We are hard at work on the convention’s schedule, together with our partners in Israel and around the world, which makes this the perfect time to suggest important professional lectures for one of our panels.
We’re pretty sure we will be holding an enterprise panel, an ISV development manager panel, a security and regulation panel as well as a SmartPilot panel for start-ups and venture capital investors. All these panels, of course, will deal with the cloud in some way, shape or form.

If you would like to stay up to date in the latest news from the cloud computing world, as well as receive the latest updates on CloudCon2011, you should sign up for a week subscription to “Achshav Meunan”, the cloud computing newsletter, which recently hit issue #11.

By way of celebration, here is the video documenting CloudCon2010 to provide both a nice reminiscence as well as a motivation to make CloudCon2011 bigger and better than before.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum

DataBase2011

The first lecture will be given by Bartal Vindzberg, CTO for Kaminario, and will deal with “accelerating databases using SSD storage systems”. Kaminario received a venture capital investment from the Sequoia and Pitango funds, and was first exposed to the global computing community and venture capital investments was at the SmartPilot1 event. Held one year ago, the company then asked not to film and reveal the video of its presentation, but I’m happy to announce that in DataBase2011, to be held on January 13th, it will present to the relevant audiences its partners in Israel and the correct way to implement its solution into the data center.

The second start-up lecture at DataBase will be by David Maman, CTO for GreenSQL. David gave a fascinating lecture at Open2010, on open sourced security solutions released by GreenSQL for MySQL, and now he will expand about GreenSQL’s commerical solution which is geared towards MS SQL Server as well. His lecture is called “Securing and Accelerating Databases in Minutes”, and if you’re interested in security and accelerating of databases, I wouldn’t miss it. David is sure to give a fascinating and interesting lecture.

Database2011’s third start-up lecture will deal with columnar databases, and will be given by Elad Israeli, founder and CEO of SiSense. Sisense enjoys a recent venture capital investment by the Opus and Genesis venture capital funds, and this will be their first appearance in such a convention. I can tell you that, after spending a few hours with Elad and listening to him talk about Columnar Databases and what they can do, I nearly purchased one of these databases myself. Not because I need to calculate immense amounts of data at lightning quick speeds, because I don’t, but only because it sounds so interesting. Elad calls his lecture “The Impact of Columnar/NoSQL Databases on BI Solutions”, and I assume it will prove interesting to anyone who needs to quickly form BI reports out of an unthinkable amount of data.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum

My first serious job in the high-tech business was in Informics Israel (a mythical database which was later purchased by IBM), and since then I’ve run into databases on every web project I’ve been involved with.

It seems that no matter which product I’m using, I’ll always think in SQL, and it will always boil down to CRUD (Create, Read, Update and Delete). Even if ROR no longer requires connecting to the database using ODBC, and you no longer have to write SELECT to recieve an answer from the table.

In the upcoming convention, we will dedicate plenty of lectures to relational databases, and try and host a few practical workshops that will expand on the new features of the key players. We will also try to touch on the new players in the database play ground: from columnary databases, through NoSQL and all the way to the building blocks of the semantic web.

If you’re interested in registering to the convention, which is geared towards DBA and developers, you can do so at this link. I’d also love to hear any and all ideas for lectures you will be interested in hearing or presenting at the conference.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum

This our track geared towards development manager and product managers for Israeli software exporters: from young, innovative start-upers to world leaders such as Checkpoint or Amdocs.

If you missed the last post, about CloudCon’s Enterprise track, you can find it here. If you’ve read that post, then you already know that CloudCon has already seen more than 1000 sign-ups, and over 40 professional speakers that will give talks throughout the general assembly, the four parallel tracks and the professional workshops.

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CloudCon’s ISV track will begin at 11:30 am, parallel to the Enterprise, Security and SmartPilot tracks.

Development managers who are currently working on Cloud Applications for their clients will probably be interested in a lecture by Guy Nirpaz of SaasPulse, which offers an analytics component for SaaS applications. Nirpaz will elaborate on the various user activity tracking procedures in SaaS systems, and just think of the thousands of potential clients which will receive a free registration code – several months later, your sales people will be sent to continue negotiations with those users who are actually serious. You will need an analytics solution that will assess their activity in the system in order to find those users.

