Shawn Bass Independent Consultant and Blogger, ShawnBass.com
Presenting: Best Practices in SBC/VDI Environments, Part 2: OS Streaming and Optimisations with Pierre Marmignon

Shawn Bass, an independent consultant based in the Chicago area, is a Citrix Technology Professional and a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional. He’s been working with Citrix technologies since the WinView product days, and today, most of his clients are Fortune 500 companies (primarily in the financial services and insurance markets).

Shawn got involved in trying to help the server-based computing community around February 2005. Back then, he spent long hours lurking on a variety of forums and learning from others, so he decided it was finally time to give back to assist others. Since that time, he’s become an active poster on the support forums on BrianMadden.com, the official Citrix Support Forums, and Softgridguru.com.

Shawn is a 10-time (and top rated) presenter at BriForum, and has spoken at other worldwide events including Citrix Synergy, PubForum, and various Citrix user groups. He also continues to teach the independent desktop virtualisation 5-day master class that he and Brian developed back in 2004.

You can follow him on Twitter @shawnbass

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Vincent Branger Senior Consultant, infralys
Presenting: Case Study: A Private DaaS for 5,000 Users with Citrix Excalibur

After getting his Ph.D. in Computer Architecture in 1998, Vincent Branger worked two years as Project Manager for Prologue Software, the French ISV who implemented Windows NT 4 T.S.E. with Citrix and Microsoft. He then worked at Ozitem for six years as a System Integrator, creating and developing two consultancy centres based on his own expertises: Unix/Linux and SBC. Thereafter, Vincent became Ozitem’s CTO and managed up to 150 engineers and diverse projects of varying size and complexity. Currently (and since 2006), Vincent is a Freelance System Virtualisation Consultant at infralys and is very active in the French desktop virtualisation community.

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Jason Conger Solutions Architect, Splunk
Presenting: Customise all the Things! How to Brand Web and Windows UI and Mobile Enterprise Applications: FUIT or ITFTW (IT For The Win!) with Warren Simondson

Jason is a Citrix Technology Professional, Microsoft Most Valuable Professionall, and long-time presenter, technical writer, and open-source software developer. With over 17 years of experience, Jason has worked in the field as a Systems Integrator, System Architect for Citrix Systems and Director of Technology for a Citrix Service Provider. He is currently working at Splunk as a Solutions Architect.

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Rick Dehlinger CTO, nGenx Corporation
Presenting: Going Deep: RDP8/ RemoteFX Session Connectivity

Rick Dehlinger, formerly a founder and managing owner of Claros Systems (now part of nGenx) is currently the CTO atnGenx. Rick joined Citrix in 1999 as a Systems Engineer/Architect, and quickly became one of the most trusted and innovative technologists in the desktop virtualisation community. After a short stint at Microsoft, he built a focused, highly specialised desktop/application virtualisation consulting practice which has evolved over the last seven years into the service offering that nGenx delivers today. Rick is an active participant in the Citrix Technology Professional (CTP) Program, as well as a consistent supporter and presenter at a variety of industry events (including BriForum, Citrix Summit and Synergy, Geek Speak, and a variety of user group events around the world).

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Adnan Hendricks IT Infrastructure Architect, Microspecialist Consulting
Presenting: Smoothing the Kinks! A Seamless User Experience with Microsoft UE-V

Adnan Hendricks is an international Microsoft infrastructure consultant and Microsoft certified trainer with more than 20 year's experience that span all fields in IT. Implementing core Microsoft solutions such as the System Center suite of products and, his personal favourites, OS deployment and virtualisation. He often spends his time assisting and speaking at community events, as well as mentoring those new to IT.

You can follow him on Twitter @Microspecialist.

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Pierre Jean Senior IT Architect, BNP Paribas

Presenting: Case Study: A Private DaaS for 5,000 Users with Citrix Excalibur with Vincent Branger

Pierre is a Senior IT Architect in charge of desktop virtualisation for the BNP Paribas company in France. He has been working in the IT industry for over ten years. Prior to working at BNP Paribas, he was with SOGETI where he managed IT engineering and architecture projects close to virtualisation technologies for various companies such as Total, GDF-Suez, etc.

