A Look Back at PASS Summit 2013
PASS Summit 2013 has been over for a little more than a week and we are already looking forward to what’s next in 2014. PASS Summit is the world’s largest and most-intensive conference for Microsoft SQL Server and BI professionals and it just keeps growing! We are pleased to have had over 5,000 registrations for this conference that featured over 190 technical sessions, 6 deep-dive Half-Day Sessions and 14 Pre-Conference Sessions. If you were not able to join us in Charlotte or missed the live stream, check out the PASSTV site to view the PASS Summit 2013 keynotes as well as gain insight to many of the sessions and learning provided at the conference.
To set the stage for this year’s 3-day conference, we heard first-hand from Microsoft Corporate Vice President, Quentin Clark and Microsoft Technical Fellow Gray Systems Labs’, Dr. David DeWitt.
Quentin Clark kicked off Day One with the keynote, “Microsoft’s Data Platform – The Road Ahead”. With an audience of over 5,000 viewing in person and via live stream, he discussed how customers are pushing the boundaries of what’s possible for businesses today using the advanced technologies in our data platform. Also during his discussion, he announced the second Community Technology Preview (CTP2) of SQL Server 2014 which features breakthrough performance with In-Memory OLTP and simplified backup and disaster recovery in Windows Azure.
David DeWitt kicked of Day Two with a keynote on “Hekaton: Why, What, and How”. He shared deep insights on In-Memory OLTP’s ability to provide performance improvements and transactional workloads.
Outside of the great keynotes, participants attended a wide variety of technical sessions presented by our experts and industry leaders. The conference also featured Microsoft on-site certification testing,instructor–led workshops, technical guidance from Microsoft Customer Service and Support (CSS) engineers and hands-on support from Azure Customer Advisory Teams (CAT).
So there you have it — it’s a wrap on PASS Summit 2013, but keep in mind that we are already planning PASS Business Analytics Conference taking place May 7-9 in San Jose, California and PASS Summit 2014 which will take place November 4-7th in Seattle, Washington. We hope to see you there!