The next lecture will see two people take the stage: Noam King, the man leading Microsoft Israe’s Azure technologies, and Maor David-Pur, Microsoft’s development advisor for ISV companies. The two will explain when exactly should a software development team use Microsfot’s cloud platform, and I’m sure this lecture will prove interesting to plenty of development managers who work with Microsoft’s platform as well as those who do not.

The next speaker will be Astrials’ Vitaly Kushner. Astrails is a start-up development lab, which works mainly with Ruby and open-source products. Many of the attendants of OPEN2010 had the privelage of participating in Kushner’s Ruby workshop, and now he will share his knowledge of public clouds start-up companies work with, and any and everything you need to do with your code once its ready to be sent into the cloud. I assume he will focus on Amazon’s cloud, but you can never know.

Genesis Partners’ Eden Shochat has chosen a lecture in a direction I’ve never heard from any of the convention speakers I’ve talked to. He identifies a type of business-technological activity which is slightly different from the common conception of the global cloud, and focuses on different modules which are already offered for cloud use and allow ISV companies to offer fast products and services, which work and are not too expensive. These services are the building blocks, and follow a basic structure of payment only for those resources which your clients acutally use, and they allow companies to create applications which will prove to be constantly profitable.

Next up will be Alon Girmonsky, from CloudIntelligence, and he will be offering a cloud platform for testing your applications. He will showcase the directions in which software testing cloud-based applications are going – such as testing performance for thousands of beta users or checking performance from users all across the world.

After software testing is over, it’s time to turn a profit from it. Shlomo Weiss is SafeNet’s business development managers and he will expand on the correct models to use in order to turn a profit from an international market. He will base his lecture on an overview of success stories of international ISV companies who already work with SafeNet.

Finally, a lecture which is sure to be interesting to all those development managers who need to transition their software to a SaaS model. Moshe Kaplan, R&D manager for ESI will expand on the right design for a cloud application, and how to reach it.

All this will follow, as mentioned, the general assembly and parallel to three other tracks (the enterprise track, a security management track and a Start-Up/Venture Capital track). It will be possible to move from one track to another, so look over the agenda and mark the most interesting lectures. Following the tracks we will adjourn for a festive lunch, followed by three parallel workshops on working with the cloud services offered by Google, Amazon and Microsoft. Anyone who’s considering working with any of these services should attend, as you can expect to gain much insight and maybe even a few months of free trials.

So take a day off before the convention, rest well and arrive refreshed. Keep your schedules clear for the day – as we will attack the cloud from all sides, from 8:00-17:00.

It seems that every IT player or consumer has formed a different attitude and strategy regarding cloud computing, and everyone wants to see, consult, share and stay up to date. I wish to thank all those whov’e been with me, following and heping in the past six months in preparing this convention.

Today, I’d like to present CloudCon’s Enterprise track, set to begin at 11:00 until 13:30, immediatly following the general assembly and right before lunch. Next week, I’ll present the other three tracks, as well as the speakers in the general assembly who are expected to reveal some interesting things. I will also be dedicating a special post to the three proffesional workshops on large-scale cloud computing we will be hosting following lunch.

CloudCon’s Enterprise track, which is aimed at Israel’s senior computing managers, is set to be visited by three interesting lectures from abroad. The first is Dr. Matt Wood, Amazon’s cloud evangelist, a world leader in the integration of complex computing systems with Amazon’s own computing infrastructure. A visit by an Amazon global expert in Israel can only point at one thing – the Israeli market is starting to matter to Amazon and they mean to compete for every organization they can get as a client. Israel’s activity manager, Dan Feld, will join the general assembly panel (hosted by Yehuda Confortes and yours truly earlier in the day, and will probably reveal more about Amazon’s AWS program.

Our second guest will be hailing from the Symantec offices in Europe. Valeria Caracuta will present to us Symantec’s security attitude towards cloud compting, a direction much reinforced by their purchase of MessageLabs, and seems radically different from the traditional direction presented by Symantec up until now to Israel’s large organization’s security managers. The cloud is having an effect on all sects of the industry, and security is not left out, with everyone needing to reorient themselves.

Our third and final guest, who will be going on stage straight from the airport, is Stephane Viallet of SalesForce, a company which has turned SaaS to someone that really works, and can teach the whole world how to transfer imporant organizational applications outside the organization. According to people at Blat-Lapidot, who are responsible for bringing Viallet to CloudCon, 300 organizations in Israel have already made this shift, and each organization going through this transition is downloading a potential install of a local CRM system onto the organization’s servers.

