North Carolina Cooperatives Utility Technology Conference - Quick Pix

I’ve been meaning to share some photos from last week’s NCEC conference in Wilmington, NC. This was my first visit to that part of the US, and really liked it - next time I’ll go back for fun.

The back story about the rural utility market was covered in this earlier post, and for this post, I’m mainly just sharing some photos for the vibe of the event. More analysis and takeaways can be found in my latest No Jitter post - here - and I’ll be talking about it as part of our next Watch This Space podcast episode, which will publish just after Labor Day.

For more background, here are my takeaways and photos from last year’s conference.

A follow-on writeup is also in the works, focusing on two pressing security issues for utilities - both cyber and physical. The conference had very interesting sessions on each topic - stay tuned.

In short, this is the world of utility co-ops, which basically serves the non-urban population, and just like everyone else, they’re struggling to modernize and adopt new technologies, especially AI.

Customer service is an important vector for this, and I presented on the role of AI for making CX better. Later in my session, I was joined by Hardy Myers from Cognigy to talk about real-world examples where their AI technologies are being used now to improve CX.

This is a very interesting vertical that I’ve been involved with for over 15 years, and I find that many of their challenges are similar to what we experience in the communications technology space.

Below - opening panel session with industry execs talking about making the grid more resilient and reliable; view from the show floor

Casey Werth from IBM talking about the role of AI for modernizing utilities; signage for my breakout session with Cognigy on Conversational AI in the contact center; from the show floor - I believe this is a current transformer - utilities are very hardware-intensive, just like telcos used to be

Two fascinating keynote sessions and speakers. First, Jesse Tuttle - “Hackah Jak” - talking about the dark side of hacking and cybersec - yeow. Second is two speakers from CACI - Lance Manthey and Chuck Jackson. Both are ex-Marines, providing a very sobering, military perspective on how vulnerable utility infrastructure is to attacks, along with how they conduct threat assessments. More on both of these sessions later.

My breakout session on Conversational AI and CX for utilities (photo: Josh Conner, NCEC), and a selfie with Jesse Tuttle and his off-the-charts sharp daughter/protege, Reese.

August Writing Roundup

Did more video and speaking than writing in August, so this is a short digest. Just two public writeups to share, so hopefully you can read ‘em both if you haven’t already!

MWC Shanghai - Three Key Perspectives, RCR Wireless, Aug. 1

North Carolina Electric Cooperatives Conference - Quick Take and Pix, my blog, Aug. 15

North Carolina Electric Cooperatives Conference - Quick Take and Pix

NCEC - that’s the acronym of the day, and it’s for the North Carolina Electric Cooperatives. That’s a mouthful, but they speak my language, and represent 26 co-ops across the state - basically the customer base that Duke Energy doesn’t serve directly.

You may not know that I have a long history in the smart grid space, including my own Smart Grid Summit event some years back, and a good run being quite involved with Zpryme’s Energy Thought Summit - which is still going strong in Austin. With a bit of searching on my blog, you’ll see all kinds of posts and videos about that, but for this post, I’m just talking about where I was last week.

That would be Myrtle Beach - first time there for me - where I was invited to speak at NCEC’s 2023 Technology Conference and Expo. Turns out this was their largest attendance to date, and as a speaker, it’s always great to have a full house. I did presentations for two sessions, and the rooms were full each time - with lots of audience engagement. That checks a lot of boxes for me.

I’ll just share some high-level takeaways here - mainly because it was a closed event - no media, and I was the only analyst there. I could go on at great length about the parallels between telecom and energy providers, and while both are utilities by nature, they’re at different stages of adopting all the new technologies that are in my orbit. Energy providers have lagged here, and what happened with telcos is happening here now.

This event was a great way to learn about the current state of energy, along with what’s on tap technology-wise. There is definitely a lot of new tech being adopted here, mostly for operations, and AI is very much in the mix. The exhibit hall had plenty of that on display, including vendors who would be familiar in the comms world, such as Fortinet, Cradlepoint, Cisco, Carousel, Calix and SAS.

