Day one of the 2011 Worldwide Partner Conference is now behind us and what a start to the conference it was! This year more than ever, not only can the attendees who are joining us here live be a part of the excitement but also partners around the world can join in on numerous parts of WPC11 online as well. With all of the fantastic stuff coming out of the Worldwide Partner Conference Day 1 today, I thought I would put together a quick recap here for you with some of the interesting items in case you missed them or in the event you want to see them again.

• Attendance: WPC11 set an all-time high record with over 15,600 total registrants so far! That is amazing!
  • Even with all of events transpiring in Japan this past year, we have a record number of partners here at WPC11 from Japan. How awesome is that?!?
• The main keynote kicked off with what I thought was a fantastic video showing the destruction this past year in Japan and the story of how Japan partners used technology such as Windows Azure to quickly develop and deploy a solution to allow survivors to post information about their whereabouts and other important information to enable people to find each other and get access to information about others that they were seeking. It was a phenomenal example of using technology in a time of need to rise up to the challenge and enable people to locate and connect with their loved ones and others to help bring some peace of mind in the face of tragedy.
• Jon Roskill kicked off the day with the main keynote to launch WPC11 and he shared a bunch of fantastic data points for our partners worldwide, such as:
  • Over 12,000 partners in attendance here at WPC11 from over 120 countries around the world
  • WPC 11 brings over 100 breakout sessions each day along with 22 regional keynotes and country breakouts.
  • 95%+ of our revenue is made with and through partners!
  • For every dollar Microsoft makes, partners make $8.70. In total, the partner ecosystem drove $580 billion in total revenue! (Yes, that is BILLION with a “B”!)
    • To put this in perspective, here is a stat that Jon shared which I think is pretty amazing: “if we (our partner ecosystem) were a country, and we stacked ourselves on the worldwide GDP stack rank, we would be number 19 sitting there between Indonesia and Switzerland.” That’s HUGE!
  • In the first 6 months of the Dynamics referral program (5% referral bonus for Dynamics partners that find an opportunity and refer it), over 750 deals have been submitted.
  • Last year, over $10.1 billion made in partner-to-partner activity
  • There are over 25,000 partner-to-partner connect meetings being scheduled already here at WPC. How important are these connections? Check out Jon’s post on this: Networking Opportunities at WPC 2011 can Generate Serious Business
  • The 640,000 Microsoft partners around the world are made up of 15 million employees serving the needs of customers
  • Jeff Loucks, president of the IAMCP shared a fascinating fact: in a recent IDC study, it said that “IAMCP members are growing at 19 percent faster than their cohorts, and it's because they’ve embraced things like P2P.”
  • Jon spoke about and pointed out our Students to Business attendees at the conference. For those not familiar with Students to Business, it is a Microsoft community initiative that connects Microsoft partners and customers with entry-level talented students trained in Microsoft technologies. One thing you may not know is that one benefit Microsoft partners get as a benefit of the membership in Microsoft Partner Network is access to the Students to Business program! Check it out.
  • Want to see more of what Jon had to say? You can read the full transcript of his keynote online here.
• Steve Ballmer then took the stage and shared a bunch of thoughts and insights with our partners, from cloud, to a “State of the state” on how we’re doing working with partners, to Windows Phone, to Bing, to Windows, Windows Server, Office, Xbox, market insights, future vision around our solutions and much more. During this time, he was joined by Stefan Weitz, Ellena Stiff, and then handed off to Tami Reller.
  • There was a ton of great information shared during this portion of the keynote, including some great demos, so I’m going to put you directly in touch with this first hand:
  • HERE is where you can view the entire transcript of Steve Ballmer’s keynote address this morning
  • You can view the official press release from today’s keynote online: Steve Ballmer Thanks Partners for Betting on Microsoft
  • HERE is where you can view the entire transcript of Tami Reller’s keynote address this morning. (Including the announcement of the July Windows Intune beta)
  • You can also view the transcript of the combined section with Steve Ballmer, Jon Roskill, and Steve Clayton together to wrap up the morning.

Want to actually watch the keynote itself? No problem! Here you go:

And that was just the morning at WPC 11 Day 1!!

Another fantastic item today was the launch of our inaugural broadcasts of MPN Live.

In our first session from (1:00 – 1:30), our speakers were: @maryjofoley @rwang0 @drsalonen @cheeky_geeky @techassoc & on @Skype @nuxnix and the host was @katlen. You can see a pic of them above.	For our second session (5:00 – 5:30), our speakers were: @Judykolde @birgerk @meetdux & on @Skype @dksaele, and I (@ericligman) was the host. You can see a pic of us ready to kick off above.

Now, if you missed one or both of the MPN Live sessions from today, don’t worry. @justinpirie is at this moment putting the recordings together for us to post up online for you all to watch on demand tomorrow (Tuesday). Once they are posted and up online, we’ll be sure to share the links out with you so you can watch them. Also, here’s how to keep up with the conversations:

• Be sure to follow #MPNLive hashtag to get the latest on MPN Live
• Be sure to follow #WPC11 hashtag to get the latest on WPC11
• You can catch the MPN Live broadcasts daily at 1:00 and 5:00 pm PDT HERE
• You can also find both WPC11 and MPNLive in the “Partner Talk” section of the Microsoft Partner Info mobile app

From a social media perspective, WPC 11 has the most social media components of any Worldwide Partner Conference we’ve ever put together. Here’s a quick post I put up on how to get the most out of WPC11 with social media that you might want to take a look at.

And just think, this is just day one and day two is now only a handful of hours away. Then we get to do it again, only with even more new content, exciting announcements, cool demos, and… oh wait, I can’t say that yet. Well, let’s just say it’s going to be another phenomenal day tomorrow at WPC Day 2 and I look forward to seeing you all either in person or online!

Did you find this information helpful? If so, you may want to make sure you are utilizing all of the areas I share information online, such as: my Facebook page, my Twitter account, my Linkedin account, and my blog. Plus, you can now get all of the latest Microsoft Partner Information right on your phone!

Thank you and have a wonderful day,

Eric Ligman – Follow me on TWITTER, LinkedIn, and RSS and see “What I’m thinking”
Director, Worldwide Partner Experience
Microsoft Corporation
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights