ebizQ in Action

Featured Speakers

Michael Dortch Michael Dortch, of the Aberdeen Group, has been an analyst, 'information entrepreneur,' speaker, and writer for the past 30 years. He focuses on the intersection between IT and 'the real world.'

Michael Lees is Senior Director, BPM Product Marketing at Software AG and is responsible for global product marketing initiatives for the company's BPM product line. Prior to joining Software AG/webMethods, Mr. Lees was founder and CEO of Cerebra, Inc., a leader in metadata management solutions. Cerebra, originally located in the U.K., moved to the U.S. in 2004 and was acquired by webMethods in 2006. Mr. Lees has worked with many large corporate and federal organizations on their use of metadata and semantic technologies as enablers (along with BPM and SOA) of agile business, information and IT strategies. Mr. Lees is a graduate of Durham University (Business Economics) and is a fully qualified Chartered Accountant. Prior to founding Cerebra, he was a technology analyst and technology fund manager for one of the U.K.'s largest investment houses.

Derek Miers is a well-known independent industry analyst and technology strategist. At BPM Focus he provides BPM training and consulting to organizations around the world. As Co-Chairman of BPMI.org, he helped merge the organization with the OMG and sits on the BPM Steering Committee of the OMG. Over the years, he has carried out a wide range of consulting roles including running hundreds of training courses (in business and process modeling techniques), undertaking detailed technology selection assessments and project-risk assessment studies. Other engagements have involved the provision of strategic consulting advice - from facilitating board level conversations around BPM initiatives, through establishing effective BPM Project and Expertise Centers, to helping clients develop new business models that leverage business process strategies.

Dr. Dale Skeen co-founded Vitria with Dr. JoMei Chang in 1994, and oversees the technology direction of the company. He is widely credited with inventing distributed publish-subscribe communication with more than a dozen patents in this and related technologies awarded or pending. Dr. Skeen has more than 20 years experience in designing and implementing large-scale computing systems and is well known for his technical contributions in the areas of distributed computing and database systems. Dr. Skeen is also the industry visionary recognized with creating and developing Business Process Integration and Real-time Business Process Analysis, two of the innovative foundations of Vitria's solutions.

Dr. Skeen is also a prolific author, having contributed to ten books and written numerous journal articles on distributed computing and integration technology. Prior to founding Vitria, Dr. Skeen was a co-founder of Tibco, where he served as Chief Scientist. He has held faculty positions at the University of California, Berkeley and at Cornell University.

Dr. Skeen received his Ph.D. from University of California, Berkeley, in distributed database systems. In May 2001, he received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the University of California, Berkeley, for "fundamental contributions in publish-subscribe communication." (Previous award winners include Steve Wozniak, founder of Apple, and Bill Joy of Sun Microsystems.)