Cybersecurity is a big deal here, as utilities are very attractive targets, both for network-based and physical plant attacks. Pretty scary stuff, actually, and comms technology has a big role to play in protecting all this.

AI is starting to carry the day here, and the use cases for smart grid are similar - and complementary - to what’s needed in adjacent spaces like smart home, smart factory, smart cities, smart vehicles. All things considered, this is actually a great time for energy providers to leverage these technologies to re-think the whole value chain. These co-ops definitely see the opportunity, and just need some support to help catch up and make a similar transition to what telcos have gone through.

In case you’re wondering - as I now put on my contact center/CX hat - yes, customer service is a big pain point here, just as it is in other sectors that have lagged with cloud and AI adoption. I see this being a huge part of the value chain that needs innovation, not just because the bar for CSAT is low, but also because supply-demand dynamics have changed so much. Energy customers - both residential and commercial - do have some choice now in providers, and with the rise of renewables, they can actually be both buyers and sellers of energy. Lots of opportunity here to uplevel the customer experience.

I got to play a small part in raising their knowledge base via my two sessions talking about AI. The content is for attendees only, so all I can say is that there’s a strong appetite for this, and my role was to provide an industry-based perspective on the trends and use cases. One session was focused on Generative AI, and I made it interactive, using an ask-me-anything format. I had three of these platforms running, and we input various questions and requests, both from me and the audience to see what responses would come back. It was a fun way to experience Generative AI first-hand, and if you want to do this with me at your next event, drop me a line!

That’s my quick take, and will close by sharing a few photos - mostly mine - from the event.

Below - Don Bowman from Wake Electric kicking things off. What you don’t know is that he’s the bandleader for their community, and his group played to close out the event - very much like the SIPtones, yeah. Didn’t work out for me to be part of their gig, but maybe next year. Next - full room for my presentation about the impact of AI on future of work and opportunities for utilities. Photo credit for me speaking - Katie Hochstedt from NCEC.

Exhibitors from the show floor - NCEC, Fortinet and Cradlepoint.

Some of the event sponsors, then a colorful shot from a fiber exhibitor. Last photo - sure looks like a switchboard - it’s a training tool used for linemen. If you’re of a certain age, you’re probably smiling, thinking hey, this is just like the Operation game we used to play as kids. Correct! I was not alone in thinking that, and it probably says a lot for the age demographic of this industry.

Top 5 Moments - Energy Thought Summit - I'm #4!

Hey, this is fun! It's a compilation of Top 5 Moments from the Energy Thought Summit, and I'm in one of them. Most of you don't know that I was active in the smart grid space for many years, alongside my focus on communications technologies.

I was part of the first few ETS events, and in 2016, I hosted an open mic session there in Austin, complete with an off-the-street piano player to set the mood. It was different, creative and pretty ad lib - that’s the Austin vibe after all - but it came off well, and there's a short clip from it here in this Top 5 montage. If you want to see more, you can view the entire open mic session here on my website. Hey, if you need an event host down the road, I just may be your guy.

Thanks to the ETS folks, and especially Zpryme CEO Jason Rodriguez for the kudos. They’ve been putting on this first-rate event for years, and if you're interested in this space, ETS should be your go-to event, no doubt. Good timing - ETS20 runs next week as a virtual event!

Adtran Connect - Quick Take and Photos

Another week, another industry event. This time it’s for Adtran Connect, a company I have some good history with. Not my core focus, but enough pieces that touch on things I follow, so it’s definitely time well-spent. I’ll have more to say soon, and for now, here’s my usual quick-take post with photos before I move on to the next thing.

Day 1 keynotes from Curtis Knittle of CableLabs, and Matthew Hare of UK-based Zzoomm. Adtran’s Gary Bolton keeping things moving along.

