What we learned at ElasticON Sydney and what it means for the future of search

Last week, our CTO, Stephen Makrogianni, and I spent a couple of days at ElasticON Sydney 2026 talking with engineers, product teams, and organisations building some of the most advanced search and data platforms in the world.

Events like this are always useful because they sit right at the intersection of three areas that are rapidly converging:

• Search
• Data platforms
• AI

And if there was one big takeaway from the conference, it’s this: Search is becoming the operating system for knowledge. It’s no longer just about helping someone find a document on a website. Search platforms are now powering everything from AI assistants to operational analytics.

For organisations running complex digital services, which includes most of our clients, that shift is pretty significant. Below are a few of the themes that stood out to us, and how they connect to the direction we’re taking with search in the Silverstripe ecosystem.

Search is no longer just a website feature

For a long time, search lived quietly in the corner of a website. You’d type a keyword. You’d get a list of results. But that model is changing quickly. Search platforms are now being used to power:

• Knowledge discovery

• Customer service tools

• Internal staff assistants

• Data analytics

• AI-driven applications

What makes search technology uniquely powerful is its ability to index huge volumes of information and surface what matters quickly. Increasingly, search is becoming the layer that sits between data and decision-making.

AI is changing what users expect from search

One of the biggest shifts we’re seeing is how AI is reshaping expectations around search experiences. Users no longer expect to type a keyword and dig through ten results.

Instead they want to:

• Ask a question

• Refine it

• Explore answers

• Get context immediately

In other words, search is becoming more conversational. The interesting part is how this actually works under the hood; we heard from Woolworths and Spark about modern search experiences combine three key capabilities:

1. Keyword search: matching exact terms and known phrases

2. Traditional relevance tuning: using ranking signals such as weighting, freshness, popularity, and business rules

3. Vector search: understanding semantic similarity so related concepts can be found even when the wording differs

When these capabilities work together, search systems can start to behave more like assistants than search boxes. This direction aligns closely with the work we’re doing in the Silverstripe Search roadmap, where we’re focused on improving both relevance and discovery experiences across content-heavy platforms.

The real challenge: context

A concept that came up repeatedly during the conference was something called context engineering. In simple terms, it’s about ensuring AI systems have access to the right information to reason properly.

AI models by themselves are powerful, but they’re far more useful when they can access:

• Organisational knowledge

• Documents and policies

• Structured data

• Trusted sources

Search technology plays a critical role here because it acts as the gateway to that information.

In practice, this is exactly the kind of problem we’re solving with our evolving search capabilities, helping organisations make their content, knowledge, and data discoverable in meaningful ways.

Trust is the real product

One of the most interesting discussions at the conference wasn’t about AI at all.

It was about trust. AI tools are only useful if people trust the answers they produce.

That means systems need to be able to show:

• Where information comes from

• Why a result is relevant

• How answers were generated

The phrase that stuck with me was: “Trust is the product.”

This is particularly important in sectors like government, education, and enterprise where information accuracy matters. 

One of the reasons we’re investing heavily in structured search capabilities across Silverstripe platforms is to ensure organisations can build AI-assisted experiences that remain grounded in trusted data.

Data quality still matters (a lot)

Another refreshing theme was how much emphasis Elastic(opens in new tab) placed on something that isn’t very glamorous: data quality.

Before AI, before analytics, before conversational search, you need good data.

That means information that is:

• Complete

• Consistent

• Structured

• Usable

Most organisations don’t actually lack data. What they lack is clarity about how that data is organised and accessed. Search platforms play a key role in helping organisations narrow huge volumes of information into usable insight.

And again, this ties back to a big focus area in our roadmap: helping clients structure and surface information effectively.

The search bar is still the starting point

Despite all the AI conversation, one simple truth remains: The search bar is still incredibly powerful. When someone searches, they’re telling you something important.

They’re telling you what they need; that moment of intent is one of the most valuable signals a digital platform can receive. The challenge is making sure the system responds with the most helpful path forward. That might be:

• A document

• A service

• A product

• Or a direct answer

Improving how platforms interpret and respond to that intent is a major focus area in the next generation of search capabilities across Silverstripe-powered sites.

How this connects to our search roadmap

Many of the themes from the conference reinforce the direction we’ve been taking with search across Silverstripe platforms. Our focus areas include:

• Improving relevance and ranking

• Strengthening structured content discovery

• Supporting semantic and vector search capabilities

• Enabling AI-powered knowledge experiences

• Ensuring search remains trusted and explainable

In short, we’re thinking about search not just as a feature, but as a foundational capability for digital services.

Final thoughts

The biggest takeaway from ElasticON was that search is evolving rapidly. But the fundamentals haven’t changed. Good search experiences still rely on:

• Well-structured content

• Trusted information

• Clear intent

• Useful results
  

AI is accelerating what’s possible, but the real value comes from combining AI with strong data and search foundations. That’s exactly where we’re focusing our efforts.

If you’re interested in how modern search capabilities could improve discovery, knowledge sharing, or digital services within your organisation, we’d love to talk. Email us today at hello@silverstripe.com.

There’s a lot of exciting work happening in this space and this conference was a great reminder that we’re only just getting started.