Last year I attended the UC Expo at London’s Olympia sharing a stand with an IBM business partner. From our stand most of my field of vision was taken up by Microsoft’s presence… not a stand, more like a small village. There was a customer immersion zone, a theatre demonstrating Lync 2010 (which was full and overflowing all day) and stands manned by a number of Microsoft Unified Communication partners such as Polycom. I remembered feeling dwarfed and slightly embarrased – IBM were barely there at all. I took some photos and back at the office complained bitterly.

Ironically, this year, IBM have a keynote speaker in the form of Luis Suarez and they’re a sponsor, so maybe someone listened (I don’t know if I can take the credit). Anyway, Microsoft are also a sponsor this year, we’ll once more have a huge presence (showing Lync and also Exchange, Office 365 and mobile solutions), representation from a number of partners, and a number of theatre speaker slots featuring some of my learned colleagues. I have it on good authority that Nokia will also be there showing the much-praised Lumia phones.

Dates are 6th and 7th of March – you can register here, which is a good idea because it’ll cost £30 if you just turn up on the day. And one other tip, take a packed lunch because the price of sandwiches in the venue is something to gasp at.

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