Alan Shimel

Alan Shimel

About the Author:

Alan Shimel is founder, CEO and editor-in-chief of Techstrong Group, a Futurum company, and a member of Futurum's executive leadership team. A technology entrepreneur, media executive and industry commentator, Shimel has spent more than three decades building businesses, communities and media platforms serving enterprise technology professionals, including co-founding StillSecure, a network security company, and the DevOps Institute, a DevOps certification and training body. At Techstrong, he leads a portfolio of media brands including DevOps.com, Security Boulevard, Cloud Native Now, Techstrong AI, Techstrong IT, Digital CxO, Platform Engineering, Techstrong Semi and Techstrong TV, along with a growing portfolio of events, educational programs and digital communities. With more than 25 years of experience in cybersecurity, Shimel is a familiar voice in the space and was an early advocate of the DevOps movement, helping bring DevOps practices into mainstream enterprise technology. His work today spans cybersecurity, DevOps, cloud-native technologies, artificial intelligence, semiconductors and digital transformation, and he hosts popular programs including Techstrong Gang, Shimmy Says and Still Cyber, After All These Years. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Government and Politics from St. John's University and a Juris Doctor from New York Law School.

Articles by Alan Shimel

You Can Keep the Benchmarks. I’ll Take the Test Drive

July 14, 2026

Alan’s assessment captures an important change in the AI market. The frontier is no longer advancing only through better answers. The leading models are becoming more capable of sustained, tool-enabled work. That creates significant opportunities for enterprises—and raises the importance of governance, permissions and human oversight.

The AI Tenants Can Leave. Boxtown Cannot.

July 13, 2026

Anthropic, Google and SpaceX have all protected themselves with flexible agreements governing hundreds of thousands of GPUs. Boxtown, the historic Memphis community living beside the Colossus AI complex, has no comparable exit clause. Alan Shimel examines who controls the infrastructure, who captures its value and what the host community receives in return.

America, intelligence grid,

America at 250: Building the Intelligence Grid

July 2, 2026

As America turns 250, the country is pouring trillions into an Intelligence Grid that may prove as consequential as the railroads, the interstates and electrification itself. The open question is who it will serve.

Satya Calls For AI 2.0, Open Source Makes it Possible

June 29, 2026

AI 2.0 is less about smarter models and more about economics. Satya Nadella’s comments signal a shift toward lower-cost AI, open source, enterprise control and intelligence that is affordable, trustworthy and widely deployable.

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