Tue May 12, 2026 - Thu May 14, 2026
Registration Questions?
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Representatives from every corner of the industry:
This is the must-attend gathering for data center leaders—an event that brings together new clients, strategic partners, and old friends from across the sector.
Interested in more?
If you're looking to save on your stay: Enjoy convenience, comfort, and special rates—book now while availability lasts HERE.
Are you an end user*?
Click here to be considered for a complimentary pass. *Hyperscaler, colocation provider (non-sales), investor, private equity, or enterprise tenant.
What You'll Learn:
Relevant News and Developments:
Who You'll Network With:
Why You Should Attend:
How You'll Do More Business
Looking to save on your stay?
Save on your stay near the event venue! Enjoy convenience, comfort, and special rates—book now while availability lasts HERE.
Join us at Blue Mash Golf Course for a day of golf, deal-making and fun!
View details on the course here: https://www.bluemash.com/
Interested in filling a foursome or sponsoring? Reach out to Brady.Bash@Bisnow.com.
Are you an end user*?
Click here to be considered for a complimentary pass. *Hyperscaler, colocation provider (non-sales), investor, private equity, or enterprise tenant.
Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center
5701 Marinelli Rd
Rockville, MD 20852
Looking to save on your stay?
Save on your stay near the event venue! Enjoy convenience, comfort, and special rates—book now while availability lasts HERE.
| May 12 | Activity |
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7:30 AM 8:20 AM |
Coffee, Networking & Breakfast
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8:20 AM 8:30 AM |
Opening Remarks: Welcome to DICE National 2026!
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8:30 AM 9:15 AM |
State of Northern Virginia and the New Global Hubs: Where the Next Trillion in AI Infrastructure Lands
As Northern Virginia tests the limits of power, land, and community patience, capital is rapidly scouting the next generation of hubs in the U.S. and abroad. This keynote explores how AI‑driven demand, grid realities, and geopolitical risk are reshaping the map of “must‑build” markets. How are investors, hyperscalers, and developers deciding where the next trillion dollars of data center and power infrastructure will actually be deployed—and what does that mean for pricing, timelines, and competition in 2026–2027?
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9:15 AM 10:00 AM |
Building at the Pace of Capital: Supply Chain, Capacity Planning and the New Procurement Playbook
Capital is ready to fund mega‑campuses, but long‑lead equipment and constrained manufacturing capacity often dictate the real schedule. This session examines how developers and operators are using multi‑year procurement strategies, standardized SKUs, and prefab ecosystems to align construction pace with capital deployment. How are teams forecasting capacity, locking in critical gear, and structuring supplier relationships so projects can actually absorb the dollars committed on investment memos?
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10:00 AM 10:15 AM |
Top Ten Data Center Legal and Business Issues for Powered Land, Leases and MSA's That You Should Know About
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10:15 AM 10:35 AM |
Networking Break
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10:35 AM 11:15 AM |
Monetizing Latency: AI‑Ready Network and Edge Architectures
As AI inference and other latency‑sensitive workloads surge, network and edge design are becoming as critical as core campus builds. This session looks at what AI‑era networking really entails, from GPU fabrics and low‑latency multi‑region paths to distributed edge sites and dense interconnection hubs. How are operators aligning fiber routes, peering strategies and edge footprints with specific AI use cases, underwriting new topologies and dark fiber, and deciding when richer interconnection ecosystems actually enhance pricing power, retention and asset values? What does it take to map workloads across core, hub and edge locations, define “good enough” latency for different applications and build a mesh‑style network and edge strategy that balances technical performance with financial outcomes as architectures and demand evolve?
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11:15 AM 12:00 PM |
From Dirt to Deal: Site Strategy, Permitting and the Economics of “Where to Build Next”
Early‑stage decisions on land, zoning, and power rights now lock in outcomes for both risk and return. This discussion looks at how teams are blending market analysis, community engagement, and lease / land structures to create bankable projects. How are developers structuring ground leases, incentives, and risk‑sharing mechanisms with cities, utilities, and end‑users so that sites are both permittable and financeable?
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12:00 PM 1:40 PM |
Lunch and Expo!
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1:00 PM 1:30 PM |
Women's Coffee & Connect!
Join fellow women professionals for a coffee-powered networking break focused on connection, collaboration, and community.
