The Experts Conference

Gil Kirkpatrick is a well-known expert in the design and development of large-scale distributed software for enterprise networks. He is Microsoft Most Valuable Professional and has more than 27 years of software development expertise. He is a recognized authority and renowned speaker on commercial network directories, including Banyan StreetTalk, Novell eDirectory, and Microsoft Active Directory. In his previous position as Director of Engineering, Kirkpatrick was responsible for the development of directory management products for NetPro and served as the architect and lead engineer for its flagship product, DirectoryAnalyzer. Kirkpatrick joined NetPro in 1994 when the company acquired his previous employer, High Technology Systems. He is the author of Active Directory Programming, published by MacMillan USA.

Jorge de Almeida Pinto is a Senior Consultant within Oxford Computer Group and is based in The Netherlands. He has been active in ICT since 1997. He has worked with Windows infrastructures since 1997, and he specializes in Windows Server, Active Directory and ILM/FIM. Besides that de Almeida Pinto has a very large interest in other Microsoft Identity and Access Management technologies like Certificate Services (CS) and Unified Access Gateway (UAG). He is MCSE certified and enjoys writing articles in a Dutch technical magazine (NetOpus). He is also a frequent contributor and active member of several forums/mailinglists/newsgroups on the internet. His blog can be found at: http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/jorge/default.aspx.

Brian Desmond is senior consultant with Moran Technologies. He has been a Microsoft MVP for Directory Services since 2003 and is the author of Active Directory, 4th Edition from O’Reilly. Desmond is an Active Directory (and sometimes Exchange) focused consultant leading and delivering on projects primarily for large enterprise (40K – 500K seat) customers. His website can be found at: www.briandesmond.com.

Guido Grillenmeier is a Master Technologist within the Advanced Technology Group at Hewlett Packard. Based in Germany, he deals primarily with global Windows infrastructure deployments for large enterprise customers. His current focus is helping HP customers to make a smooth transition to 64-bit Windows and Windows Server 2008. Guido has often spoken at NetPro’s Directory Experts Conference (DEC) and has been a speaker at various other Microsoft-technology related conferences, such as Microsoft Tech-ED, IT Forum or Windows Connections. In the last few months he has been leading the development and delivery for HP’s Windows Server 2008 Academies to HP’s own Services division. He has been a Microsoft MVP for Directory Services since 2004 and is the co-author of “Microsoft Windows Security Fundamentals” (Digital Press).

Joe Kaplan works in Accenture’s internal IT organization, building enterprise applications using the .NET Framework. He specializes in directory services programming, for which he has been recognized as a Microsoft Most Valued Professional and Active Directory Federation Services. He is the co-author of The .NET Developer’s Guide to Directory Services Programming (Addison-Wesley, 2006). An industry veteran of 15 years, he has helped build and deploy a variety of applications that support complex identity lifecyle management processes and federated identity scenarios. He also specializes in web application security and application authorization. Kaplan enjoys helping the directory services programming community solve their problems and welcomes the challenge of scenarios he has never considered.

Brian Komar is the president of Komar Consulting Inc. in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Komar has worked in partnership with Microsoft over the past three years as a subject matter expert on network security and Windows 2000 Active Directory design. Over the past year, Komar has spent the majority of his time researching the deployment of Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) and the various technologies that depend on a PKI to provide authentication and encryption services. Between writing assignments, Komar speaks at industry conferences around the world, such as WinConnections, MCP TechMentor, Microsoft Tech Ed, and the Microsoft Enterprise Conference (MEC). He is known for delivering the “under the hood” sessions that look at the details of technology and reveal how systems really work in a network.

Martin Kuppinger is Founder and Senior Partner at Kuppinger Cole and Partner. He has a long-year history in Identity Management, starting in the early days of Novell NetWare, LAN Manager at other network systems. He has written roundabout 50 IT books and uncounted articles in IT magazines. Beyond Identity Management, he has a strong background in application architecture and in many other of today’s most important IT topics like BSM, SOA, ESBs, and more.

