Please join us for our Fall 2011 event “Cool Tech: How IT innovation and new technologies are transforming business (and how to stay ahead of it)”.
September 29, 2011 | Long Beach Marriott
Time: 3:30 PM – 8:30 PM
Location: Long Beach Marriott
4700 Airport Plaza Drive Long Beach, CA 90815 MAP
We are pleased to have Tom Soderstrom, IT CTO of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, as our keynote speaker. He will explore with us the insatiable appetite for IT innovation and how we can take practical and proactive steps to shape strategies that stand up to these seemingly unending demands. Inherent in all of this wave of new technology of course is the user interface. We are fortunate to have Ray Valdez of Gartner join us to educate and enlighten us on “user experience” and to share with us the transformative shifts in software caused by concepts such as “gamifying”. The forum will be complemented by a panel of distinguished leaders and experts on key technologies that are shaping their industries. We’re excited to share the opportunity to interact with these luminaries and your peers in this relaxed setting.
Tom Soderstrom, JPL
Tom is the IT Chief Technology Officer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He leads a collaborative, practical, and hands-on approach with JPL and industry to investigate emerging IT technology trends that are relevant to JPL, NASA, and large enterprises — and to infuse these into JPL’s environment.
Tom has led remote teams and large scale IT best practices and tools development and change efforts in small startups, large commercial companies, in international venues, and in the US Government arena.
Tom serves on many industry- and government advisory boards, steering committees and awards committees and is a frequent speaker on the future of Information Technology. He is currently consulting with industry leaders on where the Government and industry is heading in information technology.
Topic: limITless – How can we satisfy the emerging insatiable demand for IT
The pace of IT innovations has increased dramatically. Once IT consumers have tasted new capabilities that delivered quickly and works well, they want more, they want it even faster, and they want it customized. The pace is snowballing and is driving a possibly insatiable demand for IT. This talk will investigate the current and future key growth areas of IT (the industry trends for the next IT decade), the major challenges, some crucial opportunities, and propose practical and proactive steps on how we can tie this together to create a future for IT that is truly limITless.
Ray Valdes, Gartner
Ray Valdes is research director in Gartner Research, where he is part of the Internet Platforms and Web Services team.
Mr. Valdes has 15 years of experience in software product development and seven years of experience in Internet development and management. Prior to joining Gartner, Mr. Valdes was on the senior management team at CKMP, a leading vendor of Internet portal solutions and services for affinity/membership organizations. Mr. Valdes has also served as vice president-engineering for an Internet music company, as well as head of software development for a wireless infrastructure vendor. In addition, he was managing director of content for the first vertical portal for IT professionals, known as inquiry.com. Mr. Valdes has managed software and product development in the areas of hospital information systems, electronic publishing systems and pen-based computing.
Topic: User Experience Design: From Web to Mobile to Social
Many organizations now realize that a high-quality user experience can provide competitive business advantage. Enterprises are adopting the technologies and practices pioneered by leading consumer Web properties (e.g., Amazon, Facebook and Google). The challenge is that the Web is evolving toward social and mobile, which means designers must stretch further, to cover these new bases. A more recent trend is “gamification” — applying the principles of game design to non-game systems, including enterprise applications.
- What is user experience (UX) design, and how do leading companies use it for competitive advantage?
- How is the practice of UX design evolving to meet requirements for mobile and social?
- What are realistic and pragmatic approaches that organizations can adopt to meet rising user expectations for high-quality UX?
Complementing our key note speakers is a diverse panel of technology leaders, each bringing a different facet of “cool technology” to light. Our moderator Brandon Johnson, CIO for Resources Global Professionals, will host an interactive panel discussion where we delve into the different ways that vendors and customers are experiencing the transformative effects of these technologies. Comprising this panel are the following distinguished professionals:
Alan Arora, VP of Customer Facing Technology, First American
Mazda Marvasti, Chief Architect of Advanced Analytics, VMware
Chris Reed, DCV Sector Manager, INX
Dorion Whitlock, Sr. Technical Advisor, Microsoft
Itinerary: Hosted Reception 3:30 – 4:20 PM Opening Remarks 4:20 – 4:30 PM Tom Soderstrom, JPL/NASA 4:30 – 5:30 PM Networking 5:30 – 6:00 PM Ray Valdez, Gartner 6:00 – 6:45 PM Panel 6:45 – 7:15 PM Closing Remarks and Dinner 7:15 -8:30 PM
Sponsored by:
