Recently, our colleague, Wes Bates of Fujitsu America, attended and toured the Oracle Open World trade show in San Francisco. Here is the first of several reports from Wes.
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On my flight back from San Francisco, my mind was focused on two things: how sore my feet were from so much walking around a beautiful city and how three days are barely enough to experience everything the Oracle OpenWorld trade show has to offer.
Even though this was my first Oracle event and my first trip to San Francisco, I did not think this show would be that impressive. I’ve done media/analyst relations support for my company for the past three years at the National Retail Federation (NRF) trade show held in the Jacob K. Javits Center every January in New York City. I was thinking that nothing could really surpass something as massive as NRF, nestled right on the Hudson River with a backdrop of Manhattan Island, but I was wrong.
The Oracle show boasts over 1,800 sessions, 400 partner exhibits and 400 Oracle demos and keynote speakers. But some would say the most impressive aspect of the show would be the Iron Man display in the Moscone Center. This display included four replicas of the Iron Man suit from the Iron Man 2 movie and two big screens displays showing repeating video of the scene where Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, makes his cameo in the movie.
If you are not familiar with the event, promoters describe Oracle OpenWorld as the world’s largest and most important conference for Oracle technologist, business users, and partners. This annual gathering is the best place to meet live and in person with experts, enthusiasts, business leaders, and innovators from every industry around the globe to network, learn, and celebrate your role in the technology that runs your business.
I was attending this show to promote my company’s involvement through social media efforts with our twitter program while obtaining video interviews of the session speakers and visiting clients.
After three days of sessions and keynotes, attendees and guests were treated to an Oracle appreciation event on Treasure Island. Until then, I have never heard of Treasure Island but it is a large island accessible by taking the bay bridge from downtown. The event was appropriately named “Rockopolis” as it featured some top mainstream acts like the Black Eyed Peas and Don Henley. It was a great event held on a cool clear night with over 20,000 people in attendance.
After speaking with several OpenWorld regulars, I was told the show rarely features any groundbreaking product or partner announcements so it garners minimum press coverage but it does attract some top celebrity guests like speed skating phenom Apolo Ohno, Governor Schwarzenegger and Lance Armstrong. So if you are looking for a technology show that is more focused on bringing people together to make connections, share ideas and learn about some new products, look to OpenWorld. This event really ends with a bang by providing plenty of entertainment in a beautiful city boasting wonderful landmarks, restaurants and outstanding venues. I believe the show was a great success to promote my company, connect with colleagues from around the world and meet several key clients. I really hope to return for next year’s event and I hope you get a chance to join me. It will sure be fun to see what they do for an encore in 2011.
Wesley Bates is the public relations manager for Fujitsu America, and is based in Richardson, Texas.
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Thanks, Wes, for a great report on a significant show.
TTSG