CloudCon’s Enterprise track will be opened by Amir Shevat, Windows Azure platform manager for Enterprise organizations at Microsoft Israel. Shevat will talk about the considerations a computing manager faces before a transition to a cloud-based platform, and will most probably touch on the enormous profit Microsoft is making on the enterprise market in Israel. Even for them, the cloud is something that will change everything.

Following him, Vadim Solovey will take the stage. Solovey is a well-known virtualization expert who was chosen to speak about Google Enterprise’s technology and Google’s public cloud offerings. It’s interesting to see which new annoucemnets will come from this unique new direction. If you’re interested in Google-related products, you’l be pleased to hear that Barak Regev, Google Enterprise’s regional manager, will appear at CloudCon’s general assembly, at 09:30 am.

Next on the Enterprise track will be Gabi Zodik, from IBM’s labs in Haifa. He will present the blue giant’s cloud strategy, and how he sees it through IBM’s gloabl software labs. It is there that one can find the software engineers who are toiling over building the future infrastructure which IBM will offer enterprise organizations in the future.

Next, Guy Lupo, regional technical manager for Checkpoint, will come on stage. Lupo promises to demonstrate how Checkpoint plans on turning cloud security into a simpler task. Is Checkpoint’s firewall set to transition into the cloud as well? Are Checkpoint analysts going to change the recomendation for stock prices? We will have to wait and see what Lupo has to say to receive yet another overview on the security market and its adaptation into cloud-based computing.

Lastly, we’ve slotted Amit Dover to speak. He is VP of software solutions for Yael Software, on of Israel’s oldest and biggest software houses. The direction decided on by Yael’s management will probably be emulated by many other software houses, who will strive to replicate the move to building enterprise applications for the cloud. Dover will present the cloud-based partners of Yael Software, and the eco-system it’s building in preparation for developing cloud-based enterprise applications. It will be very interesting to understand how the power will shift in the Israeli market and which cloud services each integrator will choose to offer its respective clients.

Quite a handful, and this only one of our tracks.

All this will follow, as mentioned, the general assembly and parallel to three other tracks (an ISV development track, a security management track and a Start-Up/Venture Capital track). It will be possible to move from one track to another, so look over the agenda and mark the most interesting lectures. Following the tracks we will adjourn for a festive lunch, followed by three parallel workshops on working with the cloud services offered by Google, Amazon and Microsoft. Anyone who’s considering working with any of these services should attend, as you can expect to gain much insight and maybe even a few months of free trials.

So take a day off before the convention, rest well and arrive refreshed. Keep your schedules clear for the day – as we will attack the cloud from all sides, from 8:00-17:00.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum

I am pleased to present to you our progress on the

CloudCon is geared towards senior IT executives, development managers and product managers in ISV companies which export software solutions abroad, as well as start-up personnel and venture capital representatives. We will present a long gallery of cloud computing experts, both from Israel and from Abroad, who will attack the hottest topic in the IT world from every possible angle.

As you can see from the agenda below, following the opening assembly we’ll have three parallel tracks for each one of the three target audiences. The Enterprise Track is meant for computing managers in large scale organizations who are interested in public and private cloud solutions, cost models and license prices as well as other issues dealing with regulation and technical support. The ISV Track is geared towards development managers and product managers who are about to offer a solution in the SaaS format, or transition a server-client solution into a SaaS format. Lastly, the SmartPilot Track will focus on Israeli start-up companies who are developing future cloud computing infrastructures which can be incorporated into or compete with the IT giants’ cloud computing infrastructures.

Following the tradition established at the OPEN convention, at 15:00, right after lunch, we will host 3 parallel practical workshops, each 90 minutes long. If you’d like some practical experience with Microsoft’s, Amazon’s or Google’s public cloud computing solutions – I highly suggest visiting one of these workshops.

Finaly, the even will also see a showcase of IT companies and start-ups who provide cloud computing solutions.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum

CloudCon2010

Last week we opened registration for “SmartPilot in the Clouds” – for Israeli start-ups which are working on cloud-based infrastructures, and wish to present their innovative ideas before Israel’s leading organization’s IT managers, venture capital personnel and those in charge of ISV activity in international IT companies.

