Zones Welcome and Keynote Panel

Unleashing The Power of Technology: Join Our Dynamic Keynote Panel! 

Take your business to new heights in the digital age with our must-attend opening keynote session. Yugal Joshi and Deepak Purohit will share practical strategies for overcoming challenges and optimizing resources in this ever-evolving landscape.

Say goodbye to cost pressure and slow demand. Gain greater returns on your investment and create immersive digital experiences. Come away equipped to build a sustainable business that thrives in the digital era. Don't miss out on this exciting opportunity to unlock the full power of technology. Sign up today and turn your challenges into opportunities for success!

Yugal Joshi

Business Leader of Technology Services, Everest Group

Yugal Joshi spearheads the developing and expanding digital cloud services and platforms by overseeing a team of analysts conducting client engagements and publishing research. As the business leader for technology services research and advisory memberships at Everest Group, Yugal has provided invaluable guidance to top-tier buyers and technology solutions and services providers. He has helped these organizations in various areas, including developing technology adoption strategies, assessing key market trends, devising effective go-to-market strategies, providing competitive insights, analyzing market positioning, and charting the expected future roadmap.

Deepak Purohit

Vice President of Advance Solutions, Zones, LLC

Deepak Purohit was named VP and GM of Solutions and Services at Zones in October 2019. Purohit plays a strategic role in the services organization, leveraging Zones’ supply chain strengths to transform service delivery. Leading a team of highly talented architects, Purohit provides executive support for strategy and execution to streamline Zones’ solution offerings and simplify customer service, working with top OEM partners.

His background is deeply rooted in solutions, specifically focusing on large global business and service transformations. Before joining Zones, Purohit served as SVP for Strategic Engagements at Birlasoft, a consulting services firm with Fortune 500 clients. Previously, he held several consulting positions in the IT industry, including Head of Enterprise Solutions Practice at Infosys. Purohit holds an MBA from XLRI, India, and a BE in Production Engineering from the College of Engineering, Guindy, India.

Enhance Employee Experience with Zones' Digital Workplace Services

With remote work here to stay, and the need for flexible work arrangements and digital workplace solutions have become essential for businesses to provide their employees with the tools and resources needed to work efficiently and effectively. Join us and learn how Zones' Digital Workplace Services, powered by HP, offer a comprehensive suite of solutions that enable employees to work from anywhere, on any device, while maintaining high levels of productivity and security. These services include device management, security services, collaboration tools, and more.

Explore how Zones and HP can provide you with cutting-edge technology designed to meet the needs of modern workplaces while offering expert support and guidance to ensure a seamless implementation. With Zones' Digital Workplace Services, businesses can enhance employee experience, increase productivity, and drive growth in an increasingly competitive marketplace.

Presented by Zones and HP, Inc.

Josh McLaughlin

Solutions Architect, Zones

Josh McLaughlin is a Digital Transformation Solutions Architect at Zones with more than ten years of experience modernizing workplace operations in Retail, Utility, Hospitality, and Commercial business units.

Mirela Cunjalo

Solution Architect, HP, Inc.

Maximize your Business Potential with Cloud

When you leverage Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) workloads and Microsoft Surface devices, your company can create a digital workplace that is flexible, scalable, and resilient. Cloud computing has become an essential tool for businesses of all sizes. It enables you to access powerful computing resources on-demand and at a lower cost than traditional on-premises infrastructure. SaaS workloads, in particular, offer a range of benefits, such as easy scalability, automatic updates, and flexible payment options. By adopting SaaS workloads, you can save time, reduce costs, and improve efficiency.

Microsoft Surface devices offer a range of features and capabilities that can further enhance the digital workplace. These devices are designed to be lightweight, portable, and versatile, making them ideal for use in various settings. They also offer advanced security features like biometric authentication to protect sensitive business data. Walk away from this breakout session with a deeper insight into how SaaS Workloads can maximize your business potential in the cloud!

Presented by Zones and Microsoft Surface

Daniel Kristek

Solution Engineer, Data Recovery Specialist, Zones

Daniel has been in the IT industry for more than a decade. He has competency in several key areas, including network administration. In his time with Zones, Daniel performed as a member of our Help Desk team and served as a project engineer.

Daniel’s specialty is in the backup disaster recovery (DR) field. Prior to Zones, Daniel worked as a Backup Disaster Recovery (DR) Specialist at Network Management Group, where he successfully created and deployed continuous backup solutions. Daniel used his expertise to build the Backup DR department from the ground up and secure monthly recurring revenue to sustain profitable business growth year over year. 

Cory Calcut

Sr. Solution Engineer Professional & Technical Services, Zones

Optimize Your Device Lifecycle

Learn how device lifecycle management is a critical aspect of IT operations, as it involves managing the entire lifecycle of devices from procurement to disposal. Proper management of device lifecycles can help you save money, reduce environmental impact, and ensure data security. ITAD solutions, in particular, are designed to help businesses manage the end-of-life process for their IT assets. These solutions can help companies properly dispose of old devices while ensuring that sensitive data is securely wiped before disposal. Additionally, ITAD solutions can help businesses recover value from old devices through refurbishment and resale.

