Parallels, a leader in virtualization and automation software, announced today that registration for its 5th annual conference is open. Parallels Summit 2009 - the biggest event of the US hosting industry calendar - was held earlier this year in Las Vegas, Nevada. The event attracted a record number of attendees and featured keynote sessions from respected industry leaders and commentators, headlined by Parallels CEO, Serguei Beloussov. Parallels Summit 2010 promises to deliver even more networking and educational opportunities.
“I thought the speakers were a big step up from most events in this space,” said Antonio Piraino, Senior Analyst, Managed Hosting & Cloud Infrastructure Services, Tier 1 Research. “I think that’s the reason we saw the rapid up-swing in attendees to well over 1000. The content was focused, relevant and I got the sense that people were really trying to help each other s businesses rather than just harbor a hidden sales pitch for the latest and greatest products.”
“The Parallels Summit has clearly become a leading conference in the hosting business,” said Bill McNee, President and CEO, Saugatuck Technology. “Parallels not only did a great job building an agenda that provided great insight into key industry trends such as Cloud Computing and SaaS, but it also provided a very delegate-friendly environment that facilitated great networking for its very executive-level international audience.”
More than 1000 business and technical professionals from over 60 countries attended Parallels Summit 2009. The two day conference included in-depth product, strategy and networking sessions for business and technical professionals interested in learning more about how virtualization and automation software can optimize their use of technology. Breakout sessions were offered in four tracks: Service Provider, Technology, Industry and Enterprise and both days concluded with a panel session that allowed attendees to interact and ask questions of industry experts, Parallels staff, and C-level employees from major players in the market.
Partners are an integral part of the success of any Parallels event. "We have a great relationship with Parallels. It was a no-brainer for us to be a Gold Sponsor of their conference, said Chris Sheridan VP Sales, eNom. “We had a great show, made some strong connections and were able to meet with many eNom Resellers at the show. We definitely plan to be back next year.”
"Parallels Summit 2009 was, surprisingly in this economic climate, significantly bigger and even more valuable than 2008," said Rafael Laguna, CEO, Open-Xchange. "This interest and the intensity of the discussions around SaaS and Cloud Computing are strong indicators to potential upside of these business models."
Planning is currently underway for Parallels Summit 2010, which will be held next spring. The conference will focus on the most important trends, issues and technologies impacting the hosting industry, with over-arching themes on Cloud Computing, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Automation, Virtualization and Parallel s 2010 initiatives. Industry experts and thought leaders will be on hand to lend strategic insights on how to survive against the corporate giants are entering the market.
“Parallels Summit 2009 was excellent,” said Jamie de Guerre, CTO, Cloudmark. “Thank you to the Parallels team for putting together a targeted event specifically for our industry that was delivered with such perfect organization and energy. Cloudmark was happy to participate as a sponsor and it was a hugely successful event for the launch of our new Cloud Computing service for hosting companies. We’ll definitely be back next year!”
"In an all-too-busy world, Parallels Summit was not only an excellent opportunity to get in-depth information on Parallel's own products, but to learn about what the company's partners and customers are doing" said Dan Kusnetzky, Kusnetzky Group. "Those seeking to better understand virtualized environments, cloud computing and gain an understanding of how to put that technology to work for their own organization would be well advised to attend in the future."
