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Eleven Intriguing Mobile Sessions at SAPPHIRE NOW in Orlando

Why eleven, and not ten? That's just how hard it was for me to narrow down the stuff I want to hear about at SAP's annual user conference.

As it was in 2011, mobile enterprise buffs will have an overflowing buffet of great content to choose from at this year's SAPPHIRE NOW conference in Orlando.

Besides the app demos to check out at the Test Drive Tables, the customers and experts to interrogate and mingle with, there will be 143 talks, discussions and panels to attend.

Most of the activity will take place at the Mobile Campus (last year's pictured above), with some scattered at other campuses such as Analytics, or Partner, or Database and Technology.

If things are at all like last year, expect many of the mobile sessions to be standing room only. Take the microforums, which are discussions limited last year to 12 people max. Many microforums last year drew crowds of 50 or more people. One session about iPhones and iPads in the enterprise even drew 100 attendees.

This year, there will be 76 microforums. And seating will be doubled from 12 to 24 seats. But expect many of them to be just as crowded.

The moral of this story: don't procrastinate on pre-registering!

That's how I spent the better part of Wednesday, building up My Agenda for May 14-16.

Besides the keynotes, what's on my can't miss list? Here they are, in no particular order:

"Introducing the New SAP Mobile Platform." 7376 Last week, SAP Executive Board Member Vishal Sikka officially announced the fusion of the Sybase Unwired Platform with Sybase 365 m-commerce services together into the SAP Mobile Platform. Hear VP for mobile solutions and strategy Tony Kueh dive deeper into how this will help enterprise developers better build mobile marketing and commerce apps that target consumers and integrate with your internal SAP applications. And follow Tony @tonykueh on Twitter to get his thoughts before the show.

"Mobile Commerce Services: 2012 and Beyond." 7538 Or if you already know SUP and want to learn more about Sybase 365, come and listen to Haridas Nair, SAP vice-president for mCommerce quiz two Sybase 365 customers, Dutch-Bangla Bank Ltd. and Citigroup Inc. The former is reaching 160 million Bangladeshis via Sybase 365's mBanking platform, while Citigroup is alerting its customers worldwide via SMS text messages.

"Partner Mobile Apps for..." Various This is not one session, but ten different 20-minute demos, each presented by SAP partners with different specialties, including Analytics, Procurement and Supply Chain, Sales and Marketing, Workflow, Human Capital Management, etc. Check them out, all taking place continually in the Mobile Demo Theater.

"Mobile Apps from SAP: Vision and Roadmap." 7434 SAP still hopes to build a software ecosystem in which 80% or more of the apps come from partners. At the same time, we're accelerating the pace of creating our own apps. Hear SAP VP, Mobile Global Center of Excellence, Vishy Gopalakrishnan tell you what's on SAP's app roadmap. As a partner/ISV, this will let you zig where SAP zags.

"Gamification: Not Just for Kids." 8764 It's also for management consultants, like Deloitte CTO Mark White. With the Consumerization of IT, end users increasingly get to choose their technology. Having gravitated towards slicker, sexier gear like iPads and MacBooks on the hardware side, expect them to favor easier-to-use, fun apps, too. For a preview of White's talk, check out Deloitte's paper on the most important technology trends of 2012.

"Enabling Enterprise Mobility: The Impact of Consumer Technology." 7889 SAP CIO Oliver Bussmann, recently named European CIO of the Year, will share his experiences enabling BYOD and deploying 14,000+ iPads at SAP. He'll be joined by Georges-Edouard Dias, senior vice-president for digital business at L'Oreal S.A., Wally Fisher, director for implementation and readiness at Standard Bank South Africa, and Manish Choksi, CIO of Asian Paints Ltd. They'll all no doubt have great things to share, too.

"SAP Runs SAP: Bringing our Expertise in Mobile to Your Organization." 7890 To get more insight into how SAP balances the conflicting needs of delighting employees and securing them, hear SAP Americas Mike Golz. Golz will also speak on the similar-but-more-targeted panel called "BYOD: Managing Personal Mobile Devices in your Enterprise" along with watchmaker Fossil's VP for IT, Mark Reynolds and Pepperidge Farm IT director John Dutsar.

"The Power of Mobile Analytics." 8767 There's nothing better than hearing directly from customers. Come and listen to T-Mobile USA and 3M be interviewed by SAP Mobile Analytics Marketing Head Mimi Spier on what SAP mobile analytic apps are doing for them.

"Transforming Your Industry..." Various Ok, I know I'm cheating, but I just had to share about these 8 sessions, each showing how companies in different industries, ranging from banking to utilities to retail and more, are taking advantage of mobile apps. What's great is that each will be a Q&A between an SAP expert and an IT Director or CIO from a large enterprise user. I plan to catch Executive VP Chris McClain interview Peabody Energy on how its executives are taking advantage of tablet dashboards to track KPIs and react to them in real-time.

"Real-Time Mobile Devices, Apps, and Expense Management." 8822 The latest Afaria 7.0 not only features a fresh new UI, but it also includes new Telecom Expense Management (TEM) features. Hear SAP product manager James Naftel explain them.

"Innovating with Enterprise Mobility in..." Various This set of 28 microforums will be an opportunity for those in the same industry, be it transportation or life sciences or finance, to share their achievements or pain points. Each discussion will be led by a relevant SAP expert. I'm planning to check out the Consumer Products one.

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