Keynote Presentations
Chris Howard, Vice President, Burton Group
Keynote: Using Cloud Computing as a Business Advantage
Chris Howard is the Vice President and service director for Burton Group Executive Advisory Program. He covers multiple aspects of enterprise IT for an executive and business audience, including application and enterprise architecture, content and collaboration, data management, identity management, privacy, and cloud computing. Prior to joining Burton Group, Chris was vice president of information delivery and payment systems at US Bank, with responsibility for .NET strategy and adoption. As a Consultant his projects included developing and implementing the MIDI specification for the Roland Corporation, multimedia production, global project leadership and enterprise application design. With 15 years of experience, Chris is a frequent speaker at IT industry conferences and universities including Cambridge, Harvard and Stanford Universities. He served as an industry advisor to the Microsoft Patterns and Practices community and listed in the Canadian Who’s Who since 1990 for his interdisciplinary achievements.
Jason Baker, Chief Technology Officer, VISI
Keynote: Get Ready for the VISI Cloud
Jason has over 14 years of experience working with Internet and telecommunications organizations in Minnesota. Prior to VISI, he co-founded Digital North and was the technology leader within the organization. In his capacity as Director of Operations, Jason helped Digital North expand into multiple datacenters serving thousands of customers. Prior to Digital North, Jason was a key technology driver at iPares, a multinational dot-com consultancy. Jason managed the profitable Application Hosting division within the organization. Early in his career he joined incNET, a startup Internet Service Provider located in Eden Prairie. As Chief Engineer he guided the organization during a time when the Internet was first becoming a useful business tool. incNET was eventually acquired by MEANS Telcom (now Onvoy). Jason joined MEANS as a Senior Engineer within their newly formed Professional Services.