Microsoft Mobile Communications Partner Summit 2008 Part II

I would be remiss in my responsibility if I did not follow-up on my original post. I will hold to my contention that MY time would have been better invested elsewhere. That is not to say that the summit was bad.

Quite the contrary. Actually it was very well organized and well managed. The posted schedule was honored and the speakers generally did a very respectable job of presenting their material. The problem for me was that the material wasn't terribly relevant to me, my business or my clients.

If I were the owner of a larger company, focused on serving the Enterprise space or if I had a team of developers, I would have probably been quite satisfied with the entire event. Microsoft made it abundantly clear that they were embracing, in fact, dependent upon, the developer community for the ultimate success of their Mobile platform. Their repeated focus on System Center Mobile Device Manager was squarely directed at partners serving the enterprise customer.

The second day was somewhat redeemed when I was able to ambush Rachel Jusseaume, Senior Product Manager-Windows Mobile, SMS&P in the break area. We agreed to follow-up after the new year. IF there is to be any fruit borne for Quality Systems Solutions, Inc in Windows Mobile, working with her is what is going to make it happen.

The Summit was closed with a keynote by Rachel's boss, Dametra Johnson-Marletti and her whole team. Dametra did a nice job of showing how Microsoft was aligning their Marketing Campaign with the hardware, the software (platform) and service (SCMDM) components. She also illustrated the multifaceted approach to the campaign including consumer, retail, competitive, enterprise and even a brief nod to SMB.

In the end, I would say that most attendees probably gave the event high marks. As for me, next year, I'll take a pass.