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Core77 is holding its second-annual design conference in Los Angeles on October 23, and we're pulling out all the stops. We've got a spectacular venue in downtown LA; we're throwing two parties; we're offering optional field trips the morning after the conference—and, of course, we have a stellar lineup of speakers and topics, which we've been introducing in a series of posts over the last few days.

Today, we're previewing our fourth and final conference session, The Future Now. Our first speaker is Jessie Kawata, a creative strategist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where she helped pioneer the first in-house design studio. Kawata will talk about her work integrating design thinking, creative methodologies and visual storytelling into early space mission concepts.

Jessie Kawata

Our next speaker is Mickey McManus, the chairman and a principal of MAYA Design, a design consultancy and technology research lab based in Pittsburgh. McManus is a pioneer in the fields of collaborative innovation, pervasive computing, human-centered design and education—and he'll talk to us about what happens when the things we design "wake up."

MAYA Design's three core disciplines

Our second-to-last speak is Javier Verdura, the director of product design at Tesla Motors, the American automotive and energy-storage company that probably needs little introduction. Verdura will sit down for a moderated conversation on his design work at Tesla and his thoughts on the big-picture future of automotive design.

Finally, NewDealDesign's creative leader and president, Gadi Amit, will talks to us about the future of technology design. As he told us in an interview last February, Amit belives that designers are now in a position to influence the lives of people to a greater extent than ever before. His talk will reflect on this moment — one of great promise for the design community, but also one of uncertainty and risk. How can designers ensure that they are at the center of conversations about assimilating technology into society? Does design education or professional development need to be rethought? What are designers doing well and what do they need to be doing better?

One of NewDealDesign's latest projects is Beep, which transforms any stereo or speakers into a conduit for streaming music.

That wraps up our four-part CoreCon preview, and we hope that we've convinced you to join us in LA on October 23. If so, grab your tickets soon—there are only six days left in our early pricing for the event.