Take a deep dive into Zones ITAD services and learn how to optimize your device lifecycle in today's ever-evolving technology.

Presented by Zones and Lenovo

Rhonda Bednar

Solutions Architect, Zones

Apple's Modern Experience

Managing and supporting devices can be complex, particularly as businesses look to optimize device lifecycles, security, and user productivity. This is where IT lifecycle services, such as those provided by Jamf, come into play. Discover how Zones and Jamf provide various IT lifecycle services that help businesses deploy, manage, and secure their Apple devices at scale. These services include device provisioning and deployment, configuration management, software and patch management, security and compliance, and end-of-life device management.

By leveraging Jamf's IT lifecycle services, businesses can ensure that their Apple devices are optimized for productivity, security, and user experience. These services enable companies to automate routine IT tasks, simplify device management, and reduce the risk of security breaches and data loss.

Presented by Zones, Apple, and Jamf

Aaron Hockett

Chief Architect, Office of the CTO, Zones

Based in Portland, Oregon, Aaron Hockett has worked across multiple industries over the last 18 years, including High Tech, Health Care, Education, Telecom, and Retail manufacturing.  His passion is to identify key points of where technology and business intersect to drive towards acceleration of a company's digital business transformation.  Innovation is his daily mandate to bring fresh insights to your ways of working. 

Kat Garbis

Senior Strategic Evangelist, Jamf

Kat has worked in the Apple ecosystem for 10 years, supporting organizations of all sizes. At Jamf, she focuses on helping partners and enterprise organizations find success with their Apple fleets and offers consulting on how to best integrate Apple into their larger infrastructures. Prior to joining Jamf, Kat worked for an organization that was a Jamf customer, and she previously worked for Apple as well. She's seen the evolution of Apple devices as well as enhancements in Apple for enterprise, and she works to stay on top of the changes in the market to keep her partners and customers informed.

VMware Backup on Azure 

We know that managing virtualization technology and protecting your environments can be complex, particularly when migrating workloads between servers or cloud platforms. Hear from our experts and discover what backup and recovery solutions provide a range of tools and services for workloads, including support for backing up virtual machines running on IaaS. Enable your business to protect its virtualized workloads and ensure that data is recoverable during a disaster or data loss event.

In addition to backup and recovery, Zones with Azure and VMware provide various tools and services for server migration, including Site Recovery. With minimal downtime and disruption, this service enables you and your business to migrate on-premises workloads to Azure or between Azure regions. Learn how you can optimize and protect their IT environments by leveraging VMware backup on Azure and server migration tools like Azure Site Recovery. These technologies enable companies to easily migrate workloads to the cloud or between cloud regions while ensuring that critical data is backed up and recoverable.

Presented by Zones

Best Practices Offloading Your Managed Services to a Service Provider

At Zones, we understand that managing IT infrastructure and services can be complex and resource-intensive for businesses with limited IT staff or expertise. As a result, many companies are turning to service providers to offload their managed services, including cloud-managed services. Cloud-managed providers offer various services, including cloud migration, infrastructure management, security, monitoring, and support. Offloading these services to a provider allows you to reduce your IT overhead, free up resources, and focus on core business objectives.

However, offloading managed services to a provider can also come with challenges and risks. It is essential for businesses to choose the right provider and to follow best practices to ensure a successful and seamless transition. Attendees will learn about the benefits of cloud-managed services, including increased flexibility, scalability, and cost-efficiency. They will also gain insights into common pitfalls and challenges to avoid when offloading managed services to a provider.

Presented by Zones

Manage Your Private Cloud While Taking Advantage of Your Opex

Discover how private clouds offer many benefits to businesses, including increased security, control, and customization over their IT infrastructure. However, managing a private cloud can also be resource-intensive and costly, particularly regarding capex expenditures. To address these challenges, businesses are turning to opex-based private cloud solutions, which allow them to pay for IT resources on a consumption basis. This approach offers increased flexibility and cost-efficiency, as you now only pay for the resources they use.

Dell private cloud solutions offer a range of tools and services for managing private clouds while taking advantage of opex. These solutions include Dell EMC PowerEdge servers, Dell EMC Unity storage, and Dell EMC PowerSwitch networking, all designed to work seamlessly together to provide a robust and integrated private cloud platform.

Presented by Zones and Dell Technologies

Kody Nguyen

Solutions Architect – Datacenter and Cloud Solutions, Zones

Kody Nguyen is a Data Center and Cloud Solutions strategist with 20+ years of experience in the IT industry.  He currently holds multiple advanced certifications from leading technology leaders, such as Microsoft and VMware.  As a Solutions Architect, he has a wide range of experience with Solutions Sales, Design, Implementation, and Support.  While at Zones, Kody has successfully completed a large data center migration project.  This was a multi-locations project that expanded across many countries, including the UK and Mexico.  Kody is also a new father who loves creating fun video content with his daughter to share on social media platforms.