Fireside chat just with analysts and press with CEO/Chairman Tom Stanton. Here’s an updated photo that I’ve posted in recent years - their wall of patents - pretty impressive. After the sessions, you do what one does in Alabama - blues and bbq. My kinda town.

Day 2 keynote - my highlight - Dr. Deborah Barnhart of the US Space and Rocket Center. What a great time to be in Huntsville, on the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, and of course how the space program came to Huntsville. She told the story well, and had some pretty strong messages about how space exploration can help us save the planet - more on that later.

My 2016 - By The Numbers

Happy 2017 all! I meant to get this done before the break, but it just didn't happen. Am back from a 10 day hiatus from work, and now there's a lot to do. Before getting to the new stuff, I wanted to  tally a quick recap of my output during 2016. 

I don't think - or expect - that most of my followers would have a broad sense of all the things I do, and that you probably only follow me selectively. That's fine, but I do cover a lot of ground, and a good way to show that is with a simple tally of what kept me busy last year. Being an indie analyst, I have to tout my horn every once in a while, so here goes.

185:    

Original, published articles and thought leadership pieces - primarily with Ziff Davis, TechTarget, UCStrategies, Internet Telephony Magazine and EM 360 Magazine

11:  

Guest blog posts/articles - primarily with UCStrategies and GetVoIP

20:   

Ghost-written articles and case studies

114:  

Posts written on my own blog

3:   

White papers/e-books

3:   

Video interviews

17:   

Podcasts participated in - primarily with UCStrategies and EM 360

8:   

Webinar presentations - primarily with Ziff Davis

18:   

Conferences/industry events attended, and/or moderated/presented at - Cisco Canada, Cisco US, Unify, ITExpo, Vertical Communications, Channel Partners, Dell, NEC, Energy Thought Summit, Interactive Intelligence, Metaswitch Canada, Monage, Genesys, SCTC, BC Summit, Nextiva, ShoreTel, Schulich Tech Talk Leaders

2:   

SIPtone music gigs  :-)

Also, in the smart grid space:

11:   

Original thought leadership pieces and executive interviews

2017 is shaping up to be just as busy, so it's time to get back to work. Feel free to inquire about specific examples from the above list - I can provide links or soft copies for anything except the ghost writing.

My Next Webinar - Machine Learning and Utility Asset Management

Time flies when you're busy!

Last week I was at the SCTC conference and between speaking and playing music with the SIPtones, I didn't get any blogging done. Just getting a free moment to blog now, and while it's short notice, I have another webinar to tell you about.

Actually, I have three webinars coming up before year end, and will have posts coming soon on the other two.

Tomorrow's webinar has me wearing my Smart Grid hat with Zpryme, and I'll be moderating on the topic of machine learning and  how it's impacting the way utilities build and monitor their power networks.

Very similar issues to the service provider space, actually, and am looking forward to it. Joining me will be executives from Spark Cognition and Duke Fossil and Nuclear - all the details are here, and it's not too late to register!

More ETS Thought Leadership - GIS and Smart Grid

I blogged yesterday about a session I hosted at the Energy Thought Summit in Austin. It included a video of the full session that Zpryme has posted on YouTube, and am glad to see that my post is getting a lot of readership. So, to keep the ETS vibe going, here's more content.

As Community Advocate for the summit, another hat I've been wearing is doing a series of thought leader interviews. Many of these were posted prior to the event, and can be accessed from the News section of the ETS16 site. Other interviews were done later, so I have a series of those coming soon. One was published while I was away last week, and am sharing it here now.

This one was done with Bill Meehan of Esri, a company that has been pioneering the use of GIS since the 1970s. The applications go well beyond energy, so my UC/collaboration followers will also find this of interest. Bill explains this quite well in the interview, and you can see him in action on the above-mentioned video from my session - he gave a very colorful presentation!

So, here's the interview, and will update the blog as the remaining interviews get posted.

