24 Apr 2008 11:13 PM EDT
[ Tags: synergy08,  keynotes,  citrix synergy ]

The heavy hitters in technology are lining up to join the conversation at Citrix Synergy. You already heard about the best selling technology author Nicholas Carr, the versatile comedian Dana Carvey and the Senior Vice President from Microsoft Bob Muglia. The line up of intriguing keynote speakers does not stop there.

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Vishal Sikka Chief Technology Officer (CTO)
SAP

Reporting directly to Henning Kagermann, Sikka is responsible for driving the company's technology and architecture strategy across its product portfolio. Sikka is ensuring a clear and harmonized roadmap for SAP products to deliver new innovations and increasing value to customers. As CTO, Sikka also leads the company's forward-thinking efforts around emerging technologies and is responsible for mapping SAP's next-generation architecture.



Scott Farrand Vice-President, ISS Software
HP

Scott is VP ISS Software and leads the ISS Software team. Scott and his team are focused on the total business for ISS software and related internal and external partnerships. The ISS software team includes base ISS management software, operating systems, SmartStart, and Virtualization software technologies.

Scott joins Hewlett Packard by way of acquisition of RLX Technologies in October 2005. Scott joined the founding team at RLX Technologies in December 2000, Scott Farrand has been responsible for operating systems support, ServerBlade management and solutions development for scale-out applications.



Roberto Moctezuma Vice President and GM, Desktop Solutions Global Business Unit
HP

Roberto Moctezuma is the vice president and general manager for Desktop Solutions. Based in Houston; he is responsible for the global business unit (GBU) that focuses on the emerging thin client and virtualization market. It includes Thin Clients, CCI (Consolidated Client Infrastructure), Blades Workstations and Retail Point of Sale solutions.



Patrick P. Gelsinger Vice President and Co-General Manager, Digital Enterprise Group
INTEL Corporation

Pat Gelsinger is senior vice president and co-general manager of Intel Corporation's Digital Enterprise Group (DEG). This group is Intel's largest business group accounting for more than half of the corporation's revenue. As co-general manager, Gelsinger is focused on delivering leading platforms and products to businesses worldwide. These platforms span the full gamut of business needs including servers, business clients, storage, communications and embedded applications. In addition to delivering platforms, DEG designs and develops many of the platform ingredients such as microprocessors, chipsets, motherboards, networking components and software.



David Booth, President, Sales and Marketing
CSC
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Mr. Booth is president of CSC's global sales and marketing. He is responsible for designing and implementing CSC sales and marketing strategies worldwide to help create and sustain competitive advantage in bringing service offerings to market. His responsibilities also include sales and marketing strategies to increase penetration in key markets; strengthening and enhancing sales and marketing capabilities across the business; creating and maintaining alliances to augment growth goals; and establishing strategies, programs and practices that define CSC's presence in the marketplace. In addition, Mr. Booth is responsible for developing and implementing a focused market segmentation strategy, improving the alignment of the sales function with the overall business, developing CSC's brand, and strengthening the sales and marketing culture within CSC across the globe. These programs, and others developed as part of Project Accelerate, will help transform how CSC goes to market. The appointment supports Project Accelerate, the company's comprehensive new strategy to accelerate growth and improve customer service.



George Kurian VP/GM, Application Delivery Business
Cisco Systems, Inc.

George Kurian is the Vice-President and General Manager for Cisco System's Application Delivery Business Unit. He leads the development and implementation of the Cisco-wide strategy for Application Delivery products including product strategy, development, acquisitions and investments, and coordinating the company's Go-to-Market capabilities for this Advanced Technology segment.


The keynote lineup includes the CTO of SAP, a Senior Vice President of Microsoft, TWO VP's from HP, a VP from Intel, a VP from Cisco, a President from CSC AND a best selling IT author and a great comedian. This promises to be the best lineup of keynote speakers we have ever had at a Citrix event.

You can click here to register for Citrix Synergy. I look forward to seeing you in Houston next month.

Permalink | Comments (3) |

Barry

I agree with most of the industry heavyweights that are going to be at this year's Synergy event, except one.  Nicolas Carr is not an industry heavyweight in my opinion.  Carr's statement that IT is going to be commoditized and not important is complete crap and a total over-intellectualization of today's business environment.  I can show numerous examples of where IT is central to the way some of my clients are creating new business models and creating even more competitive edge in their respective industries.

With all the work that we have done in this industry to show how much IT can be an enabler of business and a driver of creation of new business models, creating a competitive edge, etc having Carr as a guest speaker goes against all that work.  What was marketing thinking?  Why not get guys like Jim Champy or Gary Hamel. 

I can tell you that I won't be attending Carr's stuff. 

My .02

Cheers
Michael

Michael,

I  can understand how you feel about Nicholas Carr. He is definitely controversial. He does say alot of provocative things. In my opinion,  if you really dig down into it, his main point is that spending alot of money on technology does not guarantee you a strategic advantage. You have to line up technology projects with business objectives and be smart about how you spend that money. You need to ensure that those technology expenditures have a good return on the investment. If he had just made the point that plainly, he probably would not have sold so many books.

He admits in one of the video interviews in my post about him that failure to keep up with technology can put you at a competitive disadvantage. I think you have to go through the whole message to really get to the main point. If you view his remarks in that light, it make more sense in my opinion.   His remarks can be interpreted a number of different ways, so I can understand your feelings about it.

He is a best selling technology author , but I did not mean to imply he is an industry heavyweight. That is why there is a separate post about him. This post is about the specific industry heavyweights from SAP, HP, Cisco and Intel who are speaking at the event. Sorry for the confusion...

I will see you in Houston. 

Barry 

Thanks for the clarification and to admit, I might have misread the beginning.  I would agree wholeheartedly that the others in the list are power players in the industry.

I can respect your thoughts above and it's always good to have an intelligent discussion around this.  Thanks for the convo Barry!!

 See you in Houston

 Cheers
Michael