FabCon & SQLCon Europe 2026: Key Takeaways from Barcelona
With nearly 5,000 data professionals in Barcelona, one message stood out: Microsoft Fabric is evolving rapidly, with AI becoming part of the entire data lifecycle.
Business context, real-time insights, security and governed data are more important than ever.
Key Announcements
- Fabric IQ & Semantic Models: With Fabric IQ reaching general availability, trusted business context is taking centre stage. As AI agents increasingly rely on semantic models, high-quality data modelling, metadata and governed measures are more critical than ever.
- From Reports to Applications: Fabric Apps (Preview) and the new agentic app-building experience in Power BI are opening up opportunities to move beyond dashboards and turn insights into actionable business workflows.
- AI-Powered Data Engineering: AI agents are helping data engineers streamline tasks such as data preparation, ETL development and performance optimisation, enabling more productive ways of working.
- Flexible Compute with OneLake: New compute and billing capabilities announced at the event could offer more flexibility for experimentation, sandbox environments and workloads with fluctuating demand.
One of our biggest takeaways goes beyond the technology itself.
As AI agents become increasingly capable of helping analysts and engineers build, transform and deliver faster, accountability for the final deliverable remains with the human professional.
Our roles are evolving from being solely the people who do the work to those who know how to direct, configure and orchestrate these agents effectively—and, just as importantly, evaluate their outputs.
Using AI is not simply about generating results faster. It requires the expertise to validate results, challenge incorrect assumptions, ensure quality and security, and take accountability for what is ultimately delivered.
The competitive advantage will belong to professionals who combine technical expertise and business understanding with the ability to work effectively alongside AI.
At Witside, we’re excited to help organisations build trusted data foundations, unlock the value of their data and prepare for the next generation of analytics and AI.
