IMI and Natural Bridge Technologies Partner with Hinchcliffe & Company to Bring World-Class Web 2.0 University Events to the Greater Cincinnati region

May 31, 2007; 03:04 AM
The Infrastructure Management Institute (IMI) at Northern Kentucky University (NKU) and local consultancy Natural Bridge Technologies today announced a partnership with Hinchcliffe & Company, the acknowledged worldwide leader in Web 2.0 education and consulting services, to bring Hinchcliffe’s Web 2.0 University™ program to the Northern Kentucky / Greater Cincinnati Region for the first time. These unique and highly-acclaimed training events will be hosted at the NKU METS Center in Erlanger, Kentucky on June 19-20, 2007, and have already been attended by over 1,200 professionals worldwide. Shorter versions of Web 2.0 University courses have also been selected as exclusive pre-conference workshops by major industry conferences including Web 2.0 Expo, AjaxWorld, Enterprise 2.0, and INTEROP.

Two separate intensive one-day courses will be offered. The Web 2.0 Bootcamp™, on Wednesday, June 20, provides business and technical leaders alike with a solid overview of the latest Web 2.0 trends. It offers actionable enterprise strategies that leverage Web 2.0 to grow online revenue, build competitive advantage, improve customer interaction, and drive product innovation.

The companion Ajax Bootcamp™ on Tuesday, June 19, offers Web and application developers a deeper dive into Web 2.0 technology. Working hands-on with the leading Ajax frameworks and tools, attendees learn the latest design patterns and best practices need to create leading-edge Rich Internet Applications (RIAs).

“The Infrastructure Management Institute is proud to bring these ground-breaking events to the Greater Cincinnati region,” said Tim Ferguson, Executive Director of the IMI. “With a recent McKinsey study showing that Web 2.0 has now become mainstream, enterprises must transform their business models to integrate Web 2.0 concepts in order to remain competitive. Bringing the industry’s pre-eminent Web 2.0 training events to the region presents a great opportunity for every area enterprise to learn from the experts and accelerate their Web 2.0 knowledge and adoption.”

Rich Hempel, Managing Partner of Natural Bridge Technologies, stated: “There is intense interest in Web 2.0 from businesses across every size and market category. From firsthand experience, I know that Dion Hinchcliffe and his Web 2.0 University represent the leading edge of thought leadership in these technologies, and we’re delighted to play a key role in sponsoring these events locally.”

Further information about the events as well as online registration is available by visiting http://web20university.com.

About IMI:

The Infrastructure Management Institute (IMI) provides a collaborative platform for organizations and individuals to assist in technology assessments, professional development and training, business continuity planning, IT security implementation and best practice adoption. The IMI offerings are delivered through coordinated resources including IMI staff, IMI partners and Northern Kentucky University’s College of Informatics faculty and students.

For more information on the Institute, visit IMI’s website at http://imi.nku.edu . To learn more about NKU’s College of Informatics, visit http://informatics.nku.edu .

About Natural Bridge Technologies

Natural Bridge Technologies, based in Northern Kentucky (Greater Cincinnati), is a provider of IT consulting and services, including a domestic IT outsourcing offering to U.S. based organizations at rates up to 25-45% less than comparable resources in metropolitan areas. The company specializes in the areas of Web 2.0 services, SAP consulting and implementation, and custom software development. As a domestic alternative to overseas IT outsourcing, the Natural Bridge Technologies business model leverages the wealth of untapped human resources in rural areas who are teamed with seasoned IT professionals to provide IT services to clients, regardless of location, while having a positive economic development impact in the communities from which we operate our Regional Development Centers.

For more information about Natural Bridge Technologies and the benefits of a domestic IT outsourcing model, visit the company’s corporate website at http://www.naturalbridgetech.com.

About Hinchcliffe and Company

Hinchcliffe & Company is the acknowledged leader in Web 2.0 education and consulting services to help organizations worldwide transform their products, services, and processes to fully exploit Web 2.0 concepts and technologies. The company’s premier Web 2.0 University training events are offered regularly in key cities across the U.S. as well as in London, England. It also recently launched the Enterprise 2.0 TV Show, a Web-based video series focused on the application of Web 2.0 to business.

The company is headed by Dion Hinchcliffe, a key industry leader and visionary in Web 2.0, Enterprise 2.0, and social networking. In addition to consulting directly with key clients, he serves as editor-in-chief for both the Web 2.0 Journal and AjaxWorld Magazine; writes hugely popular blogs for ZDNet and SYS-CON; and presents and chairs tracks for many major industry conferences.

The company’s corporate website is http://hinchcliffeandco.com. Information on Web 2.0 University events can be found at http://web20university.com, and the Enterprise 2.0 TV Show site is http://e2tvshow.com.

Web 2.0 University, Web 2.0 Bootcamp, and Ajax Bootcamp are trademarks of Hinchcliffe & Company.