I am honoured to be invited to attend Tech Field Day 19 this week. For those who don’t know, Tech Field Day is a set of events hosted by Stephen Foskett and his team, where technology vendors get together with techies/bloggers/engineers of their field and have focussed discussions around their products and why they’ve produced the best product for their customers. The sessions are live and streamed to screens all over the world. I’ve always enjoyed the immensely interesting and candid discussions that happen in the 1 – 2 hour sessions per product.

Since its inception, this event has gone from strength to strength and has grown to the extent that specialised events have grown out of it e.g. Cloud, Networking, Mobility Field Day etc. and have their own Field Day events. These events are held all year long so I would urge you to catch these streams live if you can.  That way, you can interact with the delegates live and asks questions, which they will ask the presenters in the session.  That interactivity is the feature I enjoy the most.  That said, recordings of the sessions are available soon after the session.

Before it all starts, I want to tell you about the companies presenting at Tech Field Day 19, times, why should you be watching them and important links to enjoy the sessions during and after.  Please note that delegates don’t always know what to expect so I can only include what we know so far.

I recommend you bookmark these links so they’re handy while joining the session. Here are the details:

Keysight Technologies

What do they do

Keysight Technologies is an “electronic measurement company”. Essentially it means they’re focused on the precise measurement of all things electronic. They acquired Ixia which adds network insight and relevant services into the mix.

Why should you be interested

Networks are complex and an organisation of any size, needs to be at the top of their game in order to keep them running smoothly, securely and most efficiently.

In the session, you can expect a thorough tour of their visibility portfolio, highlighting their latest network packet brokers that address visibility across edge, DC and cloud networks and the use cases they serve.

When will they present

Wednesday 26th 2019 at 08:30 – 09:30 PST (UTC-0800)

Important links

Website: https://www.ixiacom.com

Twitter: @ixiacom

Tech Field Day Company Page: https://techfieldday.com/companies/ixia/

Do go to the company page to see Ixia’s past appearances at the various TFD events.

NetApp

What do they do

If you’ve been in IT for any length of time, it’s unlikely for you to be unfamiliar with NetApp. They well-known in the large-scale storage space and have been around of many a year.

Why should you be interested

In the storage world of today, it’s not enough just to store data. Companies also need better insight into all the various aspects of it, starting from the amount of it but then also monitoring, cost optimisation, user behaviour and support for all the different platforms and services available.

To that end, NetApp will be presenting the following presentations:

• Overview of Cloud Insights
• Deeper Dive into Kubernetes Support
• Cost Optimization in the Cloud
• User Behaviour Analytics

When will they present

Wednesday 26th 2019 at 10:30 – 12:30 PST (UTC-0800)

Important links

Website: https://www.netapp.com/

Twitter: @NetApp

Tech Field Day Company Page: https://techfieldday.com/companies/netapp/

NetApp has a long history of presenting at these events so please do have a look at their past appearances and see if you can find something of interest.

Automation Anywhere

What do they do

Automation Anywhere creates the breed products that fall into the category of Robotic Process Automation (RPA).  They aim to provide companies with business process automation products that “enable companies to operate with unprecedented productivity and efficiency by automating any part of the enterprise that can be automated with the most intelligent and intuitive robotic process automation platform”.

Why should you be interested

Efficiency in essential is any business scenario. Just as we (as IT people) instinctively want to script all the mundane repetitive tasks that come our way, businesses also have many scenarios where automation can be introduced to accelerate business processes, reduce operating costs, and scale in line with the demand increases.

Automation of anything is of huge interest to me personally and this is not an area I’ve focused on in the past so I will be extremely interested in what they have to show.

When will they present

Thursday 27th 2019 at 09:00 – 12:00 PST (UTC-0800)

Important links

Website: https://www.automationanywhere.com/

Twitter: @AutomationAnywh

Tech Field Day Company Page: https://techfieldday.com/companies/automation-anywhere//

They don’t have any past sessions so there are no older links on the page yet but as videos of their sessions go out, this page will contain the links so that you can watch them later.

Druva

What do they do

Druva focuses on Cloud Data Protection and Druva Cloud Platform is the main product. Built on the AWS platform, it aims to provide unified management and data governance, protection and intelligence to Enterprise environments, cloud workloads and SaaS applications.

Why should you be interested

As companies move their infrastructure and applications to the cloud, they are looking for cloud-native data management solutions that have been built from grounds up in that environment.

Most current data management companies have their physical appliances ported into the various cloud platforms with storage native to that cloud, to provide similar functionality. I would be interested to see how cloud-native their product really is.

When will they present

Thursday 27th 2019 at 14:00 – 16:00 PST (UTC-0800)

Important links

Website: https://www.druva.com/

Twitter: @druvainc

Tech Field Day Company Page: https://techfieldday.com/companies/druva/

Druva has presented at TFD events before so do check out the link above to see previous presentations.

VMware

What do they do

In their own words “VMware streamlines the journey for organizations to become digital businesses that deliver better experiences to their customers and empower employees to do their best work. Our software spans compute, cloud, networking and security, and digital workspace.”

Why should you be interested

VMware has such a broad portfolio and hence, influence on the entire industry when it comes to IT infrastructure and services. This is a period when VMware has come alive across the entire portfolio of its products. The products are integrating well and making a lot of sense together.

In addition, in the past few years, VMware has become much more vocal about the direction it’s are taking and keeping customers informed on what’s next. So, I am always interested in the various presentations when they happen.

When will they present

Friday 28th 2019 at 09:30 – 14:00 PST (UTC-0800)

Important links

Website: https://www.vmware.com/

Twitter: @VMware

Tech Field Day Company Page: https://techfieldday.com/companies/vmware/

Hope this post is useful and you will tune in to see all these vendors presenting and watching the interesting discussions that I love the most. As I eluded to in the beginning, you all make the event what it is by participating in the discussions live and posting your own questions on Twitter. Don’t forget that on Twitter, the official hashtag is #TFD19 and the main page is: Tech Field Day 19 so see you there!

Disclaimer: As is customary for Tech Field Day delegates (and just in case), I would like to say that while Gestalt IT is paying for my travel, accommodation etc. to attend Cloud Field Day, I am not being paid or being asked to write anything either good or bad about any of the companies presenting at Tech Field Day 19.