Microsoft Pushes for ‘More With Less’ at the Worldwide Partner Conference 2009

In this era of "run for your life", "the sky is falling", "every man, woman and child for themselves" corporate mentality, Microsoft is bucking the trend and hosting their 2009 Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC09), which celebrates a sense of togetherness, partnership, and progressive thought, as it relates to the use of Microsoft technologies anyway.

The annual conference being held this week in New Orleans is designed to bring together Microsoft and many of their strategic partners with the intent of providing "a forum to learn about the latest Microsoft programs, strategies, and cutting-edge technologies." The conference agenda is filled with session titles that aim to "extend", "accelerate", "increase" and "unleash" different avenues of business.  The conference seems to have a clear focus on ways of doing more with less, which is an indicator of the tough economic climate many of these companies are working in.

The Microsoft Dynamics product line will get substantial coverage over the next three days. Between Tuesday and Thursday there are roughly 30 sessions focusing on the Dynamics tools.  One particular Dynamics application sure to get a lot of lip service at the conference is Microsoft's Dynamics CRM, which the company recently announced it surpassed 1 million users.

According to sources, Microsoft is also set to debut plans tailored to Dynamics partners working in specific vertical markets, with the goal of helping them maximize the usefulness of the technologies based on their market's specific requirements. These plans are part of Microsoft's larger initiative to revamp and rebrand their partner certification program.

The use of corporate data as a strategic and tactical tool (or "business intelligence") is getting much hype these days, both in and outside of the Microsoft immediate circle.&...