Ajit Sagar

A couple of days ago I attended and delivered a keynote about "Web Services and SOA - China 2005" in Beijing. As compared to technology conferences in North America and Europe, the attendance was modest. However, for an area that is rapidly growing in China, which is the next candidate after India for delivering global IT software services, this was a very well attended event.

I don't have the actual numbers from the conference organizers, but I believe there were between 600-700 attendees. And unlike technology conferences in the USA, there were no exhibit hall/vendor booths. As a result, everyone who came to the conference attended the sessions and listened to what the speakers had to say.

You can read in more detail about the conference in the May issue of Web Services Journal. Right now, I'd like to use the time I have before my flight out of Shanghai to chronicle a few highlights from the conference and to share some of the images with you.

The WSC conference is in its fourth year. I was surprised to hear of it just 3 months ago, when GEDY Limited (the conference organizers) invited me to deliver a keynote here. This is so characteristic of China, a country whose discipline and dedication is to be admired. They don't advertise, they just do it. The government has seen the potential of WS and SOA, and they want to catch up. The market in servicing this industry has obviously been captured by India, but China has all the right pieces and talent in place to play in the Global Delivery Model space for Web Services and SOA. Incidentally, this was the topic of my presentation. You can download the powerpoint by clicking on "Web Services, SOA and the Global Delivery Model".

The conference was held at the Hotel New Otani Chang Fu Gong in Beijing. Apart from a few interruptions to my Internet, due to the fact that this week the Otani hotel was in the process of changing their ISP, the venue was excellent in terms of service. Locationwise, I would have preferred something closer to or in the heart of downtown Beijing.

The six keynote speakers were all invitees from the USA from prominent companies - Infosys (yours truly), IBM, HP, Microsoft, CA, and BEA. The keynotes were delivered in the first half of the day. Details of the conference are available here and the agenda is available here. The keynotes were a mix of English and Chinese presentations. However, there was live translation of the sessions. The speakers were all from North America.

Related Links

• Keynote Presentation (zip file): "Web Services, SOA and the Glob