Announcing Microsoft TechDays 2010

Hi Everyone,

I’ve been looking forward to this post for a long time and while I wish it would have been earlier, it was paramount to us to take the time to review your feedback and insights before we thought about moving ahead for 2010. Techdays 2009 was very successful with over 87% of the guests surveyed being very satisfied with the overall event and over 90% also indicated their intention to attend this year. Halifax was a new addition and it sold out weeks before the actual event and we had over 86% of our guests submit their feedback to help with TechDays 2010 planning. Thank you so much for your support, we couldn’t have delivered the content, experience and sessions without your help, guidance and participation.

TechDays is back in 2010!

So enough with the background…… I’m excited to share the news that TechDays is coming back for a third year and we’ve put a lot of effort into ensuring that TechDays 2010 is even better. Each year we want to improve and based upon your feedback it is our goal this year to be more inclusive of the local community and improve the overall experience from registration, to event and after with the post event online experience.

As well we heard loud and clear from the phenomenal IT community of Developers and IT Pros in Edmonton that there is support and a need to bring TechDays to that city.

As such, we are happy to announce that we will be extending TechDays 2010 to include Edmonton.

Dates and Venues

Below are the dates and locations for TechDays 2010. The tour kicks off in Vancouver on September 14 and finishes in Calgary on December 15. I know it’s early and while you can’t register yet we heard from your feedback that you want to know this this information as early as we can. As an FYI, early bird (about 50% off the regular price) registration will be available at the TechDays website in early May.

Vancouver – September 14/15 at the Vancouver Convention Centre
Edmonton – October 5/6 at the Shaw Conference Centre
Toronto – October 27/28 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre
Halifax – November 2/3 at the World Trade & Convention Centre
Ottawa – November 9/10 at the Hampton Inn & Conference Centre
Montreal – November 23/24 at the Palais de Congres
Winnipeg – December 7/8 at the Winnipeg Convention Centre
Calgary – December 14/15 at the Calgary Stampede

What’s New for 2010

Increased Content - We are increasing the content and each city will now have a minimum of 50 sessions.
Local Community Track - Each city will include a community track where local speakers will have the opportunity to submit sessions for delivery. We will be working with a local community leader in each city to ensure the right sessions are delivered. We’ve learned that every city is unique with their skills needs/expertise and our goal with this track is to nurture the strengths and needs of the Devs and IT pros in each city. (More to come on this in May)
Increased support of local initiatives and activities - Building on last year’s inclusive approach we want to increase our support of local initiatives and events. Last year in the evening of day one across many of the cities we supported delivery of variety of events which included Career Demo camp, Failcamp, and Demo Night in Canada to name a few. This year we want to expand this opportunity to include all cities. The team will be working with the local communities to increase our participation. If you are interested to learn more about this opportunity and aren’t already connected to one of our team members, please contact us at td_can@microsoft.com
Local Community group support – While we did have some local community support last year, it’s clear that we can do more. Many guests brought up the fact that we have open the space in the evening of Day One of each event and that we should use it to support to the local IT groups. Well, we thought this was a great idea to increase our community support and as such we will open the space to use from 6:30 to 9:00 PM on the first day of the event. If you are interested and want to learn more about this opportunity contact us at td_can@microsoft.com

We have had a lot of customer inquiries about when are we coming back and in response this our save the dates heads up! Our team is actively driving for registration to be available in early May. The best way to be the first to know when registration is live and the latest TechDays news, is to sign up for the MSDN Newsletter (for developers) or the TechNet Newsletter (for IT pros).

You make the positive difference!

Driving a technology conference that crosses such a huge country like ours is a big task and without your support it just couldn’t happen. We have taken some major steps in our plan for TechDays 2010 and with your help we will continue improving the experience. This is a really exciting time as this is the first time we have been able to deliver such an event for three years running! This year marks our first steps to make it more inclusive and I know with your help we can learn and grow to make it better for the years ahead!

Thanks again for your support and I’m really looking forward to see and meeting you in person at the event. As always please do not hesitate to reach out and contact me directly or be part of the conversation on twitter by following the hashtag #techdays_ca.

All the best,