Energy Thought Summit Redux - Video of my Open Mic Session

Zpryme's Energy Thought Summit - ETS16 - was just over a month ago, but there's still good content being posted, and will share here for those interested in the smart grid/smart cities/smart home/smart car space. Our event was a great success and you'll be hard pressed to find richer, more diverse insights about what the future holds for the energy economy.

By now you should know this is another hat that I wear, and as Community Advocate for ETS16, I contributed in a few ways. If that's news to you, my recap post for the summit is a good starting point for my involvement there.

During the summit, I hosted the Open Mic event, where three energy thought leaders each had 10 minutes to talk about an energy challenge - with props - and persuade the audience theirs was the best. The game show format was fun, but don't let that fool you. Each had a timely and relevant message to share that causes you to re-think what energy means in 2016.

My role was to MC the session and keep things moving along to the end where the audience cast their ballots to choose a winner. Being ETS - and being in Austin - we did things a bit differently. As you'll see in the video clip, the speakers had to write the title of their talk on a chalkboard - can't get more old school than that. In keeping with the creative/artsy vibe of Austin, my new piano friend, Adam Lozoya was plucked off the busker-lined streets the night before and provided great ad lib accompaniment throughout the session. On top of that, we held the session in an improv theater space at the back of a nearby cafe.

You won't see this at other conferences, and it was a lot of fun. It's part of what makes ETS unique, and am glad to be part of it. So, explore at your leisure - the whole session is captured below - it runs about 45 minutes, and I won't give the winner away here. Hopefully, you'll watch the whole thing, and if you do, I'd love to hear who you think was the best. You up for that?

Toronto - We're Number 11!

It's not every day that I get to say Toronto, Dell and Harvard in the same sentence, but we were all in the room together earlier this week, and am doing my civic duty here.

I've been developing some good relationships recently with Dell, and the stars lined up for me on Tuesday to participate in a panel as part of a Dell Canada event here in Toronto. This was a new event for me - Power To Do More - but it included a session with analysts, press, Dell Canada customers, and most notably Prof. David Ricketts from Harvard.

For background, Dell sponsored the 2015 Strategic Innovation Summit, which was convened by Harvard, with Dr. Rickerts serving as the summit's General Chair. Briefly, the summit focused on harnessing the forces of change - mostly tech-related of course - to drive the "innovation-based economy" of tomorrow.

Lots of good insights came out of this summit, and Dr. Ricketts was on hand to discuss them in a group setting. The newsworthy highlight came in the form a list of top 50 global cities that the research deemed as being most "future ready". I'm not going to break down the methodology or full listing here, but you can get all the key takeaways in the press release issued by Dell Canada in support of this event.

I find this research fascinating, and Toronto certainly comes out looking good, ranking at #11. We all love to shout "we're #1", but San Jose has a lock on that spot, and #11 is not too shabby. I'm not alone among Toronotians who can effortlessly spout all our shortcomings, but as liveable cities go, TO is pretty hard to beat.

Given that I also wear a smart grid/smart cities hat, I'd be remiss if I didn't give a hat tip as well to Austin, which came in even higher in the global rankings at #7. Having just served as the Community Advocate for last month's Energy Thought Summit in Austin, I can tell you first hand this is an up and coming city - looks like the next San Francisco to me - and they are doing some very cool and smart things, especially in the energy space. For a taste of that, here's my blog post with some highlights from ETS16, and for our broader thought leadership on energysmart cities - including mine - feel free to check out the News tab here.

Coming back to Dell/Harvard, what the research is really focused on is the extent to which leading cities have the right mix of attributes to sustain economic growth, and the authors break this down into three core dimensions - human capital, infrastructure and commerce.

There's lots more to explore here, but for now I'm just doing a shout-out to share TO's good news. As well, kudos to Dell for sponsoring this research, and as I get more involved with their IoT practice, I'll have to more to say about what cities need to do to be globally competitive, as well as how best to use technology to help make that happen.

March Writing Roundup

Busy month, yeah.

