What to expect from Dell EMC World

This week the inaugural Dell EMC World conference takes place at in Austin Texas, with yours truly on hand to cover all goings on for IT Pro, as well as Channel Pro and Cloud Pro.

To say that this is the first Dell EMC World is rather strange - while true, this will be my third time in Austin reporting on an annual Dell conference, but this is the brave new post-mega merger world, so there is some validity in the pitch.

What to expect from this year's conference, then? Well some new Isilon servers have already been hinted at through official social media channels and Todd Pavone, EVP of product strategy and development at VCE (one of the many arms of the EMC Federation bought by Dell this time last year) said in a blog post that "the Converged Platforms and Solutions Division will be a critical part of the event", as well as hinting specifically at a PowerEdge server announcement. This is hardly a surprise - while converged hasn't exactly been a massive focus for Dell, it has been a key part of EMC's strategy.

Speaking of strategy, I personally expect an awful lot of talk about the new joint strategy for Dell EMC. This is, after all, the first major event being held by the new entity (although Momentum last week in London was a bit of a behind-the-scenes taster for those invited to attend). Go to market, channel plans, rebranding, whatever it is that's going on with what was Dell Software - expect to hear something on about all of this and more.

There will definitely be some cloud talk too. Expect plenty of references to hybrid cloud and, while I doubt Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella will be making an appearance again this year, name dropping Azure in particular wouldn't come as a surprise.

The main event kicks off on Wednesday at 3pm UK time with Michael Dell's keynote, but you can expect coverage from your intrepid reporter from Tuesday evening all the way through to Friday. Be sure to follow me on Twitter for live tweeting and, of course, bookmark our Dell EMC World page for all the latest news, announcements and analysis throughout the week.