Update on the Institute of Industry Analyst Relations

There's been a lot going on at the Institute of Industry Analyst Relations recently so it seemed an appropriate time for a quick update.

As you may have seen, we now have a website. This contains information and news on the Institute as well as various sections for members. These include an AR job shop, discussion forums, a calendar of training courses and events, as well as a library that contains (among other things) 'best practice' whitepapers and analyst firm research agendas and team directories. (Hat tip to Tekrati for providing the newsfeed we use on our homepage).

Looking ahead, we’re delighted to have Gartner presenting at our next meeting which is taking place on 15 March. Peter Sondergaard (SVP and head of research) and Aaron Yaverski (GVP, high-tech provider product management) are our guest speakers. If anyone is interested in attending, please contact us using the details on the website.

In January, at our last meeting, IIAR members and guests from companies such as BEA, BT, CA, Cisco, LogicaCMG, Oracle, T-Systems and Unisys came to hear Datamonitor executives Anthony Parslow and Tim Royston-Webb. There was obviously lots of interest in Datamonitor’s recent acquisition of Ovum and Anthony and Tim spoke openly about the company’s future plans for the business.

There’s a summary of the meeting at the IIAR Yahoo Group. Members can find more information (including the Datamonitor presentation and handouts in the Library section of the IIAR website.

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Disclosure: I am a board member at the IIAR along with Duncan Chapple, Susanne Huebner, Ludovic Leforestier and David Taylor. The secretary of the IIAR is Hannah Kirkman.