Had two conferences at the back end of the month - Channel Partners, and ETS16 - from which I just returned late last night. So, aside from my regular writing stints, I produced a lot of content for the GetVoIP blog from Channel Partners, along with my smart grid thought leadership around ETS16 - and more of that to come. Here's a summary of what I was up to in March.

Channel Partners Takeaways -What Millennials, Mobility and 5G Mean for UC, UCStrategies, March 31

ETS16 - Day 1 Quick Hits, March 30, my blog

What Else SMBs need to do to Ensure UC Provides Flexibility, March 29, Toolbox.com

Channel Partners Spotlight on Vonage - What Makes Them a Good Partner, March 25, GetVoIP blog

Microsoft at Channel Partners - "We're Partner Friendly", March 25, GetVoIP blog

Channel Partners Spotlight on Nextiva - Winning Those Loose Balls, March 22, GetVoIP blog

8x8's State of Channel Program, March 21, GetVoIP blog

Intel Q&A - Utilities and the Internet of Things, March 18, ETS Insights

How UC Brings Flexibility to Your Business, March 17, Toolbox.com

Channel Parters Conference - First Take, March 16, GetVoIP blog

Why SMBs Aren't Adopting UC, March 14, Toolbox.com

Why Are We Still Using Desk Phones?, March 9, Internet Telephony Magazine

S&C Electric Q&A, Part 2 - Energy Storage Opportunities, March 8, ETS Insights

Allconnect Q&A - News Ways to Connect with Customers, March 8, ETS Insights

Why VoIP Hasn't Yet Replaced Legacy Telephony, March 7, Toolbox.com

Humans - Bringing the Personal Touch to Energy, March 7, ETS Insights

Univago - Solving Video from the Cloud, March 4, my blog

ETS16 - Day 1 Quick Hits

Things are moving fast here at Zpryme's ETS16 - Energy Thought Summit - and I'm wearing a few hats. I've been producing a lot of thought leadership content in advance of the summit, and this morning, I hosted the first session - an Open Mic panel that was a lot of fun. Today I'm also doing a series of video interviews with industry execs, and these will turn up soon on the ETS Insights page.

Time is short, and for now I can only manage a few photos with brief commentary from yesterday, plus some late additions from the Open Mic session. Here we go...

Early start yesterday, with a tour of the power plant site, which was decommissioned a few years back, and has been totally reinvented as a different kind of community asset. Very impressive, and Austin is really leading way for integrating energy and the role of utilities into the fabric of everyday life in the digital age. Kind of ironic to see two letters below not illuminated - not sure if that's Austin humor, or nobody noticed these lights are out.  :-)

Another cool vibe about Austin is the arts scene. It's more than just a music town, and creativity is everywhere here. I believe it's actually a key part of the secret sauce that makes the tech startup scene here so dynamic. If that's not on your radar, it really should be. Check out what they've done with these huge metal tubes - as I understand things, it's part of how they cool the water when producing steam to drive the turbines. Not any more, and I love what they've done here. Perhaps it symbolizes a prison break, escaping from the legacy energy model, or more likely reinvention - for both the energy sector and repurposing an industrial site to something with great aesthetics. I'm reaching, but I also see the bodies of two guitars here, and that wouldn't be out of place in this town.

Another example of repurposing the site and 21st century urban renewal. Dormant cooling tower next to a high rise condo, making this a very hip neighborhood now.

Another part of the tour was to see what they're doing to promote alternate forms of transportation and energy - electric vehicles and e-bikes in particular. They're doing lots of leading-edge things in these areas, and here's a fast charging station, with a Nissan Leaf with the lid flipped up for charging.

Nothing really radical here, but I really like how the charger has the look and feel of the pumps we all use at gas stations. I asked about this, and they are in fact, looking at partnerships with gas stations to put in some chargers, even one that serves BBQ. Why not? Fast chargers only take about 20 minutes, so it's about the right amout of time to get a bite to eat and get back on the road.

Now, here's the interesting part for me. The experience of using an EV charger totally has the same look and feel as if being at a gas station. They didn't have to design it this way, but when you think about the activity you're trying moving people away from, it's much easier to do that when the user experience is so familiar.

If EV charging looked different - or weird as they say in Austin - or complex, people wouldn't use it so readily. The UC&C space is going through this now, and the vendors definitely get it, and that's really helping drive adoption. Great to see that here with energy, and when other points of contact in the home have the same thinking - smart meters, thermostats, home networks, etc. - that's going to make smart grid adoption move a lot faster.

Show time at the Paramount - they don't make 'em like this any more.

ETS President Drew Johnston welcoming everyone and setting the tone.

Dr. Thomas Wagner from NASA - great talk, more about that later - and some visual art happening in real time. I didn't catch the name of the illustrator, but over the course of the morning sessions, she created a visual narrative that captured the essence of what the speakers were sharing.

Voila! The finished product - very cool, huh? And, between sessions, there is a musical performer to serenade us - different ones each time. In this case, we had classical music. Loved it, but am not sure if she was playing a cello or a viola. Anyhow, I don't think you're going to see this mixing of arts, creativity and music - all acoustic, all live - at any other event. Again, you may call Austin weird, but it totally works for me, and really engages all the senses.

For star power, we had Dr. Vint Cerf, via remote connection. Too bad he couldn't be on stage, but it was great to hear his thoughts. The experience was just so-so, though, and Google Hangouts was probably not the ideal choice for such an esteemed speaker. That's another conversation, but I'm wearing my smart grid hat right now.

Finally, some me time. This was from today's 8am session, so it's really a bonus add-on for my Day 1 recap. I MC'd the Open Mic session, and I grabbed this photo that was posted on twitter earlier. Thanks for that! We had a full house, and was very happy to have a local pianist accompany us during the transitions from speaker to speaker. Maybe it's just an Austin thing, but it was a nice touch.

Here's the piano man, Adam Lozoya. Literally, he was discovered playing on the street the day before, and next thing you know he's at my session. Great guy, and nice of him to let me play a bit too - I can't not do that if there's a piano in the room. Here he is with Act II, performing outside the theater during our morning break. Gotta love the electric candles sticking up, and of course the tip hat. Man's gotta make a living!

Energy Thought Summit, Austin - Final Shout-Out!

With this being a short week, I wanted to push another post out about Zpryme's ETS16, starting next Tuesday in Austin.

I've cited the back story regarding my involvement in the summit along with the smart grid space in general many times, and if you don't have that, here's a recent post about it.

I'll be flying to Austin on Monday, and if you're there, I won't be hard to find. As you may know, I've been writing a fair bit to support the summit, and my latest is a Q&A I did with Intel about the role IoT plays in how utilities evolve for 21st century needs.

Once you see that, my other posts won't be hard to find, and I'll continue blogging and tweeting throughout the event.

Oh, and if you're there, I'm hosting the Open Mic event bright and early on Wednesday at 8am!

Energy Thought Summit - My Q&A Interview Series

Slipping on my smart grid hat, as Community Advocate for the upcoming Energy Thought Summit in Austin, I have a few roles to play. One of them is developing thought leadership content to provide a preview of what to expect at ETS16. This has taken two basic forms, one of which I just completed, and now I've got a second track underway.

The first form is my four-part TECH series, where each article focused on a distinct theme that defines ETS16 - Transformation, Emergence, Convergence and Humans. Earlier this week, the final article was posted, and that's a good starting point if you'd like to explore the full series.

Just as the communications space has been radically disrupted the past 10 years, the same story is unfolding now in the energy sector, and that's why I've been involved here for several years. These posts will give you a pretty good idea of how technology has been a driving force for change across the entire energy value chain, and we still have a long way to go.

Now I'll get to the second form of thought leadership. Another way of understanding what's driving change is to hear first hand from across the ecosytem - the disruptors, the utilities being disrupted, and energy consumers. I've done this via a series of Q&A interviews that is still ongoing, and the first set was just posted this week, and links to each are provided below.

I'll add others as they're posted, and I hope you enjoy these. Who knows? Maybe it will be enough to get you to come join us in Austin, March 29-31.

S&C Electric - Energy Storage Opportunities
S&C Electric - Innovation and Collaboration for Energy
Allconnect - New Ways to Connect With Customers
Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative - Managing Customer Chaos

Humans - Bringing the Personal Touch to Energy

That's the title of my fourth and final post in the "ETS16 Primer" series as a lead-up to the Energy Thought Summit later this month in Austin.

As you may know, this is part of my broader involvement in the smart grid space as well as this conference, both of which I do with Austin-based Zpryme Research. I've been posting updates here, with the most recent being about the third post in the Primer series.

The latest post looks at the importance of keeping humans central to how utilities go about modernizing their business. It's easy to think passively about energy as a commodity service, but humans are the ones building the smart grid, as well as being the consumers of what they produce.

Our world is much more connected and engaged today - hence my interest in smart grid coming from the UC/collab space - and the success of modernization efforts relies heavily on keeping the human touch. That's what this post touches on, and helps set the stage for ETS16. I hope you read it, and if you like it, I encourage you to read the earlier posts in the series, and maybe, just maybe you'll decide to join us in Austin, March 28-31.

February Writing Roundup

As you can see below, I had a good variety of writing last month. Aside from the regular mix of UC, collaboration, customer experience and VoIP, there are two things to note that are a bit outside the norm.

First, wearing my smart grid hat, I'm quite involved with the Energy Thought Summit, running end of March in Austin. I've been active in this space for some time, and one of my roles is to create thought leadership leading up to the summit. Last month, two posts in a four part series of mine ran - see below.

Second, if you just read one thing from this digest of posts, go to the very last one, which wasn't even written by me. Rather, it's by long-time Forbes writer David F. Carr, who wrote a great review of a panel I moderated on collaboration that he was a speaker on. I don't get cited in the mainstream business press very often, so this was very nice to see - and totally unexpected.

Otherwise, here's what else I was writing about last month to give you a sense of what I'm seeing in the communications market.

Ideal Scenarios for Cloud-Based UC, Feb. 25, Toolbox.com

What Employees Will Not Like About VoIP, Feb. 23, Toolbox.com

Vertical Communications - Can They Succeed Selling Direct?, Feb. 22, UCStrategies

Considering Unified Communications as a Service?, Feb. 18, TechTarget PRO+ Premium Content

Three Things Employees Will Love About VoIP, Feb. 15, Toolbox.com

VoIP Deployment Mistakes to Watch For, Feb. 9, Toolbox.com

Convergence - The Road Ahead When Transportation and Energy Merge, Feb. 9, ETS16 portal

Three Factors That Impact Audio Quality for Conferencing, Feb. 8, Toolbox.com

Top Six Tips for Shaping the Customer Experience in 2016, Feb. 4, Enterprise Management 360

UC Analytics Must Mature Before Benefits can be Seen, Feb. 4, TechTarget

Emergence - New Players and Technologies Bring Utilities to the Innovation Game, Feb. 3, ETS16 portal

Honorable mention - I moderated a panel about collaboration in late January at ITExpo, and one of my speakers, who spoke on behalf of a vendor, is also a regular contributor for Forbes. He wrote an article about the session, with generous citations for me and the other panelists.

Are You Communicating or Collaborating?, February 2, Forbes, by David F. Carr

Energy Thought Summit Updates

Many of my followers know that I've been active in the smart grid space for many years, as there are strong parallels between utilities and telcos in terms of how communications technology is disrupting everything that they do. What VoIP started doing to telecom began about 10 years ago, the Web - and other things - is doing to the energy sector now, and there's a lot to be learned from the comms space about how to handle change.