David Lundell, ILM MVP (3 years running), is in his 4th year speaking at TEC, has delivered multiple preconference workshops, including “Identity All Up” which covered ILM 2, CLM, AD RMS, and AD FS. He has trained people from hundreds of organizations worldwide on how to implement FIM/ILM 2, ILM 2007 and SQL Server. Lundell has an MBA and a BS in Computer Engineering from the University of Arizona, where he was also a National Merit Scholar. His certifications include: MCSE, MCITP: Database Administrator, MCITP: Database Developer, MCITP: Business Intelligence Developer, MCSD and is also an author. As the Identity Management Practice Director for Ensynch he has designed and led several recent Identity Management projects including a full blown production implementation of FIM 2010, and is developing add-on reporting capabilities for FIM, and has also served as the SQL expert on several SharePoint implementations.

Craig Martin speaks in the third person when writing his own brief biography. He has been sync’ing for longer than he ever thought possible. He has also done work integrating ILM and CLM, spending countless hours weeding out issues in his lab environments learning CLM lessons the hard way in order to beat his chest in triumph and share his scars as lessons in a self-deprecating manner.

Daniel Meyer has over 20 years experience in software engineering, solution architecture, product management, technical sales and partner management working for companies like Netscape, IONA, Forté Software, ILOG, iPlanet and most recently Sun Microsystems focusing on different fields like Enterprise Software Architecture, Solution Design, Integration/Interop, SOA, Enterprise Portals, Security and Identity Management. Daniel has an extensive breadth and depth in many Architecture and Security/IDA related areas covering many enterprise platforms and technologies. Daniel is a professional speaker, board member and organizer for events & conferences. Daniel holds a first class MBA in Computer Science. In his current role as a CATM Enterprise Technology Architect, he is the lead for Identity&Security in EMEA, he works closely with customers, partners and Microsoft Corporate and leads field readiness, partner solutions and competitive efforts in EMEA.

Jeremy Palenchar is a Director at Avanade, Inc. where he focuses on Directory Services and Identity Management. Palenchar is responsible for the planning, design, and implementation of Directory Service and Identity Management solutions for Avanade’s Fortune 500 clients. He is a Microsoft Certified Architect in Directory Services and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Engineering from North Carolina State University. He lives and works in sunny, downtown Seattle.

Brian Puhl is an Architect on the Microsoft IT Identity and Access Management team. He started with Microsoft in 2001, as an Active Directory engineer, and has recently been delivering solutions around MSIT’s adoption of cloud services.

Ulf B.Simon-Weidner is a senior consultant with a European provider for infrastructure solutions in Germany. He also is an independent author, consultant, speaker and trainer. He has been repeatedly awarded MVP for Windows Server – Directory Services. Throughout his professional career, Simon-Weidner has had many consulting engagements with major European corporations, mostly in the financial sector. His certifications include Microsoft Certified Trainer and Microsoft Certified System Engineer (Security) for all Operating Systems since NT4.

Hugh Simpson-Wells has spent the past 25 years in the IT sector, in technical roles as well as serving at senior management and board levels within public and private companies. He originally started Oxford Computer Group (OCG) in 1983 and in 2002 restarted OCG with a specialization in the area of Identity and Access Management (IDA). Since that time he has focused on the development and presentation of ILM and related material, as well as IDA consultancy and training for business and technical audiences worldwide.

Now in is his fourth year as an ILM MVP, Brad Turner is a project-oriented veteran of the Information Technology industry. He has taken a lead technical role in successful projects for large government and education entities, as well as mid-sized and enterprise corporations. His areas of expertise include enterprise, directory, and identity management architecture, systems integration, as well as domain and systems management. Brad’s solutions have won several worldwide partner awards.

Dean Wells has been working in the information technology industry since 1987. His roles and experience have been varied and include software development, training, systems security consulting and enterprise-systems design & implementation. Wells has been training and presenting for about 15 years and has hosted hundreds of technical training courses for end-users and Microsoft technical staff alike. He is also a commonplace speaker at popular industry events such as NetWorld Interop, TechEd and the Directory Experts Conferences. He has been working with Active Directory since its inception, and earlier in various beta releases, since 1999. A few years later, Wells was awarded Microsoft’s MVP designation in Directory Services and Security. Most recently, he joined the Directory Services product group at Microsoft where he now works as a Senior Program Manager.