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Gabe Knuth Independent Industry Analyst and Blogger, BrianMadden.com

Gabe Knuth is an industry analyst and blogger, known throughout the world as "the other guy" at BrianMadden.com. In addition to blogging on BrianMadden.com (including being heard weekly on Brian & Gabe LIVE), he also contributes to SearchVirtualDesktop.com.

Gabe can be seen speaking at industry events such as Citrix Synergy and is a 10-time presenter at TechTarget's own BriForum.

Gabe has been in the application delivery space for over 13 years and has seen the industry evolve from the one-trick pony of Terminal Services to the application and desktop virtualisation of today. As a consultant early in his career, Gabe's exposure to many different types of technologies, organizations, projects, and processes continues to help him as a blogger/speaker. Fiercely independent, Gabe focuses on boiling off the hype and reducing solutions to their usefulness in today's corporate environments. Gabe Knuth has been a member of the TechTarget Editorial Speaker Bureau since its formation in 2012.

You can follow him on Twitter @gabeknuth

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Nico Luedemann CEO, bluecue Consulting GmbH & Co. KG
Presenting: An Expert Guide to Delivering Seamless Remote Applications Through Citrix and Microsoft Technologies with Benny Tritsch

Nico Luedemann has been working in IT since 1994 and has been the CEO at bluecue consulting GmbH & Co. KG (formerly the Systems&Services business unit at acocon GmbH) since 2013.  His main areas of expertise include corporate consulting, lecturing and public speaking with particular focus on the centralisation and virtualisation of IT systems. He is well known in these areas as a much-demanded specialist thanks to a series of IT projects involving Microsoft Server System, Citrix Delivery Center and general network optimisation products. In addition to his main work, he is also author of books (all in German) on Citrix XenApp, XenDesktop, Microsoft SoftGrid/App-V and has written a number of articles in specialist magazines. Nico is also a Microsoft Most Valuable Profressional (MVP) and Citrix Technology Professional (CTP).

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Brian Madden Independent Analyst, Blogger and Author, BrianMadden.com

Brian Madden is known throughout the world as an opinionated, super technical, fiercely independent desktop virtualisation expert.

He's also written several books and thousands of articles about desktop and application virtualisation. His blog, BrianMadden.com, receives millions of visitors per year and is a leading source for conversation, debate and discourse about the application and desktop virtualisation industry. Brian Madden has been a member of the TechTarget Editorial Speaker Bureau since its formation in 2012.

In addition, Brian is the creator of BriForum, the premier independent application delivery technical conference.

You can follow him on Twitter @brianmadden.

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Jack Madden Bloggerr, BrianMadden.com

Jack Madden writes about everything related to enterprise mobility management at BrianMadden.com. He was the editor of ConsumerizeIT.com (now a part of BrianMadden.com) and has also contributed toSearchVirtualDesktop.com. Jack is the co-creator of the Consumerization Nation podcast, and has spoken at BriForum, Citrix Synergy, and other events throughout the US. Jack was a co-author of The VDI Delusion, and his book Enterprise Mobility Management 2013 will be published this April.

Jack Madden has been a member of the TechTarget Editorial Speaker Bureau since its formation in 2012.

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Tim Mangan Kahuna, TMurgent Technologies
Presenting: What's New in Microsoft App-V 5

Tim Mangan is the Founder of TMurgent Technologies. Prior to launching TMurgent, Tim was with many software and/or hardware companies including Softricity, Sync Research, Teleglobe, and ComputerVision. Somewhere in between he also did consulting work. At one point he was also the President of the Frame Relay Forum, an international consortium of Communication Carriers, Vendors, and Users. Tim speaks at many conferences and has been awarded by Microsoft as a Most Valuable Profressional for Application Virtualisation and by Citrix as a Citrix Technology Professional.

