Software giant puts freeze on CA World
Annual conference cancelled for 2005
Computer Associates (CA) has put CA World, its annual conference, on ice while its new chief executive tries on his shoes for size.
But the software giant said it hopes to open its exhibition floor to competitors in 2006.
The decision to axe CA World 2005 was revealed to previous delegates just one day before the vendor concluded its search for a chief executive.
Former IBM Software executive John Swainson has become CA's chief executive elect and will be on probation until spring 2005, the time the next CA World was planned.
Joan Blackwood, CA's head of marketing, who oversees CA World, refused to be drawn on any involvement Swainson had in postponing the conference. But she said she would use the year off to take CA World back to the drawing board, and hopes to make it even bigger than before.
"I'd look to increase and vary the attendance," she said. In 2004 the event attracted about 10,000 delegates.
Blackwood also said CA World would become more focused on its partners. "It wasn't well attended by the partner community. It was well attended by the user and technical community. We want to make it more representative of the industry as a whole," she said.
The plan is to give CA World more focus on how technology might be applied to business problems, she added.
Dave Simpson, director of CA reseller SoftCat, said he went to CA World last year and is disappointed that the event will not be held in 2005.
"I've never seen anything like it," he said. "The keynote was in a room at the Venetian hotel in Las Vegas. The speaker was so far away he was about an inch high. I would definitely attend the next event, whenever that may be."