UK and Italian VMUG Usercon events

Runecast has been a devoted VMware User Group supporter, especially in 2017. We sponsor VMUG events all over the globe - in US, Australia and Europe. We have been grateful for the opportunity to meet our community peers and have direct discussions on the problems and needs in IT operations.

I just came back from the last two UserCons for this year - Milan and Birmingham and I would love to share the experience.

Left to right: Gianluca Venturini (Systematika), Stanimir Markov (Runecast), Valentino Erre (Systematika).

First off - Milan. It is the first time I’ve participated in an Italian VMUG event and I was pleasantly surprised. The attendees spent a lot of time in the Solutions Exchange area and really talked to the sponsors. Genuine interest, lively discussions and energetic Italian attitude rounded up a really productive event. Runecast just started making some serious steps into the Italian market and the initial response has been excellent.

We were honored to be joined by our partners and Runecast distributors - Systematika. Our recently established partnership marks an important milestone in increasing our presence in the Italian market. Systematika, being the first VMware distributor in Italy, is the perfect trusted partner to introduce the value of Runecast.

Stanimir giving a demo to one of the attendees.

I was so glad to see some Runecast friends and Italian vRoyalties like fellow VCDX Andrea Mauro, VMUG leader Pietro Piutti and renowned blogger Paolo Valsecchi. Good to see Frank Denneman too, who presented his book "vSphere 6.5 Host Resources Deep Dive" and spoke about "VMware Cloud on AWS" at his closing keynote.

I can't talk about this event without mentioning the food. I had high expectations there and Italy did not disappoint!

The following day, we had to migrate over to Birmingham for the next event and I was happy to fly with the VMUG team and get to know them better. I thought I was travelling a lot, but it can't compare to what these people go through. Kudos to their dedication and hard work to make it all happen.

Arriving in Birmingham, I was excited to meet my fellow Runecasters Bryan Hutchinson and Warren Legg. First stop was the vCurry event, the night before the actual conference, which traditionally takes place at the National Motorcycle Museum conference center. Having participated in a number of London VMUG events, I met a lot of familiar faces here. It was a light hearted fun night perfectly organized by the local VMUG leaders. Apart from the delicious food and drinks, my favorite part was the quiz. Especially where we had to guess the peculiar past jobs of VMware celebrities like Duncan Epping, Alan Renouf and Jane Rimmer.

Left to right: Ryan Mangan (Systech IT Solutions), Warren Legg (Runecast), Scott Reed (Systech IT Solutions), Bryan Hutchinson (Runecast), Stanimir Markov (Runecast), Antony Sandell (ONI).

On the day of the UserCon, we were joined by our partners from Systech IT Solutions. I first met Ryan, their CTO, at the vExpert event in Barcelona a year back and I was impressed with the combination of deep technical knowledge and market insights he possessed. I am thrilled we established an official Runecast - Systech partnership. Ryan and his colleague Scott showcased Runecast together with us the entire day.

We were honored to have one of the latest UK Runecast customers - Antony Sandell of ONI - join us for the entire day. As Platinum sponsors Runecast had a session where Antony spoke about ONI's experience with Runecast and Warren went through a live demo of the product. Antony described how important availability is for their business and how Runecast helps meet their SLAs. We met a number of people who have seen the product a year ago and were impressed by the vast number of new features we introduced - multi-vCenter support, full APIs, Web Client and vRO plugins and access levels. Looking back at this relatively short period of time and all the improvements we made, I can't help but feel so proud of the Runecast team.

The UK session was recorded and we will upload it early next week, stay tuned!

The cherry on top was the closing keynote delivered by no other than Chris McCain – NSX evangelist and a captivating speaker. His inspiring words on Growth Mindset resonate with our continuous drive for innovation at Runecast.

As we wrapped up our VMUG UserCon participation for this year and looked back at all the cities we’ve been to, all the peers we met and conversations we had, I feel more appreciative than ever for being part of such an awesome community.

We are not exactly done with the events this year. Next stop – London – this time for the SVC awards ceremony on November 23rd where Runecast is a finalist!

Stan Markov, co-founder and CEO Runecast