Over the past decade, Kubernetes transformed from an ambitious open-source experiment into the invisible engine powering global business infrastructure.

This week on the Tech Field Day Podcast ahead of KubeCon North America 2026, hosts Alastair Cooke and Barton George look back at how a 500-person gathering in a hotel ballroom expanded into an industry-defining ecosystem of hundreds of projects.

They explore how early container orchestration battles led to vendor standardization, why Kubernetes became baked into everyday hardware and software appliances, and how the platform emerged as the de facto operating system for enterprise AI inference.

Finally, they tackle the rise of AI operations, debating the real-world security and reliability risks of letting non-deterministic AI agents touch deterministic production environments.

This and more on the Tech Field Day Podcast, part of the Futurum Media Podcast Network.