UBM TechWeb and UBM Studios Executives Share Insights on Digital Strategies at Virtual Edge Summit

SAN FRANCISCO and CHICAGO, Jan. 4, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- UBM TechWeb's CEO, Tony Uphoff and UBM Studios Vice President, Kathleen Connolly, Senior Vice President, Kristin Beaulieu, andVice President Digital Strategy, Michael Kushner, will present at the Virtual Edge Summit, which will take place at the San Diego Convention Center January 8-11, 2012. 

The Virtual Edge Summit is a premier event that provides marketing, meeting and learning professionals with the opportunity to learn first-hand from the most experienced producers of virtual events, meetings and online communities. In addition, Virtual Edge Summit is co-located with Professional Convention Management Association's (PCMA's) Convening Leaders conference, a conference that assists meeting planners capture innovation for their meetings and events.

On Monday, January 9 at 10:30 a.m., Connolly and Beaulieu will present "Choosing Your Digital Engagement Tool."  From Webcasts to virtual trade shows and interactive environments, there are a host of digital tools to drive engagement. In this session, Connolly and Beaulieu will analyze all of the digital options and discuss the ones that best fit business objectives.

On Monday, January 9 at 1:15 p.m., Uphoff will participate as a panelist on the Virtual Edge Institute General Session.  Entitled "The Great 2012 Digital Debate," the session will highlight if virtual exhibits will be a part of a business strategy moving forward; the best measurement of ROI for your virtual engagements; and how to prepare for the future of virtual events and environments.  Other panel participants include: Larry Cook, Manager, Events and Digital Metrics, IBM; John H. Graham, CAE, President and CEO, ASAE: The Center for Association Leadership; Tony Lorenz, Founder, bXb Online; David Rich, Senior VP, Strategy & Planning, Worldwide, George P. Johnson; and Kathy Visser-May, US Marketing Channels and Analytics Director, Microsoft.

On Tuesday, January 10 at 9:00 a.m., Kushner will present "Virtual's Next Stage – Going Beyond Events."  This session will showcase the broadening use of virtual solutions and will highlight the new digital solutions available including partner/member briefing centers, 365 "evergreen" environments, product roll-outs, virtual road shows, career & recruitment events, editorial updates and tablet directories with interactive content.  

Uphoff is an innovative media executive with a unique track record of building, growing and leading B2B media businesses in highly competitive markets and has been at the forefront of media innovation and transformation for the last 20 years.  Uphoff has the distinction of having been a leader of three of the top five B2B brands in history all at the peak of their reach, revenues and profits; InformationWeek, The Hollywood Reporter and PC Week. He served in several key management positions at Ziff-Davis Media during the build out of the company in the late 80's and early 90's. He then joined CMP Media as publisher of InformationWeek leading the brand to the # 1 position in the market and ultimately into one of the largest brands in B2B. Uphoff also served as divisional VP and President during CMP's dramatic growth in the mid 1990's from a $200 Million privately owned company, to a $600 Million, publicly traded, global leader in technology media. He was the founding CEO of the Internet media company Beliefnet, which was sold to News Corp in November of 2007 and he also served as President of VNU Media's Entertainment Group and Publisher of The Hollywood Reporter. Named one of the top 100 business media executives by B2B Magazine's "Who's Who in Business Media" 2006-2011, "Top Media Innovator" in 2009 by Media Business Magazine and "Folio 40, C-Level Visionary" by Folio Magazine in 2011. He is a regular speaker on media, marketing and technology trends at industry and association conferences including; The "Folio Media Conferences," The "Milken Global Conference," The "LA RoadShow," The "Association of Media and Entertainment Attorneys," "Jive World Conference," PricewaterhouseCoopers "Outlook Conference," Media Post "Outlook 2008," "Inverge" and The American Business Media Conferences, SISO Conferences. He has also been guest lecturer on "Leading Internet Businesses," "Managing High Growth Environments," "Technology and Financing in Film" and "Digital Transformation" at Columbia, Emory, NYU and USC's Annenberg Business Schools.

