The Handheld Partner Conference 2011

The 4^th annual Handheld Business Partner Conference 2011 was this year held in Gothenburg (Sweden) at the beautifully located Quality Hotel 11, situated right by the water and the inlet to Gothenburg. The interest to participate in the conference has risen every year since the start and this year sported a record attendance as well.

Everyone gathered by the pier and ready for the dinner event

Mingle evening

The conference was kick-started with a casual mingle party, where all attendees were welcomed by the events moderator Amy Urban, Marketing Director Handheld US. She also introduced the participating Showcase partners : Brodit, RAM Mounts, Sacci, Bitcomp, Pocum, The Institution, RapidMap Global and G.E.G which demonstrated their accessories and special solutions, applicable to our line-up of rugged handheld computers.

The mingle evening full of networking, with the possibility to check out the solutions provided by the Showcase partners, - while enjoying good food and drinks.

The Main conference day

The conference day was opened by Jerker Hellström, CEO of Handheld Group, who gave a short re-cap of 2010 and what has happened since the last conference in June 2010.

Jerker Hellström was followed by one of the external speakers; David Krebs, Director of mobile and wireless research at VDC, who spoke about industry trends of the rugged handheld market, and how VDC view the market moving forward. After a coffee break there was an insightful Question & Answers session with David Krebs where the conference participants could raise their questions and get David's and VDC view on the subjects. The Question & Answer session was new for this year and turned out well and will surely be included in forthcoming year's program as well.

The third speaker was Mike Zelman, Vice President of Business Development for Handheld Group, he presented Handheld's latest released product the Nautiz X3. Mike also showed a product comparison to the major competition for the Nautiz X3 and described how the product is positioned against competing products. After Mike's presentation it was time for lunch and a visit to the partner showcase area.

The second external speaker was Dr. Jonathan Bowes from SEPA (Scottish Environmental Protection Agency) who's presentation was called "Total Cost of Ownership in a Customer case". SEPA is an end user of the Algiz 7 and Dr. Jonathan Bowes described SEPA’s selection process and explained in an entertaining and factual presentation why and how SEPA is moving from a paper based data collection to a new way or working, now using the Algiz 7.

Sofia Löfblad, Marketing Director of the Handheld group talked about a variety of marketing support that Handheld provides to its resellers. Max Dahlbom, Service and Support Manager gave a presentation of Handhelds service program MaxCare as well as the first public showing of the film of the birth of Handhelds service organization. Mike Zelman of the Handheld Group gave a presentation of the roadmap of moving forward and Handheld's view on new products.

The final presentation of the day was by Michael Södermalm, inspirational speaker, who speech was named "Embracing your challenges". Michael talked about the difference that makes the difference and the importance of knowing what you want. With his energetic presentation and persona Michael left us with some good insights and important questions to consider.

Dinner at Älvsborgs fästning

After a full day of conferencing a boat took the participants out to the 17^th century fortress Älvsborgs Fästning. There the group was meet by a full gun salute by traditionally dressed soldiers. After the reception of soldiers some champagne and finger foods hit the spot. A fabulous dinner was served in the fortress and singer/songwriter Peter Wall entertained throughout the evening.

During the dinner, awards were given to those who:

Was the first person to register for this year’s conference
Had travelled the farthest way to get to the event (Australia).
Had their birthday

A prize was also given to the person who got the best result in the "Handheld Showcase Mingle Quiz". The sparkling fine prize for getting all the answers correct was given to Peter Hartlén from SIB Data AB.

The Handheld team would like to thank each and everyone who had the possibility to attend, and we hope that you will be able to join us again next year.