Why go to Houston in July you ask, because Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Conference was held there. Why else would you go visit a place only rivaled by the sun for extreme heat. Before I offend I must say the city hosted us well for several days.

Some WPC Statistics

Established:	2003
Partners in Attendance:	7,500
Microsoft Employees in Attendance:	2,500
Countries Represented:	145
Training Sessions:	225
Exhibitors:	145
Sponsors:	64
Number of Partners in the Microsoft Partner Program:	40,000
Number of Partners Affiliated with Microsoft:	640,000
Number of Partner Companies in the World:	1.4 million
Number of Individuals Associated with those Companies:	10 million
Percentage of Microsoft Revenue Stemming from Partners:	95%

The conference was filled with keynotes, sessions, training, exhibits, and social activities. An exciting note was the constant and positive Dynamics focus and business solutions in general. CRM lead the way with the strongest buzz and success stories, but followed closely by a building Dynamics AX story.

Microsoft COO Kevin Turner gave his annual closing speech at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference. While he provided mostly a roundup of announcements from throughout the week, he did have a big piece of news. Turner announced a $600 million increase in the Microsoft investment in its channel. The latest figure I'd heard was $2 billion. But Turner said Microsoft invested $2.3 billion in fiscal year 2008 (which ended in June), and will invest $2.9 billion in FY09. For those of you keeping score, that's a 26 percent bump.

Back when Microsoft put $2 billion into the channel, nobody else in the industry was close, as far as we know. This increase makes that gap even bigger. Meanwhile, the company will invest $7 billion again in research and development for FY09, Turner said.

New channel head Doug Kennedy sees the potential in Microsoft Dynamics. He also knows that Redmond needs to work on its approach to the enterprise software product line. The long-time Oracle veteran signed on in March and is now vice president of Microsoft Dynamics Partners. He's got a vision to fine-tune -- there's no overhaul needed – to help the Dynamics suite continue to eat away at the market share of SAP as well as that of Kennedy's former employer. Kennedy is excited about Microsoft's plan to differentiate channel members in the partner program with good-better-best competency designations.

The location for next year's Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference is set. Allison Watson, corporate vice president for the Worldwide Partner Group, said the show will be held in New Orleans in July 2009.   It will mark a return to the Big Easy, which was the location of the first Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in October 2003.

Watson took a few minutes in her keynote Wednesday morning to note the five-year anniversary of the Microsoft Partner Program, and said, "It's time to evolve together to the next step."

I look forward to the next step.