Well it sure was an eventful day! I hardly had time to sit back and get onto the computer to check in on things in Calgary but I’m sure the team is doing well without me. It’s comforting knowing we have such a great group at Eligeo that I don’t need to worry about things like I used to when we started out.
Day 2 was great! It was a day that featured a lot of information on cloud services including the partner kick off event for Office 365. We saw some incredible demonstrations on Office 365 products such as SharePoint and Lync which are the products that have been the most overhauled in this latest cloud services offering.
Keynote
As I didn’t get to attend the Day 1 keynote, I did attend the Tuesday Vision Keynote. I was fortunate enough to be invited to the IAMCP (International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners) suite to watch the entire show. I also met another Calgarian who is from Microsoft and told me a lot about the benefits of the upcoming CRM releases which will be tightly packed with Office 365 and are now starting to give Small Business a powerful tool to manage the sales cycle.
The Keynotes are held at the STAPLES Center in downtown Los Angeles. As you can see from the screen shots above we were treated to a pretty impressive performance by American Idol finalist Allison Iraheta. It was an incredible performance where she sang Cold Play’s Viva La Vida.
Afterwards it was very much a cloud discussion. Several executives from Microsoft talked a lot about Microsoft Office, Office 365, the cloud, and many new devices coming to market or already in it. We saw some impressive demonstrations of Microsoft Lync (instant messaging, telephony and video chat tool with Office 365) and as well saw many commercial uses of Xbox Kinect. It’s not just for video gaming.
I was also really impressed to see Jon Roskill pop into our suite to say hello.
Afterwards I was off to do some networking and grab some lunch. I met a really nice individual from Saudi Arabia, although originally from India, Agnello. He works with a distribution company there and we had a really good chat about the economy in both of our countries as well as opportunities we see coming up. And it turns out I’m more than welcome to come visit him in Saudi Arabia whenever I want!
Preparation for Breakout Session
The main reason I’m in Los Angeles is to do the breakout session on Google Apps Competition and why we chose to go with Microsoft Online Services rather than Google Apps. We had our first meeting between Alina (Microsoft), Martin(Microsoft), Domnick (speaker) and Danny (speaker). This was the first time we had all met in person rather than by phone.
Office 365 Kickoff
This was my favourite part of the sessions during the day. The Office 365 Partner Kickoff was specifically for Office 365 Partners or prospective partners. We heard a lot of great information from several key product managers on many of the new features in the Office 365 suite as well as the opportunities available for business partners. Microsoft SharePoint has certainly come a long way and many of our clients that are starting to migrate to Office 365 have a lot of cool features to look forward too.
Another great mention was the discussions on Microsoft Lync and collaboration. We watched a segment where an individual was inside the conference room having a Lync video chat with a colleague in another room. We then watched as they worked together on the very same excel worksheet. And get this, changes were INSTANT between both parties. Now that is cool and productive.
Office 365 certainly is something that is well worth keeping a tab on as it has a lot of great features for only $7 per month. No minimum seat count. So if you have only 1 or 2 people in your business then you can benefit from this great offer.
The fun evening happenings
Afterwards I caught up with Alina and Martin from Microsoft for dinner at the Yard House just outside of our hotel. This was a Microsoft Blackbelt Partner appreciation dinner. A Microsoft Blackbelt Partner seems to be the compete team for Microsoft and Eligeo is proud to be part of that group. I met several individuals from Chile, Australia and Denmark from this group. Oh and I also had some of the best jumbo prawns I’ve ever had in my life.
Afterwards it was time for the Canada Party. Microsoft Canada rented out the entire night club the Mayan and put on an incredible show. We were first treated to our DJ Host, Maestro. He then introduced the first act which is an up and coming band in the Arkells. They were phenomenal! After a brief break from the band we were then surprised by the appearance of the Quest Crew. These guys (and gal) have some incredible dance moves. I have some video’s on my Android that I will try posting at some point.
After this long day I headed off to bed.
Today (Wednesday) is a pretty busy day. In a few hours the keynote kicks off and of course the featured guest speaker takes to the stage. The guest speaker? None other than Sir Richard Branson. I’m really looking forward to it.
Here are some photo’s from the evening:
