Microsoft consolidates its IT pro tradeshows into one
Summary: Microsoft is consolidating a number of its standalone IT pro-focused tradeshows into a single unified event, slated to kick off in May 2015 in Chicago. — Microsoft is consolidating its TechEd, Microsoft Management Summit …
Context & Ripple Effects
Microsoft had already reshaped its conference calendar in 2012, replacing Mix with a new developer conference. The move to a unified IT-professional gathering extends that earlier redesign of its developer-event strategy to the administrator and management audience.
The change matters because TechEd and Microsoft Management Summit had served adjacent professional communities. A single Chicago event in May 2015 gives Microsoft one setting to present its infrastructure, management and IT guidance together.
First-order effects
- TechEd and Microsoft Management Summit attendees, sponsors and speakers move from separate event plans to one Microsoft-run IT-professional event in Chicago.
- Microsoft can concentrate event programming, sponsorship inventory and executive messaging around a single annual gathering.
Second-order effects
- IT departments and Microsoft partners that allocated travel and training budgets across standalone shows can concentrate those commitments on one event.
- Vendors seeking access to Microsoft's administrator audience face a single, larger sponsorship and exhibition decision rather than separate TechEd and management-show opportunities.
Third-order effects
- If Microsoft keeps consolidating its conference portfolio, its events become fewer but more central venues for coordinating product, partner and IT-professional messaging across business lines.
The trend: Microsoft is simplifying a previously segmented conference portfolio into broader events organized around overlapping technical audiences.