BSA kicks of its 2011 CTO Forum today -- an annual series of meetings between some of the top technologists in software and computing and their counterparts in the federal government. Over two days, nine high-ranking technologists from BSA member companies will meet with 14 high-level technology decision-makers in the Obama administration to brainstorm ways the federal government can harness new innovations to do more with less in this era of tight budgeting.
This year's CTO Forum comes at a critical juncture in Washington -- a time when policymakers are eager for new strategies to capture efficiencies to help streamline government, spur economic growth, and create jobs. BSA member-company CTOs will offer specific ideas around three inter-related issues:
- Harnessing cloud computing to save money and transform the way the government does business. How quickly we reap the cloud's benefits will be shaped by decisions being made by policymakers today.
- Strengthening intellectual property protections to spur technology innovation. Reducing piracy is vital to the health of the commercial software industry and the broader technology ecosystem it powers.
- Utilizing IT to reduce energy consumption. Software can be a catalyst for simultaneously cutting energy consumption, creating jobs, and saving money.
In addition to sharing their unique expertise and insights in these areas, BSA members will be sharing a vision of how new technologies can continue transforming the economy in the short, middle, and long term -- and how policymakers can take practical steps to unleash technology's full promise.
Joining me for these important discussions will be a distinguished group of technologists from nine BSA member companies, including Jeff Kowalski of Autodesk, Bhupinder Singh of Bentley Systems, Greg Bodine of CA Technologies, Paul Czarnik of Compuware, Eric Martin of Intuit, Craig Mundie of Microsoft John Bates of Progress Software, Mike Fulkerson of Rosetta Stone, and Joe Pasqua of Symantec.
They will meet with US Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra, US Chief Information Officer Steven VanRoekel, US Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria A. Espinel, General Services Administration Associate Administrator Dr. David L. McClure, National Institute of Standards and Technology Director Dr. Patrick Gallagher, Advanced Research Projects Agency -- Energy (ARPA-E) Director Dr. Arun Majumdar, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Ambassador Philip Verveer.
We expect to have provocative discussions about some of today's most pressing technology issues. I will outline the substance of those issues in greater detail over the next several days.
This post was also featured on the Business Software Alliance's blog, BSA TechPost. The Business Software Alliance is a trade group that represents software makers against copyright infringement.