Database Trends and Applications (DBTA) met with Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG) president Mark C. Clark during the recent COLLABORATE 11 conference in Orlando, Florida. Clark, who became president of the users group earlier this year, is a senior partner for O2Works, which specializes in configuring the Oracle Applications to adhere to best practices and to streamline business operations.
Now, more than 2 years following the financial meltdown of late 2008, it is clear that more users are again out attending COLLABORATE. "We have gone through a period of very tight IT budgets, a 2-to-4 year phase of maintenance. Everybody I am talking to is looking at opportunities to do projects this year. And if they aren't doing it this year, they are planning for it next year," said Clark, commenting on the renewed enthusiasm for attending the conference.
"We are really pleased with the turnout. Everything is looking really positive for the conference. Orlando, the city, and the convention bureau, were very helpful and made it very easy to do business here," said Clark.
COLLABORATE 11 included 1,200 sessions presented by all three user groups in the Oracle community (OAUG, the Independent Oracle Users Group (IOUG), and Quest International Users Group). The OAUG Forum featured more than 500 user-driven sessions, featuring tips and best practices for Oracle Fusion Applications, the Oracle E-Business Suite, Oracle's PeopleSoft Enterprise, Oracle's Agile, Oracle's Hyperion Performance Management, Oracle's Siebel CRM, and Oracle's Primavera Enterprise Project Portfolio Management (EPPM) product families. Approximately 50 sessions were specific to the Primavera Educational Track, including a keynote session with Dick Faris and a road map session with Mike Sicilia and Kristy Neckowicz.
OAUG will also deliver a follow-up virtual event that will be a "member-only" benefit. For OAUG members who could not attend the Orlando conference, as well as those who were able to attend but may have missed a particular session, the follow-up virtual event will be an opportunity to learn even more. OAUG will be offering the "best-attended and best-regarded sessions" online later this summer. DBTA and OAUG will have details on dates and sessions in a few weeks' time.
Connection Point 12.1 is yet another opportunity for OAUG members who can get into Chicago during the summer. Working in conjunction with Oracle, this meeting is for everyone moving from 11i and even earlier versions of 12. The program will disclose new features, migration details and the best practices for moving to 12.1. The call for papers has been announced.
Finally, Connection Point will take place later in the year in two additional locales. The first will be held in Seattle, July 20-21, and the second will be in Atlanta, November 15-16. These two OAUG Connection Point - Enterprise Performance Management conferences cover Oracle Hyperion enterprise performance management (EPM) applications, Oracle Essbase and Oracle Business Intelligence (BI). The educational content features customer success stories, partner tips and tricks, and timely issues and future directions from Oracle executives on better leveraging current and prospective investments across all of the Oracle BI and EPM applications and tools.
Visit OAUG.org for further details.