Danny Mawn

Channel Sales Executive, APEX and Multicloud, Dell EMC

Server Migration 

Moving applications and data from one server to another, either on-premises or in the cloud, can be complex and time-consuming, particularly when migrating workloads to the cloud. Hear how Zones and Microsoft offer a range of tools and services for server migration, including Azure Site Recovery and Azure Migrate, designed to streamline the migration process and reduce downtime. You will also gain insights into comprehensive solutions for server migration to the cloud. These tools enable businesses to migrate IaaS workloads to Azure with minimal downtime and reduced risk while providing ongoing management and monitoring capabilities.

Presented by Zones and Microsoft

Daniel Kristek

Solution Engineer, Data Recovery Specialist, Zones

Daniel has been in the IT industry for more than a decade. He has competency in several key areas, including network administration. In his time with Zones, Daniel performed as a member of our Help Desk team and served as a project engineer.

Daniel’s specialty is in the backup disaster recovery (DR) field. Prior to Zones, Daniel worked as a Backup Disaster Recovery (DR) Specialist at Network Management Group, where he successfully created and deployed continuous backup solutions. Daniel used his expertise to build the Backup DR department from the ground up and secure monthly recurring revenue to sustain profitable business growth year over year. 

Prioritizing Your Security Roadmap

We are no strangers to the increased threat landscape and the rise of cyberattacks. Organizations must prioritize security to protect their sensitive data, reputation, and business operations. However, developing a comprehensive security roadmap can be challenging, mainly when dealing with limited resources and competing priorities. Discover the importance of security assessments in prioritizing your business's security roadmap. Security assessments comprehensively evaluate an organization's security posture, including identifying vulnerabilities, risks, and compliance gaps.

The session will cover best practices for conducting security assessments, including:

1. Identifying the scope and objectives of the assessment

2. Conducting a comprehensive review of systems, applications, and data assets

3. Analyzing and interpreting assessment results

4. Developing an actionable roadmap for addressing security gaps and vulnerabilities

5. Ongoing monitoring and reassessment to ensure continued security.

Gain insights into prioritizing security initiatives based on the results of security assessments. You will learn about best practices for developing a comprehensive security roadmap, including identifying critical assets and implementing security controls for the most significant risk reduction.

Presented by Zones

Utilizing Microsoft Sentinel in Your Cloud Security

With the increasing adoption of cloud services, it has become crucial for organizations to have a strong security strategy in place to protect their data and operations. Explore Microsoft Sentinel, a cloud-native security information and event management (SIEM) solution that provides comprehensive security monitoring and threat detection across the entire cloud infrastructure. Join us to learn about the benefits of utilizing Microsoft Sentinel in your organization's cloud security strategy.

• Comprehensive security monitoring and threat detection across the entire cloud infrastructure
• Integration with other Microsoft security solutions for improved threat intelligence and response
• Customizable dashboards and alerts for real-time visibility into security incidents
• Automated threat response and remediation to reduce time-to-resolution.

The breakout will also cover Zones' Security Operations Center as a Service (SOCaaS), which provides an outsourced, turnkey solution for managing security operations. SOCaaS enables organizations to benefit from the expertise of experienced security professionals without investing in expensive security infrastructure and resources.

Presented by Zones 

How to Align Your Security Controls 

In today's constantly evolving threat landscape, aligning your security controls with your organization's goals and objectives is critical to achieving adequate security. In this breakout session, attendees will learn how to align their security controls to reduce risk and improve their security posture, focusing on security compliance services. Security compliance services comprehensively evaluate an organization's security posture against industry standards and regulations, such as GDPR, HIPAA, and ISO 27001. These services help organizations identify gaps in their security controls and develop a roadmap for improving security posture.

During the session, you will gain better practices for aligning security controls with organizational goals and become equipped with the knowledge and insights to align security controls with corporate goals to achieve effective security. They will learn about best practices for integrating security compliance services into their overall security strategy, enabling them to reduce risk and protect their critical assets against advanced threats.

Presented by Zones 

Andrew Reese

Practice Head - Cybersecurity, Zones

Andrew is a security and compliance subject matter expert with extensive hands-on experience measuring, assessing, designing, implementing, improving, and managing information security management systems (ISMS) as well as cybersecurity programs.

He is well-versed in aligning organizational controls with legal, regulatory, and contractual requirements as well as business goals and objectives. Andrew also has consulting experience working with hundreds of organizations of all sizes and verticals, using industry best practices.

Ransomware Incident Response Readiness

Ransomware attacks continue to be a significant threat to organizations of all sizes and industries, and it is critical to be prepared to respond to these incidents effectively. In this breakout session, attendees will learn how to develop and implement an effective ransomware incident response plan, focusing on Zones security assessments and Cisco solutions. Security assessments are critical in identifying an organization's vulnerabilities in infrastructure, processes, and policies. They help organizations understand their security posture and recommend improving security controls.

Discover the different types of security assessments and how to leverage them to improve their ransomware incident response readiness. This session will also cover how Cisco solutions can help organizations prepare for and respond to ransomware incidents. Cisco provides various solutions that enable organizations to detect and respond to ransomware attacks quickly and effectively. You will learn about Zones and Cisco's ransomware defense solutions and, most importantly, how they can be integrated into your incident response plan.

Presented by Zones and Cisco