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Pierre Marmignon CTO, Norskale
Presenting: Best Practices in SBC/VDI Environments, Part 2: OS Streaming and Optimisations with Shawn Bass

Pierre is known as one of the very top European experts for application and desktop delivery, a field he has been working in since 2003. He has been successfully creating and subsequently running the Citrix departments for two Citrix platinum partners, creating and managing the teams that have delivered the Citrix environments now in use across a number of French Fortune 100 companies.  Pierre is a well-respected desktop virtualisation expert and a leading voice in the technical community across Europe and the United States.  His reputation has been based on these successes as well as his creation of automation scripts and tools that industrialise Citrix integration and management.  These tools are in production today within thousands of organisations. He also runs the popular community website CitrixTools.ne (now part of www.Norskale.com) and is a regular contributor to BrianMadden.com and other cutting edge technical websites .Pierre has been named a Citrix Technology Professional (CTP).

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Jim Moyle Lead Solutions Architect, Atlantis Computing
Presenting: How the New Storage Improvements in vSphere 5.1 Help Your Desktop Virtualisation Project and The Future of Desktop Deployment: What's Happening with MCS & PVS, Plus an Alternative with Aaron Parker

Jim Moyle is an infrastructure technologist with almost two decades of passionate involvement in the IT industry. Over the last 10 years, he has been a specialist in the server based computing (SBC), application and desktop delivery sector. He has worked with many blue chip companies around the UK, including involvement in the architecture and delivery of some of the largest Citrix farms in Europe. As the Lead Solution Architect for Atlantis Computing in EMEA, he is responsible for the design and execution of many world class projects for this Citrix Platinum partner. Jim also enjoys speaking at various industry events such as BriForum, E2E and Citrix Synergy. You can find him sharing knowledge on his blog at www.jimmoyle.com, on Twitter @jimmoyle and on the Citrix IRC Channel.

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Mike Nelson Architect, nGenx Corporation
Presenting: Clash of the Client-Side Hypervisors: Windows 8 Hyper-V and VMware Workstation and Hyper-V for VMware Administrators: A Crash Course

Mike's IT career spans over 23 years, involving all different kinds of technologies. He has been a BriForum speaker since 2008 and his roles in corporate management to industry consulting provide him with a wide range of hands-on experience. Mike has a strong passion for virtualisation, both from a technical and visionary point of view. For the last 10 years, his focus has been on the SBC area, with major projects in VDI and virtual consolidations. He has served as an expert advisor for the Citrix Education team on Netscaler technology, and is also an active VMware VCP and VMUG Leader. He writes articles for TechTarget Web publications, such as SearchVirtualDesktop.com.

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Aaron Parker Solution Architect, Kelway
Presenting: The Future of Desktop Deployment: What's Happening with MCS & PVS, Plus an Alternative with Jim Moyle 

Aaron Parker is a Solutions Architect with 18 years of experience in the IT industry. He's spent most of that time in desktop and application delivery with various solution providers. Since 1999, most of that time has been spent on projects for server-based computing, desktop virtualisation and, more recently, application and user virtualisation. Aaron is currently working for Kelway where he is involved in deployments for private and public sector clients including Fortune Global 500 companies. You can find him contributing to the AppVirtGuru.com and theTechNet App-V forums,blogging at stealthpuppy.com, tweeting on occasion (@stealthpuppy), speaking at events such as BriForum or even contributing to technical books.

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Claudio Rodrigues CEO, WTSLabs
Presenting: From Zero to RDS 2012 Hero: Learn All the New Features and How They Compare to XenApp and What Still Holds Up as a Citrix Best Practice 12 Years After MetaFrame Tuning Tips?

As the CEO at WTSLabs Inc., Claudio provides strategic direction and vision for the company. Claudio is also an active consultant and architect and specialises in Server Based Computing and Windows architectures. He is the author of many technical articles on the subject and has been working with enterprise class environments for more than 14 years, mostly in North America, South America and Europe. Claudio is also the BriForum GeekOut Master Champion having won it three times in a row, and for that reason, is banned from it by Brian himself.

