Impressions from Dreamforce 2013

GCOMM’s Managing Director, Peter Thompson was an attendee at the Dreamforce 2013 conference in San Francisco that ran from 18 – 20 November. It is salesforce.com’s annual user and developer conference and the enterprise cloud computing event of the year that attracts over hundred thousand business, IT and other professionals from all over the world.

GCOMM’s Managing Director, Peter Thompson was an attendee at the Dreamforce 2013 conference in San Francisco that ran from 18 – 20 November. It is salesforce.com’s annual user and developer conference and the enterprise cloud computing event of the year that attracts over hundred thousand business, IT and other professionals from all over the world.

Mr Thompson, for the first time, has been present for a week in San Francisco, attending thought provoking sessions, excellent keynotes and networking events, which all left a significant impact on him. “The future of business computing is what draws so many attendees to the event. Also, Salesforce is a fantastic brand that attracts excellent speakers and it invests a significant amount of money in not-for-profit institutions, which is a highly respected facet of their company,” said Mr Thompson.

The atmosphere at the event is hard to convey through words explained Mr Thompson:

“Dreamforce is an incredibly well orchestrated mega-event spread across a couple of city blocks. Thousands of people from so many different countries attend. The logistics required to stage the event must be remarkable. In the daytime, it was packed full of keynotes speeches and breakout sessions. During the evenings, there were parties all over the city. All the hotels, bars and cafes were overflowing with conference attendees. The Moscone Centre is the biggest convention complex I’ve ever been to. It’s huge! It’s extraordinary to experience such an atmosphere. You really need to be there to know what it’s like.”

Mr Thompson points out that salesforce.com is a leader in enabling businesses to work from mobile devices, which makes organisation a lot more efficient. He had the opportunity to get a sneak peak into the new technological advancements that will be entering the market, including wireless technology and devices that can gather and transmit information back to a central data base. As Dreamforce is not targeted exclusively to information technology professionals, it offers a broad range of nearly 1,000 events covering areas like business, marketing and sales. “As it was my first time at Dreamforce, I was sticking with all the major, more general keynote speeches; however, next time I think I will be targeting some specific sessions. Either way, it’s a fantastic opportunity to learn and connect with similar people, with similar ambitions,” shared Mr Thompson.

Dreamforce attracts global speakers and Mr Thompson explains that the benefit of this is that “it’s wonderful to have an opportunity to listen to global business leaders. You get to listen to different perspectives on business and life.” With over 100,000 professionals from a range of industries in attendance, the event turned out to be a huge success. The main message Mr Thompson took from it is that, because of advancements in software and the Internet, the world is in an incredible transitional phase and most businesses are not ready for it. “GCOMM is well positioned with the PaaS revolution that Salesforce is leading and because of that I am confident we are heading in the right direction. Verification of that vision made it definitely worthwhile attending the event,” delightfully shared Mr Thompson.