Microsoft Convergence 2009 Field Report – Day 1

Our 90 Minds member Scott Hickman from Service World Computer Center in Southwest Missouri is on the ground in Orleans with his staff attending the Microsoft Convergence 2009 reseller conference being  held now through March 13, 2009 in New Orleans.

Scott today filed this report to 90 Mind group members and I’ve asked Scott if I can reprint it verbatim to give readers an attendee’s point of view about the conference happenings.

Keep in mind that these comments are based on the first day of Convergence. There may be other announcements later in the conference and we’ll take care to update the story as additional information is released.

Microsoft Convergenge 2009 Day 1 Field Report

From: Scott Hickman
Date: Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 8:37 AM
Subject: [sageresellers] Second Day in New Orleans with Microsoft
To: sageresellers

I am in New Orleans at the Microsoft convention. There has not been anything earth shattering. The Keynote indicated that we will be “blown away” on Thursday. We shall see.

Notable items

Over 4,000 partners attending (pretty strong for Dynamics)

Beginning to develop business applications around their “surface” hardware. (ie., touchscreen Kiosk in warehouse)

50 tips on Dynamics GP in 50 minutes – great session – great idea

They are pushing green green green. No bottled watered – they gave us a refillable water bottle. Plastic cups are made of corn. Ink pens are called Vegetals. I still have not seen paperless out of the box with GP though. They want us to give our water bottles to NOLA schools. Recycle our name badges which are made from recycled material and corn.

No nightly entertainment. Sessions go until 6:00. There are a few left over snacks on the table and then you need to leave. Kind of like the last day on a cruise ship. Free beer and alchohol is also past bye-gones .

Heavily pushing CRM. CRM resellers are optimistic about their practices. Say they are recession proof. Engagements are t y pically $50K implementation, $25K software and 20 users.

CRM integration with Dynamics – GP is comparable to Sage’s solution. Just a bunch of synchronization. They are coming out with a new integration this year.

Dynamics RMS is mysterically missing.

Good NOLA band openend up before keynote. Much better than the broom stunt.

I will post the “blown away” news tomorrow if I think the group’s heart and health can take the shock.

Scott

via: Scott Hickman – ServiceWorld Computer Center – Missouri

Update - I also spotted this Microsoft Convergence update from ZDNET which mirrors all of Scott’s observations.

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