Among the start-up founders you will meet in the SmartPilot in the Clouds track are:

• Alon Girmonsky (Cloud-Intelligence)
• Gilad Parann-Nissany (Porticor Cloud Security)
• Dan Gross (Navajo Systems)
• Guy Nirpaz (SaaSPulse)
• Razi Sharir (Xeround)
• Peled Navot (Gizmox)
• Doron Lev-Ari (SCALEBASE)
• Ophir Kra-Oz (CloudShare)
• Nati Shalom (Gigaspaces)
• Elad Reznikov (FederationCloud)
• David Drai (Contendo)
• and many more…

I am hard at work organizing

At the event we will hold three parallel lecture tracks: for ISV development managers, for Enterprise computing managers and a SmartPilot track where start-ups will present their cloud solutions. At the current stage, I am looking for Israeli start-ups who develop solutions for cloud computing and are interested in participating in the SmartPilot track.

After the success of the Ruby workshop conducted by Astrails at the OPEN convention, I intend to offer three practical workshops for developers, all starting at 14:00. The first two will demonstrate how to work with Amazon AWS and Google App Engine; the third will deal with a series of recommended Web Services.

If you happen to know the best instructors for these workshops, or happened to experience a fantastic workshop given by a talented individual – I would be happy to talk to them. Furthermore, if you are interested in keeping up to date with the convention’s agenda, we are adding roughly two lecturers per week, you can sign up to the convention’s newsletter and check out its blog – right here.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum

Here is the short film documenting the event, created by Yaron Yarkoni. Enjoy.

Last week saw the close of the selection phase for IBM’s SmartCamp competition, and the ten start-ups that will move on to the semi-finals have been selected. The semi-final will be held on June 24^th, and the five start-ups most fitting IBM’s SmartPlanet initiative will compete for the right to represent Israel in the finals in November.

Joining the already announced Gnrgy and Panoramic Power are the following 8 start-ups:

TruMedia specializes in analyzing videos of human crowds, and transmitting multimedia content which fit the analyzed footage. Applications can include displaying commercials which address a particular audience, marketing networks who identify specific parameters for potential buyers, or information kiosks.

Greenlet Technologies is a start-up which specializes in energy consumption solutions for electrical products. Greenlet’s solution, which makes use of hardware which easily plugs into the electrical grid and various electrical products, combines analysis features of the amount of energy consumed by each product, the ability to control electrical flow into that device and a web-based application and dedicated databases which can be used to determine the correct energy consumption profiles for each device.

The fifth entry in the Israeli semi-finals is Joliper, a start-up which sets out to turn the cell phone into a mobile security center, and provides the ability to connect, through the mobile device, to cameras located anywhere in the world, and view their feed, no matter where you are, all through the cellular carrier network.

Xsights, is a start-up which provides image analysis technology and prides itself on its ability to identify any static object a cell phone camera is pointed at. That is, assuming one of Xsights users has already taken a picture of that object before and created a database link between that object (such as a url for a cinema) and the object picture he or she inputer (such as the façade of that cinema).

Blabbers is a company which provides a service that adds an extra layer of data linked to standard web-page addresses. Users will be able to add annotations, charts and even dedicated applications that will be linked to specific web-pages, and these add-ons will be available to other Blabbers users who surf to the same URL.

The start-up Fooducate offers an iPhone application which scans bar-codes on food products, connects to an external database which contains alternative information to that which the manufacturer provides on the packaging. The information provided includes alternative suggestions, which, according to Fooducate personnel, provide a healthier alternative.

eViglio is a start-up which provides a platform for emergency information dispersion. eViglio specializes in mass messaging a large crowd with urgent messages, according to geographic and demographic sects, and make use of a plethora of communication methods such as SMS, the internet and other mass communication channels.

Lastly, Way Better, is dedicating its efforts to improve modern cities’ transportation. Through a unique algorithm, the entrepreneurs promise to analyze the need for passenger transport and the transportation options available in the field, and identify the most efficient, and cheapest options available at any given moment. The company’s products, which are aimed at large public and private organization, large transport services and private clients who require transport services, strive to locate efficient and cheap “rides” from one location to another, all the while finding the most suitable driver and vehicle for the situation at hand, and connecting them with the passanger who will make the best use of the route.

If you’re involved in the start-up field, and active in work in the Israeli start-up relam, or working with a promising Israeli start-up, you are hereby invited to register to the upcoming SmarCamp event, where you will get some networking done, experience the five finalists’ presentations and hear lectures by IBM guests.

Translated by Itai Rosenbaum