I have been a Veeam Vanguard for six years and Veeam Legend for just over a year and was fortunate enough to have attended the VeeamON 2017 event in New Orleans and VeeamON 2022 in Las Vegas, which was fantastic.
Being a Vanguard is a real honour, and many people ask me when they see my Veeam Vanguard jacket or shirt - What is Veeam? My answer is a typical one - it is backup software for your infrastructure for now and the future, leading to a conversation around technology, backups, and many other things.
This year's VeeamON 2023 event was in Miami, which I attended in person, and it was amazing. Besides the great weather and hotel, there were many sessions, networking, a VeeamON playground with the Veeam Community Booth, Lab Warz, Hands-on-Labs and the legendary swag shop.
Attending VeeamON is one of the best events if you want to learn more about backup and what Veeam is all about. From user sessions to networking and training, this event is packed with something for everyone. Thanks to the #Veeam100 program I am part of, we had the luxury of attending VeeamON 2023 in Miami at no cost. What an amazing gesture from @Veeam
VeeamON 2023
From the General sessions and keynotes to the breakout sessions, there was much to see and hear from Veeam.
Day 1
Monday was technically the first day of the conference, where you could register and retrieve your badge. There was also a Day 0 session with Michael Cade on Kubernetes & Kasten, which I could not attend but heard was great from those who did. It was also my day with my good friend and fellow Vanguard Al Rasheed to conduct Veeam Community Booth duty. Veeam was also gracious enough to purchase 20 of my newest book, Mastering Veeam Backup & Replication Third Edition (v12), which I signed and handed out to lucky attendees.
That was pretty much it for day 1 as I travelled with my family to the conference, and we took extra vacation afterwards, so it was time to hit the pool with them.
Day 2
The day started out with an early breakfast with some fellow Vanguards then it was off to attend the General Session at 9:30. This was the welcome and innovation session for what was coming with Veeam.
There were many speakers for the general session as well that we heard from.
There was also a shoutout to the #Veeam100 from Anand in the general session -
From here, it was time for breakout sessions and the Tech Festival, where the vendors were located. I was able to attend some of the sessions that I picked out, but every year, there are always so many that overlap it is hard to choose, so this is why you can catch all of them again online at the VeeamON website - VeeamON 2023 - Miami. I attended the sessions that I found relevant and what I wanted to learn on day 2, including a great session by our very own Vanguards - Jim Jones & Falko Banaszak, on Architecting Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365 - AMAZING session! There were many other speakers from #Veeam100, but I could not attend all the sessions. Congratulations to all those that had sessions and represented the Veeam Community!
Day 2 wrapped up with the Tech Festival happy hour, and there were draws from vendors for prizes.
Day 3 - Last Day
The conference's final day again started with a nice breakfast on the terrace in the very hot sun. It was a little too warm, to be honest, so inside it was to the wonderful air conditioning.
There were many more breakout sessions and the second General session on this day. On the last day, another really great session with Rick Vanover, Hannes Kasparick, and Christoph Meyer - All Demo Session for the Hardened Repository. The session was all demo and used the new ISO that Veeam is working on for deploying the hardened repo for users.
The last day also includes the famous VeeamON party, but this year I decided to skip that and join Al Rasheed with our families at a great eating place - Taco Taco.
So that wraps up another great VeeamON event in Miami. If you have the chance to attend a VeeamON even I highly recommend it as it is a great place to learn about technology, backups, Veeam and network with peers. One of the best events of the year, hands down!
While most were set to travel home on Thursday and Friday, my family and I decided to stay longer and visit Orlando and Universal Studios. It was a great day on my birthday there and the following Monday. One last picture from a truly great event and vacation.