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Thorsten Rood Principal Architect and Team Leader of Application Networking, net.workers
Presenting: Demystifying the Citrix Mobility Stack: The Next Layers of Cake

Thorsten is an IT veteran with two decades of experience in systems engineering, is a Citrix Technology Professional (CTP) and is certified as MCSE and CCIA. He has implemented large-scale installations for worldwide companies in several different industries. Currently he is the Principal Architect at net.workers corporaiton, and Team Leader for Application Networking Business, which includes technologies like Citrix NetScaler, Repeater and XenMobile. He has been an active speaker at BriForum, Synergy and more.

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Warren Simondson Senior Systems Architect and Founder, Ctrl-Alt-Del IT Consultancy
Presenting:Mobile Enterprise Applications: FUIT or ITFTW (IT For The Win!) with Jason Conger

Warren Simondson is the Senior Systems Architect and Founder of Ctrl-Alt-Del IT Consultancy. The company is well known for the CAD Freeware Util Pack, a collection of over 30 Freeware utilities that have been written to assist IT professionals extend the functionality and management of Terminal Server and Citrix Environments. Since 1996, Warren has been solely committed to thin client solutions, using his background as a programmer and school teacher to share his knowledge of Citrix and Terminal Server environments, and to deliver his freeware utilities to the world community. Warren’s primary focus in his professional life is to help those around him, demystifying the illusion of IT and sharing as much knowledge as possible to the wider community. In 2012, Warren was honoured to receive the Citrix Technology Professional (CTP) award from Citrix Systems.

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Ruben Sprujit CTO, PQR
Presenting: An Insider's Guide to Virtualisation: A Virtual Reality Check, 2013 Edition with Jeroen van der Kamp, The Bento Box Bliss of Enterprise Mobility with Peter Sterk and VDI Smackdown 2013!

Ruben Spruijt is CTO of PQR and focuses primarily on enterprise mobility, virtualisation and cloud management. He is actively involved in determining PQR’s vision and strategy. Ruben is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP), Citrix Technology Professional (CTP), VMware vExpert and is also the only European with these three virtualisation awards. With his expertise, he is able to give customers sound advice, motivate his colleagues and write blogs, articles and opinion pieces on a regular basis. Through his presentations in several national and international congresses, Ruben shares his thoughts and knowledge on application and desktop delivery, and on virtualisation solutions. If you have feedback or questions for Ruben, send him an email at rsp@pqr.nl or follow him on Twitter @rspruijt.

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David Stafford, Director of New Markets and Technology, VMware
Presenting: What Got Us Here Won't Get Us There: Today's IT Needs to Get with the Times

Making his second BriForum speaking appearance, David Stafford is possibly the 2nd most passionate person on the planet when it comes to end-user technologies.  Having focused exclusively in this space for the last 18 years professionally, he has held IT roles from sysadmin to lead architect managing 100K+ user/device environments as well as spending time in business development and product management at a pair of amazing technology companies. He joined VMware in 2010 and is currently the Director of New Markets in the CTO office for End User Computing where he gets to help imagine, invent and share his excitement about future possibilities for where this industry is heading. You can follow David on Twitter @dstafford

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Peterk Sterk Solutions Architect, PQR
Presenting: The Bento Box Bliss of Enterprise Mobility with Ruben Sprujit

Peter Sterk is a Solution Architect at PQR. In this position, he supports customers with any technical challenge they may encounter, following PQR’s credo, ‘Simplicity in ICT’. Although he is primarily focused on enterprise mobility and application and desktop delivery, Peter is also able to oversee and advise on other components in IT infrastructures. Peter is very active in communicating the vision of PQR on such topics at various national industry events.

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Benny Tritsch Director of Technical Community, AppSense
Presenting: An Expert Guide to Delivering Seamless Remote Applications through Citrix and Microsoft Technologies with Nico Luedemann

Benny Tritsch is a virtualisation technology evangelist, IT system architect, market analyst and author, working as Technical Director and member of the Office of CTO at AppSense. Over the last few years, he has published many technical articles and several best-selling books, such as "Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Terminal Services" (Microsoft Press). Benny is a frequent speaker at leading international events such as Microsoft Tech-Ed and Citrix Synergy. He has received the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional award for RDS since 2004 and e Citrix Technology Professional (CTP) since 2006. If you want to know more about Benny's activities in the virtualisation community, check out his website at www.DrTritsch.com or follow @drtritsch on Twitter.

