Collaborate 12 April 22-26 has concluded & overall, I really enjoyed the event, this was first time I joined Collaborate such a big event and in the city of Las Vegas….all set was stunning experiences. I will start off with a big thanks to all the organizers from OAUG , IOUG and Quest , with a special mention for OAUG who made sure I found the right accommodations, a good reception and oracle sessions and networking with the right folks.

The conference was arranged in Mandalay Bay, Convention Center, Las Vegas, it was a good venue having good

environment with ample space for breakout sessions and a praiseworthy to see Shark Reef Aquarium at Mandalay Bay. OAUG Attendee Welcome Reception was arranged in Shark Reef Aquarium on Sunday evening .

The conference kicked off with a keynote from Captain Mark Kelly, Commander of the Space Shuttle Endeavour’s Final Mission on Leadership, Teamwork and Courage. It was good to listen non-oracle keynote, no tech mumbo jumbo and Captain presented his personal challenge of his life, which he faced when an assassination attempt was made on his wife, former Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. His dedication to family and his wife’s road to recovery would captivate Mark Kelly. He expressed to all conference audiences how to accomplish their mission while maintaining the love and devotion to family that is the foundation of true success. Overall it was a great motivational speech.

The 2^nd day (Monday 23^rd Apr) of conference kicked off with a keynote from Oracle CIO & SVP Mark Sunday on “IT at Oracle: The Art of IT Transformation to Enable Business Growth.” His presentation stressed the importance of simplifying IT and how Oracle is implementing different parts of engineered system as a customer of Oracle Products. It was good to listen about all modules of e-business suite, databases and how they are managing the data centers. The rest of the session topics reflected Collaborate’s mixed nature as a melting pot of three different user groups (OAUG, IOUG and Quest). I have attended number of sessions from a big number of speakers on the agenda, who showed off a wide variety of expertise with specific sessions. Over all conference was heavily based on Fusion focused sessions with E-business suite R-12 to upgrade and lot of Oracle strategy/roadmap sessions.

During the evening there was a Welcome Reception in the Exhibitor Showcase area at 6pm, a large number of companies joined Collaborate to showcase their products and number of booths were having lot of fun activities, THEgame, Relaxation Lounge, OAUG Tattoo Parlour and many more….

On Wednesday Apr 25, there was a BACK TO 80s PARTY, a performance by The Spazmatics, with all the awesome sounds, styles and radical dance steps from the 1980s, The Spazmatics recapture all the best and the worst of the decade for an evening of pure energy and entertainment.

It was a great week with lot of fun, learning & networking with peer folks, and thanks to everyone for making Collaborate 12 a boundless event for me.

All in short, Collaborate 12 was a great show with a massive agenda and attendees eager to learn about the latest solutions in the Oracle technology, number of parallel sessions were good and there was a point to which session will be attended and which one we can miss out…. muddled

In the end, to rest my voice…… feels free to share thoughts on the conference?

Finally we have reached to a week of Majlis 16^th & 17^th Apr planned as a 1^st under the MEOUG name. There were lots of preparations throughout last 40-50 days to make this event as successful, finalization of agenda, getting ready with the speakers, venue finalization, communication plan, event plan etc etc……. in short it was a very good event organized by local volunteers. MEOUG Majlis was organized on in Hotel Westin, Dubai, almost 250+ attendees register for an exciting 2 days conference. Senior executives from 8 different middle east countries joined and Oracle road-map, shared by Cliff Godwin (Oracle Senior Vice President) and Nadia Bendjedou (Senior Director).

There were number of end users presentations and it was good to hear about different implementations approaches, challenges faced and the solutions implemented in different industry groups. Over all Oracle Fusion, EPM/BI and upgrade to R12 were the hot topics discussed.

On the end of day 1^st there was very well organized Networking Dinner at Amphitheatre in Hotel Westin with the delicious food and good program was organised during the event is ‘Voice of Oracle Users’. .. There were no Oracle representative during this session and different customers faced their challenges being faced in Oracle account management, support, consulting, presales and overall product related technology issues. Was to hear from users what they feel about oracle products.

In the end of 2^nd day, it was tiring but we all were very happy to arrange such an event based on Oracle users Community and there were surprise from Oracle Dubai team for us when they called MEOUG Board Members on stage to present certificates of appreciations…..isn’t surprise!!! It was 🙂 thank you guys…..

you want to become member of MEOUG, please join us on www.meoug.com and you’re welcome…..