CEDIA has announced that former Disney executive Duncan Wardle will deliver the keynote presentation at CEDIA Expo/CIX 2026 on Sept. 2 at 8 a.m. in the Mile High Ballroom.
According to CEDIA, Wardle’s keynote will focus on innovation, creativity and design thinking, with an emphasis on how custom integration businesses can adapt to evolving technologies and changing client expectations in an increasingly AI-driven market.
Wardle previously served as Head of Innovation and Creativity at The Walt Disney Company, where he worked with teams across Disney Parks, Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm, Imagineering and Animation. During his 25-year tenure at Disney, he helped develop creative strategies and experiential storytelling initiatives for the company’s entertainment brands.
CEDIA says Wardle’s presentation will provide attendees with practical tools and techniques designed to help integration firms approach projects more creatively, improve collaboration and identify new business opportunities. The association also noted that design-thinking concepts introduced during the keynote will be expanded upon during a CEDIA workshop later that day.
“I am absolutely delighted to be able to join everyone at this year’s CEDIA Expo in Denver on Sept. 2,” Wardle says in the announcement. “I hope to not only inspire everyone to want to innovate but give them tools that take the intimidation out of innovation to make creativity tangible and the process fun.”
Since leaving Disney, Wardle has presented keynote sessions and workshops focused on innovation and creative thinking for organizations and universities worldwide. He has also delivered TEDx talks and teaches innovation and creativity masterclasses at Harvard, Yale and Stanford.
CEDIA Global President and CEO Daryl Friedman says Wardle’s experience in storytelling and innovation aligns with the smart home industry’s focus on creating personalized user experiences.
“Smart home professionals are in the business of creating experiences that feel a little like magic in people’s homes, which is why Duncan’s perspective on innovation and storytelling is such a natural fit for our community,” Friedman says in the announcement. “As AI continues to evolve, the real differentiator will be human skills like creativity, intuition, and curiosity.”
What CEDIA Expo 2026 attendees can expect to hear during Wardle’s keynote
Artificial intelligence, and the human skills that may become more valuable because of it, appear to be a central theme in many of Duncan Wardle’s publicly available talks and interviews ahead of his upcoming keynote at CEDIA Expo 2026. The timing here couldn’t be better, as the industry is fully embracing AI for both back-end operations and across the smart home user experience. Across keynote clips, podcasts and presentations posted online, the former Disney executive frequently argues that creativity, curiosity, empathy, intuition and imagination will become increasingly important as AI takes over more analytical and repetitive work.
A recurring message in Wardle’s talks is that creativity is not limited to a small group of “creative” people, but is instead something organizations unintentionally suppress over time. Drawing from his decades at The Walt Disney Company, Wardle often says children naturally think more imaginatively because they are curious, playful and unafraid of failure, while schools and workplaces train adults to search for only one “right” answer. He also frequently discusses how relaxed mental states — showering, walking, driving or falling asleep — tend to produce stronger ideas than stressful work environments because they allow intuition and subconscious thinking to emerge.
Wardle also regularly highlights how Disney approached innovation through customer experience and emotional storytelling rather than purely operational thinking. Examples he often references include Disney’s “guest” versus “customer” philosophy, brainstorming methods built around “yes, and” collaboration, and the creation of the Disney MagicBand to reduce wait times and friction inside the parks. Throughout the talks, he argues that companies will increasingly differentiate themselves not through access to data alone, but through human-centered thinking, emotional intelligence and the willingness to challenge conventional processes.
Additional information about the keynote presentation and CEDIA Expo 2026 programming is available through CEDIA Expo.
