5 minutes before opening key note...
hello all - in true Microsoft style there's a rock band on stage and it's 0830AM! Today's opening keynote is in the Toyota Centre, a 15,000 seat sports arena - big screens, loud music and loads of people. Should be lively!
Steve Balmer is giving his keynote tomorrow, that's going to be one to see also
Show starts. Here we go then - loads of loud loud video looking back to the last WPC in Boston. There's the vid of Balmer jumping and shouting about on stage "you partners are great!!" etc.
Dancing and rock on stage now. It's pretty inspiring stuff actually in that corp-style way,and the music's good too. The place is full now - must be 12000+ people here!
Allison Watson, Corp VP on stage now doing the thanks and welcomes. Here come the top 10 comedy reasons to be at WPC.. Fancy water bottles, "it's never been a better time to be an MS partner". ok....
What's WPC this year going to be all about then? Key Themes;
- Partner Programme Evolution. It will evolve over the next 18 months to improve talent and brand focus
- Software+Sservices - announcements about online and partnering
- Use the Launch Momentum
- Vista deployment. (Obviously some issues here)
- Relentless Focus on Customer Satisfaction. Mutual customer base etc.
All the partner winners are coming on stage now, loads of them, 46 partner winners from all over the world for all the Partner Competencies. Oxford Computer Group in the UK (met them last night) have built an identity solution for students on top of Windows Live and the EDU platform. 10 universities and 100,000 students use this now. Neat stuff.
Stephen Elop, President Microsoft Business Division is now talking about the Microsoft eco-systems. There are 500,000 partners worldwide for MS. For every $1 that MS generate, partners generate $7 for their own business. Enhanced personal communications - there are 25,000 MS employees now that use UC, presence and don’t have a traditional PBX-based phone. These are the first early stages of the revolution for personal telephony, it’s hard to imagine how much personal comms will evolve and integrate with our lives in the next few years.
Here comes a demo of Dynamics CRM from Brad Wilson, good showing of some integration with MOSS,web search and then some presence and Outlook magic. Showed mobile access into CRM also - get your opportunities online! Good stuff to illustrate the integration and customisation opportunities for Partners. Here’s a factoid for you – integration services like this make 20-27% margin on average in their partner base.
Here are the big Software+Services announcements then....
#1 - Deskless Worker Suite. Office SharePoint Online Deskless & Exchange Online Deskless. What this really is isn’t that clear... looks like OWA and Mobile to me, i.e. a light service.
#2 - QuickStart for MOS – 12% of first year revenue to be had, the 6% of subsequent revenue. The programme is the opportunity for partners to help Microsoft sell MOS to Microsoft’s customers.
Didn't they just say “Microsoft’s customers” there? And wasn’t the margin for doing this yourself upto 27%?
The rest is the same as before; it’s about the power of choice again, that’s their approach. There’s some activity going on here though - 500 CRM Online customers & 200 partners selling this already, Coca-Cola, Nokia etc., have all given some commitments to Microsoft Online Services (MOS), I guess that the multi-million dollar licensing bills are helping this. IDC est. S+S will grow 32% YoY, to 2012 turning into a $21Billion market etc. etc. Big opportunity etc.
Now there’s a case study video of a Microsoft Partner selling Online Services - hang on.. Wow, they sold a SharePoint site, well done boys.
