Pax8 To Hold Inaugural Global Partner Conference In 2023

Speakers include NFL superstar Peyton Manning; Francessca Vasquez, vice president of customer experience and technology at Amazon Web Services; Jim Lee, vice president of U.S. global partner solutions and sales at Microsoft; and Lucia Milică, resident chief information security officer at Proofpoint.

Denver-based Pax8 is kicking off its first-ever conference in 2023 with hopes to empower partners “and really show them what the future of possibility can look like,” the cloud distributor’s top channel executive told CRN.

“We do tons of community events with our launch briefings, mission briefings and boot camps, but we really want to center on bringing our global partner conference together, and our industry as well,” Jennifer Bodell, SVP of channel, Americas at Pax8, said. “There’s tons of events that go on in the channel today, but this will be for our partners that are committed to elevating their business to the next level.”

The inaugural Beyond 2023 conference, with the theme of “One Community, Infinite Innovation,” will be held June 11-13, 2023, at the Gaylord Rockies Hotel in Denver. The distributor expects to have 1,500 attendees at the event, including 1,000 MSPs.

[Related: Pax8: There’s ‘Huge Growth’ For MSPs In Small Business, Cloud]

The biggest focus will be the company’s partners and overall community and making sure executives are listening to their desires, needs, wants and challenges, Bodell said.

Pax8 originally had plans for a conference in 2020 but it was put off due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The one thing we always hear from our partners is the education that we provide is outstanding,” she said. “So we want to elevate even what we’re doing from our events and bring it to Beyond.”

While there will be breakout sessions, trainings and education, Bodell said the conference is focusing on community and innovation, which feeds into the conference’s theme.

“Community is kind of where my heart lives,” she said. “It’s about our partner base. It’s about building more than just the community. For me it’s relationships. It’s showing our partners how much we care… we’re listening. And then the innovation is really about not just Pax8 per se but about our partners, where they can go. They could potentially utilize some of those training aspects to tap into some resources, verticals, industries, partners and vendors that they haven‘t even thought about.”

Along with training and education, the event will also offer thought leadership, access to industry-leading vendors, networking opportunities and a preview into the future Pax8 marketplace.

Speakers include NFL superstar Peyton Manning; Francessca Vasquez, vice president of customer experience and technology at Amazon Web Services; Jim Lee, vice president of U.S. global partner solutions and sales at Microsoft and Lucia Milică, resident chief information security officer at Proofpoint.

Heather Simek, vice president of RJ2 Technologies, a Schaumburg, Ill.-based MSP, said the distributor has grown a lot since she became a partner in the last three years.

“The thing that I really like about Pax8 is their training, so I am really hoping that they stick with that model and offer some technical training alongside of [the conference],” she told CRN.