Recently in Musings Category

He is worth billions and he still works as hard as anyone I know. He travels the world and closes business. He actually said selling things turns him on. It shows - the companies he has started are some of the most successful around. I hope to have a fraction of his energy at his age.

Based upon the crowd here at his address and the focus by audience members on every word Terry is saying, it seems we picked a great keynoter for this event. Here is a clip of Terry speaking and the crowd shot of who was there.

NORWALK, CT- August 31, 2009 - Technology Marketing Corporation (TMC) today announced that their editorial and conference teams have completed final preparations for this week's ITEXPO West 2009 at the L.A Convention Center in Los Angeles. The conference and EXPO, being held for the 20^th time since its launch in 1999, features a robust conference program, keynotes by industry leaders and visionaries, and networking opportunities where buyers and sellers can meet and forge relationships.

ITEXPO officially opens Tuesday, September 1 with a full-day of conference sessions, workshops, keynotes, and a networking reception.

The ITEXPO exhibit hall is open during the following hours:

Wednesday, September 2: 4:00pm - 8:00pm
Thursday, September 3: 11:15am - 5:00pm

TMC also reported that all dedicated hotel room blocks at the Westin Bonaventure, the official show hotel, have completely sold out.

"The hotels are sold out, pre-registered exhibit hall attendance is up over 2008, and the exhibit hall is filled with companies displaying some of the most innovative communications technologies. All elements are pointing toward a terrific event," proclaimed TMC CEO Rich Tehrani.

Tehrani added, "And what's most exciting is that the registration figures that are trending ahead of last year suggests that companies are ready once again serious about investing in technologies that can help be more productive. It appears that buyers and sellers are once again poised to gather in L.A. to close deals, form partnerships and develop new relationships - the hallmarks of the ITEXPO experience."

Highlights of ITEXPO West 2009 include:

• Conference tracks covering Enterprise and Service Provider solutions, unified communications, SIP, and Wireless/Mobility solutions
• TMCUniversity Certification Courses: IP Network Security and Microsoft OCS
• Fonality trixbox Open Communication Certification (FtOCC)
• Ingate's Free SIP Trunking Workshop
• Sipera's UC Security Workshop
• Collocated M2M Evolution Conference
• Collocated Smart Grid Summit Conference
• Collocated 4GWE Conference
• Asterisk Training Courses
• Reseller Solutions Day free workshop
• Keynotes by ShoreTel, Aspect, Paetec, Alvarion, Sir Terry Matthews of Wesley Clover, Clearwire, and Interactive Intelligence
• Open Source Pavilion on the exhibit floor, showcasing open source solutions

In addition to the educational and networking opportunities, attendees have the chance to win a brand new Jeep, an iPhone, Slingbox, or HP Netbook.

Visit www.itexpo.com for more information or to register for ITEXPO West 2009.

Contact Information:

We are heading into ITEXPO with one day to go and today I got great news from my team who all arrived safely in Los Angeles and are busy preparing the Los Angeles Convention Center for the best ITEXPO ever. The good news? The preregistration for Avaya's social networking kick-off event is over 3X greater than last year's Avaya conference so far. Either this is an indication of the interest in social networking or there are more people coming to the show. Hopefully it's a bit of both.

My weekend in Los Angeles has been great... I have spent time with many relatives - at least 100 and counting. Yes, I have a huge family.

As always, we are looking forward to welcoming you all to what promised to be a great show - full of collaboration tools, videoconferencing solutions, IP communications tools and more. Moreover, there are new areas of the show such as Smart Grid, M2M, 4G and WINOG which I just can't wait to learn more about.

Then there are open source certifications (Digium/Asterisk, Fonality/Trixbox) on all the important flavors of open source communications solutions.

It's just what you have been waiting for - the 76-page show directory for ITEXPO which will give you lots of needed information regarding the show (Sept 1-3 in LA) . Virtually everything you need is in here - sponsors, floor plan, exhibitor list, TMC University, Trixbox training, Ingate's SIP trunking workshop, Reseller solutions day, keynotes, Asterisk Training, WiNOG, Sipera SIP Security, Wireless Broadband training, M2M, Smart Grid Summit, 4GWE, agenda and Q&As with industry thought leaders. Get it while it's hot and download it to your smartphone or laptop/netbook so you can refer to it often.

Be sure to check out all of the exciting news happening at ITEXPO. In order to get up to date news be sure to bookmark the show news page and check out the three show dailies which have already been produced. Check this page often to stay up to date.

August 20 show daily: SIP security, next gen IMS, VoIP boosts small biz, smart grid progress, Brightcom, Octasic, SIP trunking seminar, Digium open source Asterisk workshop, Terry Matthews keynote, cash for phone system clunkers etc.

August 25 show daily: Smart grid as global trend, mobile communications, Amdocs, 4G, mobile devices, consumer unified communications, Cbeyond and pretzels, Spanlink, wholesale and enterprise VoIP.

August 27 show daily: home energy management/smarthome, networking alternatives, open-source communications in Europe, Multi-Tech, WiMAX dead again, telepresence worth $4.7 billion, fax over IP survivability, SIP trunks

As a follow-up to the ITEXPO interviews I posted links to last week, here are the latest responses from the industry. Of particular interest are answers from Doug Mohney who explains how he got into the business by being employee number 11 or 12 at DIGEX. I also found the responses from Eli Katz of XConnect enlightening... If you are interested in peering or IP communications you want to give them a read.

There is so much great information here and I suggest you click all the interviews and read them - these are some of the true thought-leaders in our spaces and they have a wealth of useful information to share. I hope to meet you as well as all the speakers and exhibitors very soon at the show. We are officially 13 days away.

Be sure to register now if you haven't already.

For nearly 13 years, Greg Galitzine has been a tremendously valuable part of the TMC team. His career started as an editor for CTI Magazine in 1996. Where he reported on the collision of the computer and communications spaces including what we called IP telephony back in the day. In 1997 we convened a meeting with Greg to explore whether it made sense to launch a publication in the IP telephony space. The outcome of the meeting was to launch what we hoped would become a cornerstone of what we hoped would be a new industry - Internet Telephony Magazine.

Greg became the editor of this publication and had the vision to see this is where the industry was going. Many companies in the communications space told us we were nuts for launching this publication as at the time there was no industry, just a few nerds calling each other on softphones.

Lo and behold, over the past decade this nerdy, niche technology revolutionized telecom to the point where business models have changed, new entrants have come into the telecom market and entire industries were transformed through international outsourcing made possible by inexpensive VoIP-based telephony.

In the last few years, Greg did a great job helping transform TMCnet into a major web force in communications and technology news. We are grateful to him for the years he has put in.

I am very happy for Greg as recently he has been given a great opportunity which involves a move to a new industry altogether. Galitzine has accepted a position with ISA, Inc., a prime contractor to the National Nuclear Security Administration and working in about 18 countries through Central and Eastern Europe to identify and interdict the illegal movement of materials for weapons of mass destruction. Greg will be taking his analytical and editorial skills to a higher level, contributing to national-level policy and operational support analysis for these major international nonproliferation undertakings.

While we all selfishly wish Greg wouldn't move on, we are happy for him and are sure he will make a tremendous impact in his new position.