Where the Mobile Things Are
29. Mar, 2011
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mobileTech Tuesday, by Steve Guengerich
Dug out from Southby 2011 yet? After a week, I’m finally feeling a little recovered and in a position to look ahead. And, for me, what lies ahead falls into the spirit of the infamous Monty Python catchphrase: “…and now, for something completely different!”
Because as awesome as it was to experience the 10-day carnival that was SxSW 2011 and see local buds like Hurricane Party get such great national buzz, and as amazing as the hubbub about the identity-snatching, $40 zillion-something funded app Color has been in the intervening week, my attention is squarely focused on the more quiet revolution in the enterprise.
In Austin, there are a few formal and informal resources for you to tap, if mobile is your responsibility in the enterprise. For casual, in-person networking with other like-minded professionals, there’s the Mobile Monday and Android Developer communities and related meetings.
For chief information officers (CIOs) and other IT professionals, a couple of recommended groups are the ATC’s CIO/CTO roundtable and the Association of IT Professionals (or AITP). These two jointly conduct regular meetings and, as one would expect, nearly every one of them touches some aspect of mobile in the enterprise. The conversation is rich and the best practices, extremely valuable.
If you are looking for forums with an expanded audience, a few to recommend include:
- CIO Summit, part of the Innotech regional conference group’s annual fall conference
- Texas Wireless Summit, a statewide event with national ties, from programming led by the ATI
- Mobilize, to pick one of several analyst firms’ options
While all of these are Fall timeframe events, there is a near-term opportunity, also being produced by GigaOM: the Mobile Enterprise Summit. Scheduled for late April in San Francisco, this 1-day event will feature speakers from industry as well as major enterprise vendors like AT&T, RIM, and SAP.
Both the Mobile Monday Austin and Mobile Monday Silicon Valley chapters are promotional partners, with my company, Appconomy, participating as an underwriting host along with GigaOM.
For those that can’t make it, we’re considering video recording and streaming options. But, just like the CIO and mobile roundtables described earlier, it’s hard to beat the occasional in-person, high velocity value that these types of events offer.
Look: we all know the size and scale of the transition of economic activity to mobile is massive. From VC sage Mary Meeker of Kleiner to F500 stalwart John McCarthy of Forrester, the data showing thatr the transition underway is phenomenal. But, there are still some incredibly vexing problems, nay barriers, to enabling inter- and intra-enterprise app roll-out on a massive scale.
And the more we can all learn from and share solutions to those barriers – whether at an Austin tech happy hours or a GigaOM Summits – the better off we will all be. If there are other mobile-focused events in Austin, as well as regional or national conferences that you recommend, please let us know in the comments below.
Posted by Steve Guengerich
http://www.guengerich.com
Steve is managing director of BroadBrush Ventures and a member of the founding management team of Appconomy, Inc. Steve is an award-winning writer, with his ninth book “Think Lobal > Act Glocal” available on Amazon.com at http://bit.ly/awKABU. In addition to the mobileTech Tuesday, Steve writes “The BroadBrush Update” at http://www.Guengerich.com on tech innovation and society.
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