’re interested in sponsoring, message andie.rhyins@venturebeat.com. Thanks to our sponsors Samsung, Intel, Gazillion, the Canadian consolate, and Blackstorm.

Breakout sessions

Intersection of sci-fi, games, and tech

Monetization: How to acquire and retain your user base

Deals: Follow the money

Esports and community

Is the gaming world flat?

Platforms: Where to place your bets? VR, AR, and more

Advisory board

Sam Barlow, game developer of Her Story and creative director at Interlude

Michael Chang, senior vice president at NCSoft

Daniel Cho, chairman at Innospark

Jay Eum, managing director, Translink Capital

Clinton Foy, chairman of the Immortals and managing director at Crosscut Ventures

Megan Gaiser, co-CEO at Spiral Media

Lee Jones, global business lead Google Ads

Perrin Kaplan, principal at Zebra Partners

Roy Liu, general manager at Linekong USA

Wanda Meloni, executive director of the Open Gaming Alliance

Jamil Moledina, game strategic lead at Google Play

Adam Orth, founder at Three One Zero

Mihai Pohontu, vice president of emerging technologies at Samsung

Mike Sepso, cofounder of MLG and senior vice president at Activision Blizzard

Mike Vorhaus, president of Magid Advisors

Margaret Wallace, CEO of Playmatics

Marco DeMiroz, cofounder, The Venture Reality Fund

I’ve been writing about our theme for a while — the accelerating cycle of inspiration between tech, games, and science fiction. I interviewed Shane Wall, HP’s chief technology officer, about the connection between sci-fi and tech. The Westworld TV show also explored the seams between artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and video games.