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Jeroen van de Kamp CTO, Login Consultants
Presenting: An Insider's Guide to Virtualisation: A Virtual Reality Check, 2013 Edition with Ruben Sprujit

Jeroen van de Kamp is the CTO for Login Consultants where he’s responsible for defining and executing their technical strategy and innovation. From the start, he has played a critical role in the technical growth and accreditation Login Consultants has accumulated over the years.

Jeroen has developed several core solutions which allow Login Consultants to easily differentiate in the infrastructure consulting market including, Solution4, the “Virtual Session Indexer” (Login VSI).  He is also responsible for several well-known publications such as the Flex Profile Kit, TCT templates and the famous “Project Virtual Reality Check”. He has become a residential speaker for virtualization seminars around the world including Citrix Synergy, Microsoft Tech-Ed, VMworld and BriForum. Jeroen is also a member of the Citrix Technology Professional program.

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Ment van der Plas IT Architect, Login Consultants
Presenting: Implementing App-V 5: Lessons Learned from a Production Rollout

Ment van der Plas is working as an IT Architect at Login Consultants, an international independent consulting company based in the Netherlands. He is specialised in designing, implementing and migrating large and complex infrastructures, including the process of defining an application delivery strategy. Besides his role with customers, he is also a Microsoft Certified Trainer, teaching a variety of classes around application virtualisation and system management. Apart from working in the field, he writes technical content for a range of websites and magazines and is a regular speaker at national and international technical seminars. He has been rewarded with the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional award since 2009 on Application Virtualisation (App-V).

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Carl Walker Senior Consultant, deploythis, Ltd.
Presenting: Automated Migration of a User from Physical to Virtual, with Data, Using System Center Configuration Manager

Carl Walker has well over a decade of experience in desktop deployment using Microsoft technologies such as App-V and ConfigMgr. Carl can credit his vast knowledge in desktop deployment to his dedicated work ethic — he doesn't just fit the technology to deploy new operating environments, he also hangs around to make sure the deployment goes well (which is often where the real work is).

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Carl Webster Owner, Carl Webster Consulting
Presenting: More Things in AD That Can Hurt Your Applications and Desktop Virtualisation Efforts and How to Fix Them and Show and Tell: Webster's Adventures into Documenting with PowerShell

Carl Webster is an independent consultant with over 35 years of IT experience. Webster has been working with application and desktop virtualisation since 1990 and with Active Directory since 2001. He also holds the prestigious Citrix Technology Professional designation.

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Jeff Wouters Technical Consultant, Methos IT
Presenting: PowerShell: How to Manage Your Environment with CIM Instead of WMI

Jeff Wouters (B ICT, MCITP, MCSA, MCSE) is a freelance Technical Consultant from The Netherlands with a main focus on automation, virtualisation and high availability. He has 8+ years of experience in the IT industry in which he worked at a variety of companies, such as a retail company (fashion), system integrator, consultancy firm, software vendor and has started his own company Methos IT in 2011.

His focus lies in automation and high availability through virtualisation/ delivery and deployment of applications, desktops and servers using Microsoft and Citrix products by using technologies such as virtualisation, redundancy, clustering and replication. This wide area of expertise enables him to design, implement and troubleshoot the entire stack of an IT infrastructure. Jeff is also a founding member of the Dutch PowerShell User Group.

Jeff is an active Twitter user (@jeffwouters), blogger (JeffWouters.nl) and speaker at IT events about topics related to his focus area.

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Nicki Wruck IT Architect, H&D International Group
Presenting: Licensing Your "Pandora's Box" of Mobile Devices

Nicki Wruck works as a Technical Evangelist with more than 12 years of IT experiences and at least the same amount of community presence. Formally known as “Officer Wruck,” he’s the founder of ice-Lingen, a community event for IT experts known across Europe as the biggest, costless summit that brings together some of the most valued and most wanted speakers. When he’s not connecting IT pros, he has a focus on questions and challenges about cloud strategies and licensing in virtual environments. Nicki is also a member of the Citrix Technology Professional program.

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