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1:40 PM 2:15 PM |
Beyond the Substation: Integrating New Power Sources into AI-Ready Campuses
Traditional grid supply alone can no longer keep pace with AI-driven growth, pushing operators to experiment with renewables, advanced nuclear, hydrogen, fuel cells, and hybrid microgrids. This session explores how teams are evaluating business cases, regulatory risk, and technical integration for emerging power sources across both new builds and existing campuses. Which models are proving most viable in real projects, and how should developers decide when to double down on the traditional grid versus layering in alternative generation to secure firm, future-ready capacity?
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2:15 PM 2:55 PM |
Workforce Under Pressure: Navigating Talent Shortages, Skills Gaps, and the Urgent Need for Strategic Action
As AI demand accelerates, the data center talent shortage has become a core financial and operational constraint rather than a back‑office HR issue. This session examines how owners, operators, and builders are grappling with scarce skilled labor, rising wage and relocation costs, and thin local talent pools across construction, operations, and specialized technical roles. How are teams rethinking workforce strategy—apprenticeships, reskilling, AI‑enabled productivity tools, and partnerships with trades and educators—to keep projects moving, protect uptime, and make the economics of new capacity still pencil out in today’s labor market?
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2:55 PM 3:15 PM |
Networking Break
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3:15 PM 3:55 PM |
The Power P&L: Maximizing Compute per Megawatt in the New Economics of Power
With power now a defining line item in every pro forma, energy strategy has become a core financial decision, not just an engineering exercise. This panel dives into how owners, operators, and capital providers are approaching long term PPAs, hedging strategies, creative tariff structures, and demand response or grid services revenues while explicitly tying those decisions to compute per megawatt and asset value over time. How are teams modeling cost, volatility, and carbon over the life of AI era campuses, and what separates power strategies that merely secure supply from those that systematically turn constrained megawatts into durable revenue and competitive advantage?
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3:55 PM 4:35 PM |
From Market Land Grab to Disciplined Growth: How 2026 Sets the Tone for the Next Cycle
After a decade of land grabs and hyper‑growth, the industry is entering a phase where discipline matters as much as speed. In this keynote, senior leaders reflect on Day 1 themes—markets, sites, supply chains, and talent—and discuss how their organizations are prioritizing projects and capital. What does “responsible growth” look like when demand is still exploding, and how will the decisions made in 2026 shape competitiveness through 2030?
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4:35 PM 5:35 PM |
DICE National Day 1 Post-Event Cocktail Reception!!
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| May 13 | Activity |
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7:30 AM 8:20 AM |
Coffee, Networking & Breakfast
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8:20 AM 8:30 AM |
Opening Remarks: Welcome to Day 2!
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8:30 AM 9:00 AM |
Keynote: The Class A Developer
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9:00 AM 9:45 AM |
Power Playbooks for the AI Era: Making Limited Megawatts Go Further
AI growth is forcing teams to think differently about how every megawatt is allocated, sequenced and used across a campus. This panel explores how operators are reshaping power strategies with staged energization, smarter distribution, and selective use of on‑site and alternative solutions to stretch constrained capacity. What practical approaches are helping projects move forward in tight power markets, and how are teams designing today’s systems so they can absorb future upgrades without major disruption?
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9:45 AM 10:30 AM |
AI-First Design: Rethinking Scale, Redundancy and Modularity
Designing for AI reshapes fundamentals, from power topologies and cooling concepts to space planning and building form. This session explores how teams are updating reference designs and standards to support higher densities, faster change and more varied customer needs. How are designers choosing where to standardize versus customize, and what lessons from early AI builds are already changing the next wave of templates?
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10:30 AM 10:55 AM |
Networking Break
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10:55 AM 11:40 AM |
The Future of Cooling: Designing for High-Density AI Without Overbuilding
As GPU densities climb, cooling strategies must evolve without turning every project into a science experiment. This session looks at how teams compare liquid, immersion and hybrid options while keeping an eye on reliability, maintainability and long‑term operating profile. Which design choices are proving resilient as hardware changes, and how are project teams avoiding both under‑provisioning and expensive, rarely used over‑design?
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11:40 AM 1:40 PM |
Lunch and Expo!
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12:25 PM 12:45 PM |
From Blueprint to Build: Best Practices for Physical Security Throughout Development
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1:00 PM 1:30 PM |
Women's Coffee & Connect!
Join fellow women professionals for a coffee-powered networking break focused on connection, collaboration, and community.
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1:40 PM 2:20 PM |
Operational Excellence 2.0: Tools, Teams and the New Performance Baseline
Operating modern AI‑ready facilities requires tighter coordination between people, platforms and processes. This panel examines how organizations are updating playbooks around monitoring, incident response, skills development and collaboration across sites. Which combinations of DCIM, analytics and automation are actually improving reliability and efficiency, and how are leaders deciding where to invest next to raise the baseline across their portfolios?
