The APAC trip, the new CEO; a recap.

This always seems to happen;  I go out of town for a while and major things happen at Borland and now CodeGear.  First of all, let me recap my trip to the Asia/Pacific region.  I started by heading down to Sydney, Australia.  I flew out on Sunday, March 25th and arrived early in the morning on Tuesday, March 27th.  (It was a 14 hour flight... so what happened to my Monday ;-).  I spent the next day getting acquainted with the folks in the Sydney Borland/CodeGear office.

I met up with Malcolm Groves, who works out of that office. We then flew to Melbourne on March 28th and met up with Tim Jarvis.  I spoke at the ADUG Symposium the following morning.

After that, Malcolm and I caught a plane to Brisbane and did the same thing the following day.  You can see Marco Cantu at the far right in the first photo.  He had two sessions each day.

Then it was back to Sydney where I had that Saturday, March 31st to explore Sydney.  So I took the ferry across Sydney Harbor from Circular Quay out to Manley.  I got some good shots of the city, the famous Harbor Bridge (including some good shots of several groups of bridge climbing tour groups) and the famous Sydney Opera House.

Early the next morning I boarded a flight heading out to Tokyo, Japan.  Geez, there are Starbucks Coffee shops everywhere!

I also visited the Borland/CodeGear offices there in the Shinjuku district where I was staying.  Fujii-san and Yaegashi-san were both excellent hosts. They had lined up an interview with a local Delphi magazine, a customer visit and later that evening we had a very good dinner meeting with some Delphi community members.  I found it very interesting to speak through an interpreter.  You have to be very conscious of how much you've already said so that the interpreter doesn't get lost.

Once finished there in Japan, Malcolm and I then boarded a plane to Bangalore, India. We had to stop in Bangkok, Thailand to change planes so I got some photos of their new airport.

From there we landed in Bangalore, India.  That's a different world...  This is a photo from the hotel room, which was very new and modern.  The contrast between the two was remarkable.

Then there was the traffic!

Like Japan, I had a very full day with a customer meeting, met with members of the India Delphi Users Group (InDUG), and finally had two interviews with a couple of Indian IT magazines.  Arul, from the Indian office, did an excellent job of getting all of these events lined up.

A new CEO.

I had my first one-on-one meeting with CodeGear's new CEO, Jim Douglas (who is in the process of setting up a blog for himself, which is excellent news!).  Besides the fact that I'd been out of town when he started, it was actually good that I had my meeting with him just yesterday.  I was able to read all the press and various comments from the community.  I was able to ask some very hard and specific questions, like “what is your agenda?  Why did you take this job?  What are your long-term and short-term goals?  Are you in it for the long-term or is this just a stepping stone to something else?”  The good thing is that he didn't flinch at any of these very pointed questions and was very candid.  The good news is that he definately took this position with an eye for ensuring the long-term viability of CodeGear.  There is no “pump and dump” agenda here.  So far, I was duly impressed and appreciated his candor as well.  It will be good to hear what Jim has to say in his blog.

I was actually very disappointed when I got word that Ben was leaving.  However, after speaking with Ben the Friday before the announcement and thought about what had transpired over the last year, it was clear that CodeGear was entering a new phase of it's development.  Ben was key in setting CodeGear up and making sure the key positions are filled with the right folks.  But now we need a more of an operational leader that can help drive things that standpoint.  The good news is that Ben is still local and has offered to remain available in an advisory capacity.  His experience and insights will continue to be welcome.

Now that I've got my first international tour done, I'm eager to start visiting some of the other regions and meet even more folks from the community.  Hopefully my next trip takes me to the EMEA and/or South American regions.