Connolly is responsible for business development and consultative services focused on leveraging virtual environments to engage with audiences all of types. Connolly has 20 years of sales and management experience in IT media and events.  Most recently, Connolly was the Strategic Director with Everything Channel where she worked with leading Channel Chiefs to help meet their Channel objectives from strategy to recruitment and enablement to demand generation. She is an expert in blending the right products and services to suit the unique needs of each client.  Prior, Connolly held both sales and management positions with Internet Week, InformationWeek, and Network Computing. Connolly earned a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration with an emphasis in International Marketing from California State University at Fullerton and received a certificate from the Leading and Managing People Program from Columbia University's Graduate School of Business.

With more than 15 years of experience, Beaulieu has a track record of significantly growing revenue in both the virtual media and publishing markets.  Beaulieu held a variety of positions at Ziff Davis Media; most recently, she was Senior Vice President at Ziff Davis Enterprise – Event Sales. While at Ziff Davis Media, Beaulieu created and built a $6M virtual event business - eSeminars; led the company's International Licensing group; and launched PCMagCast, a virtual event business created specifically for PC Magazine's audience.  In addition, Beaulieu held several positions with InXpo where she implemented virtual event business strategy and managed key publishing and enterprise accounts including Tech Target, Red7 Media, ZDE, Bank of America and EMC.  Earlier, Beaulieu held key marketing positions with several dotcoms. 

Kushner has a track record of significantly growing revenue and profit by monetizing content/information through innovative, interactive delivery platforms in both domestic and global markets.  Kushner led the streaming media business for the Business Media division of the Nielsen Company where he oversaw a $3m+ business that produced over 150 webcasts, 200 event videos and 20 virtual expos and conferences.  Additionally, Kushner launched Reed Business Interactive at Reed Elsevier and produced one of the first enterprise virtual trade shows as an extension of a trade publication. He also pioneered ads webcast series, trade show video and video product showcases as media extensions, building a multimillion dollar business.   Kushner was also founder of Virtual Media Strategies, a consulting firm that develop ancillary lines of business integrating print, on-line, events and custom media, transforming one-dimensional products into multimedia brands.  

For additional information on UBM Studios, contact Max Gerstein at 773 687 4317 or [email protected].  For additional information on UBM TechWeb, contact Natalia Wodecki, PR Director at 415 694 9413 or [email protected].

Follow UBM Studios on Twitter (http://twitter.com/UBMStudios), Facebook, or LinkedIn for all the latest news. To follow UBM TechWeb on Twitter visit http://twitter.com/techweb, to follow on Facebook, visit
http://www.facebook.com/pages/TechWeb/30907765509?ref=ts and to follow on LinkedIn, visit http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=115886&trk=hb_side_g.

About UBM TechWeb (www.ubmtechweb.com)

UBM TechWeb, the global leader in technology media and professional information, enables people and organizations to harness the transformative power of technology. Through its three core businesses – media solutions, marketing services and paid content – UBM TechWeb produces the most respected and consumed brands and media applications in the technology market. More than 14.5 million business and technology professionals (CIOs and IT managers, Web & Digital professionals, Software Developers, Government decision makers, and Telecom providers) actively engage in UBM TechWeb's communities and information resources monthly. UBM TechWeb brands include: global face-to-face events such as Interop, Web 2.0, Black Hat and Enterprise Connect; award-winning online resources such as InformationWeek, Light Reading, and Network Computing; and market-leading magazines InformationWeek, Wall Street & Technology, and Advanced Trading. UBM TechWeb is a UBM plc company, a global provider of news distribution and specialist information services with a market capitalization of more than $2.5 billion.

About UBM Studios (www.ubmstudios.com)

UBM Studios is a global leader in interactive digital events, environments and communities transforming the way audiences connect, educate and engage.  UBM Studios offers a complete global marketing service from content and audience to creative and analytics creating world-class user engagement. For additional information on UBM Studios, visit www.ubmstudios.com.

SOURCE UBM Studios; UBM TechWeb