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2:20 PM 3:05 PM |
Capital at the Core: Underwriting AI‑Era Campuses, Pipelines and Exits
Capital is chasing AI‑era development at unprecedented scale, but not every site, campus or platform is truly underwritable. As sponsors navigate interest rates, delivery risk, power constraints and evolving contract structures, they are recalibrating how they size, price and structure deals across development, recapitalizations and M&A. Which projects actually clear the bar for “bankable,” how are investors reshaping portfolios and capital stacks around the most durable demand, and what choices today will define who can keep building as capital becomes more selective?
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3:05 PM 3:20 PM |
Networking Break
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3:20 PM 3:50 PM |
Keynote: The Missing Middle: Power Strategy for Mid-Sized Demand
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3:50 PM 4:35 PM |
Closing Keynote Day 2
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4:35 PM 5:35 PM |
DICE National Day 2 Post-Event Cocktail Reception!!
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| May 14 | Activity |
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7:30 AM 8:20 AM |
Coffee, Networking & Breakfast
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8:20 AM 8:30 AM |
Opening Remarks: Welcome to Day 3!
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9:00 AM 9:40 AM |
When Data Centers Come to Town: Community, Resources, and Sustainability
When data centers arrive, the biggest friction points are often water, power, labor, tax incentives, and overall community impact. Developers, operators, and public officials are rethinking how they approach residents and local leaders, how they talk about incentives, and how they design projects so benefits feel real on the ground. At the same time, communities are asking harder questions about sustainability—how facilities use water, source power, and manage their footprint over the long term. How are teams building trust early, baking in more sustainable choices, and turning skeptics into long-term allies as campuses grow over multiple phases?
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9:40 AM 10:25 AM |
Delivery at Scale: Turning Big Pipelines into Real, Buildable Projects
Backlogs are full, but not every project can move at once. This panel explores how owners, builders and designers are prioritizing work, sequencing scopes and standardizing approaches when they have more demand than delivery capacity. How are teams deciding which projects to advance, which to re‑shape and which to slow down—while keeping customers engaged and internal resources focused on the right opportunities?
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10:25 AM 10:40 AM |
Networking Break
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10:40 AM 11:25 AM |
The Art of Running Hot: Operating High‑Density Cooling Day‑to‑Day
As liquid and hybrid cooling roll out, the hard part is less picking a technology and more running it well every day. This session looks at how operators are tuning setpoints, controls, maintenance practices, and monitoring so high‑density environments stay stable without over‑reacting to every hardware change. How are teams updating playbooks, staffing, and tooling to keep new cooling systems reliable and manageable at scale?
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11:25 AM 12:10 PM |
Lifetime Achievement Award Presentation/Keynote Day 3: Joe Kava
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12:10 PM 2:00 PM |
Lunch and Expo!
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2:00 PM 2:45 PM |
Smart Jobsites: Construction Tech That Keeps Critical Paths Moving
Construction teams are leaning on robotics, drones, reality capture and field data platforms to keep complex data center projects coordinated and on schedule. This session focuses on the tools that are actually making a difference on the jobsite—from clash detection and material tracking to real‑time status updates that inform daily planning. How are project teams integrating these technologies into standard workflows so they support faster, cleaner delivery rather than remaining one‑off pilots?
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2:45 PM 3:30 PM |
Designing for Speed: Construction Strategies That Shorten the Path to First Power
When timelines are tight, construction planning can either unlock speed or bake in delays. This discussion explores how modular power and cooling skids, repeatable building layouts, prefabrication and smarter sequencing are compressing schedules on large data center projects. Where are teams successfully using these construction‑driven strategies to reduce redesign cycles, cut field changes and move from concept to energized capacity faster in high‑demand markets?
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3:30 PM 5:30 PM |
DICE National Day 3 Post-Event Cocktail Reception and DICE CASINO NIGHT!!
Join Bisnow and your friends for food, drinks and casino games!
What better way to wrap up an amazing three days of networking, deals and content??
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| May 15 | Activity |
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8:00 AM 3:00 PM |
Golf Outing!
Join us at Blue Mash Golf Course for a day of golf, deal-making and fun!
Interested in filling a foursome or sponsoring? Email: Brady.Bash@Bisnow.com
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Seniority Breakdown:
Industry Representation
Our 2025 event saw more than 50 organizations bringing multi-person teams—with some groups sending over 10 attendees each! The crowd spanned the entire data center value chain:
Plus:
Dynamic presence from telecom and tech innovation leaders
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