The Prescient Solutions team recently attended the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, interacting with more than 16,000 attendees from more than 160 different countries. Consistent with past years, Microsoft’s commitment to its partners was at the forefront. After being immersed in stimulating business and technology related information sessions, exposed to numerous networking opportunities with other partners, and hearing directly from Microsoft executives and other prominent speakers during all-encompassing keynotes, three hot topics stood out to us:

Cloud Computing Strategy

The momentum of the cloud is exponentially increasing as capabilities are being fine-tuned, and more and more businesses are exploring and implementing the modern data center. This billion dollar platform has been at the forefront of conversations among Microsoft clients and it is predicted that 80 percent of people will have a presence in the cloud by 2020. It is evolving into a tool that organizations expect and want to have. The next step in moving forward for these companies is ensuring they’ve obtained all the necessary certificates to remain in compliance with government requirements and regulations.

CityNext Initiatives

Microsoft CityNext is a people-first approach that empowers governments, citizens, and businesses to transform their cities and their future. The initiative is aimed at determining how technology can help solve real world problems, namely in large metropolitan areas. With more than 50 percent of the world’s population living in major cities by 2050, CityNext is targeted at helping city leaders achieve sought after goals including building 21^st century communities, transforming operations and infrastructure, and engaging citizens and businesses, while accelerating innovation and opportunities. Cities actively partaking in CityNext are encouraged to join the cloud in order to cut costs, which also lessens the difficulties associated with operating large data centers. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel recently announced that the city moved 30,000 employees to Microsoft Office 365 for cloud-based email and productivity. It is said that this move will save the city more than $1.3 million in costs over the next four years, which trickles down to about an 80 percent decrease in cost per employee.

Big Data, Mobile Market Solutions

Big data presents a big challenge for a growing number of companies, and Microsoft is working on a number of services and programs to help its partners and customers handle the issues associated with big data. With these solutions, companies can gain real insights and knowledge about structured and unstructured data use, trends and the technologies essential to addressing big data challenges. Partners learned how to leverage this data to help customers and to aid each other in gaining greater economic value from their current data solutions.

Overall, the conference exceeded its attendees’ expectations. In addition to learning what’s next for cloud computing, innovations involved with CityNext and Microsoft’s big data/mobile market solutions, it was great to hear personal success stories from other attendees as well as the energetic keynotes, namely, Microsoft COO Kevin Turner’s speech on the Microsoft ecosystem.

Looking forward to see what next year’s Worldwide Partners Conference will bring!