The next Energy Thought Summit - ETS16 - is a month away, and it's time for an update. I've been involved with ETS from the beginning, and it's part of my broader involvement with Austin-based Zpryme Research, where I'm also an Advisor. This is a unique event in that it's all about thought leadership from A-list executives across the energy sector, along with leading academics and policy makers. No exhibitors or show floor - just great content and insights about what's happening now and where things are going.

The full agenda was published on Friday, so see for yourself. Since we all use energy - not even the Internet is this important - you don't have to be a utility lifer to find the topics of interest. Aside from the hands-on industry issues, we'll be addressing things like electric vehicles, Internet of Things, customer engagement, smart cities, smart homes, renewable energy, sustainable business models, etc.

I'll be there wearing a few hats, including something a bit different. On Wednesday morning, I'll be the Emcee for an Open Mic session titled "What's the Next Greatest Challenge in Energy?". It's going to be a fun session, and if things work out, I may warm up the audience playing some piano.  Why not - it's Austin, right?

Otherwise, I'll moderate a session or two - updates coming-  and generally will not be hard to find. I'm also contributing thought leadership content as we build up to the summit, with my most recent posting here. Drop me a line if you want to hear more about ETS16, and even better if you want to attend.

Convergence in Smart Grid - Transforming the Chaos Series #3

"Transforming the Chaos" is the main theme for our upcoming Energy Thought Summit in Austin, starting March 28. Wearing my Smart Grid hat, I'm the Community Advocate for ETS16, and have been blogging about it here fairly often.

To help prime our audience for the experience, I've been developing a four-part series addressing separate but connected sub-themes. To start at the beginning, this post will take you to the first two posts, covering Transformation and Emergence. The third sub-theme is Convergence, and that article was just posted to the ETS16 website, and I hope you give it a read. The fourth post is in the works now, and I'll update you here once it's running. I've got other content in the works to support the summit, and before you know it, I'll be there in Austin.

My Latest Smart Grid Article - Emergence Theme Around Technology and Innovation

Time to wear my Smart Grid hat again. In this mode, I'm an Advisor to Austin-based Zpryme Research, and the Community Advocate for next month's Energy Thought Summit. Leading up to the summit, I'm writing a four part thought leadership series, and this is the second piece.

The title is "Emergence - New Players and Technologies Bring Utilities to the Innovation Game", and it's posted now on the ETS16 website. Utilities are 10 years behind telcos in term of Internet/IP disruption, and my focus here is on emerging trends that are poised to transform the energy sector.

I hope you give it a read, and if you like it, you'll want to read my first instalment, and then stay tuned the upcoming pieces, which are in the works now. Beyond that, if you're interested in how this overall transformation is happening, you'll want to join us at ETS16, March 28-31.

Transformation Challenges Facing Utilities - My Latest Smart Grid Post

For long-time followers, you'll know that I've been active in the Smart Grid space for many years, and serve as an Advisor to Austin-based Zpryme Research. They're a niche research consultancy focused on the energy sector, and I work with them in various ways.

One of these is as the Community Advocate for their marquee event, the Energy Thought Summit. Here is one of my recap posts from last year's event, along with a digest of the various posts I wrote to support it.

For ETS16 - running this March 28-31, again in Austin, I'll be writing a series of similar posts, and these are getting underway now. Additionally, I'm writing a series focusing on the four main themes of this year's summit - Transformation, Emergence, Convergence and Humans - TECH - all of which support the broader message of Transforming the Chaos.

I've been active in the Smart Grid space because I see the same pattern of disruption from IP and the Web in telecom being played out 10 years later with utilities. The parallels are strong, and I'm not alone from the tech/comms space in seeing this.

To keep that theme going, the first post in my series was just published on the ETS16 site, and I hope you give it a read. There's plenty of time to join us in Austin, and you just might want to do that after looking over the program and speaking roster in place - with lots more to come.