Recapping Google Atmosphere Sydney & Tokyo: What We Learned

Taylor Gould is BetterCloud’s VP of Marketing. Follow Taylor on Google+ here.

This year, BetterCloud was invited to sponsor both Google Atmosphere Sydney and Tokyo, two events in a global series that aim to transform the way people work by helping organizations take advantage of technological advancements and cultural changes in the workplace.

Last month, I was fortunate enough to travel to both Australia and Japan to learn how these vastly different cultures embrace and implement technological change in their own ways.

Atmosphere Sydney

Atmosphere Sydney saw more than 1,000 attendees including some of Google’s largest Enterprise customers like Woolworths and Qantas Airlines. There were also nearly 100 Google Enterprise professionals and 100 business partner representatives in attendance. Clearly, there’s demand in the region for the services and technology Google Enterprise is providing.

The event’s keynote, delivered by Kevin Ackhurst, Managing Director, Google Enterprise, Australia and New Zealand and Maile Carnegie, Managing Director, Google Australia and New Zealand touched on a few key themes:

• The workplace has been and will continue to be disrupted and transformed by digital and mobile advancements
• Collaboration plays a crucial role in increasing workplace productivity and can even have a substantial impact on a country’s GDP
• Technology is undergoing intense personalization and people expect interactions with workplace technology to be just as personalized

For BetterCloud, the experience of actually traveling to Australia and meeting our customers and partners in this region face to face was unbeatable. It’s clear from Atmosphere Sydney that the region is extremely excited about Google Apps and Google Enterprise’s extensive offerings and we look forward to expanding our efforts and investment down under.

Atmosphere Tokyo

Atmosphere Tokyo, which took place just a week after Sydney, spanned two days and was host to more than 3,000 attendees. The Tokyo event emphasized the growing need and desire to establish a “work-life balance” and a national push to get there. And throughout the event, various presentations and demonstrations showed how Google Apps could be just the key due to its focus on mobile-first and ability to allow users to work virtually, anywhere at any time.

Beyond Apps, Atmosphere Tokyo attendees showed interest in a wide variety of Google Enterprise offerings including Chromebooks, Cloud Platform, Maps, Geo and more. Google Enterprise has really penetrated the region and as such, it’s a mission of BetterCloud’s going forward to work more closely with prospective and current Japanese customers and partners. We were especially amazed at the reach of our Google Gooru site. Even non-English speakers who visited our booth recognized the Gooru’s tilted grin and signature blue glasses.

Speakers at the event (and participants in an excellent dance routine that we’ve chosen not to publish on YouTube for now) included Amit Singh, President, Google Enterprise, Shinichi Abe, Managing Director, Google Enterprise, Japan, Chris Farinacci, Senior Director of Global Enterprise Marketing at Google, and Rahul Sood, Managing Director, Google Apps and Enterprise Search at Google. Executives from key customers such as Fujifilm, Kubota and Benesse Holdings also spoke (but were excused from the video).

Final Thoughts

Sponsoring Atmosphere Sydney and Japan this year really opened our eyes to the immense adoption of Google Apps and Enterprise products outside the US, as well as the sophistication of the Google Apps ecosystems in these regions. It’s clear that Google and their partners have made great headway in the enterprise, and with continued focus on Apps and new offerings springing up all the time (Chromebox for Meetings comes to mind), Google is disrupting the IT infrastructures of organizations around the world. We’re looking forward to sponsoring Atmosphere events in other regions and aim to continue to deliver a product that meets the need of our global audience.