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WICxHelloAlice Launched Cloud Guides To Successfully Develop your As-A-Service Business

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The tech industry is full of possibilities. Especially nowadays that everything is migrating to the cloud. The pandemic caused a “digital transformation” revolution, and many companies had to think out of the box and develop new ways to keep functioning.

Microsoft, for example, experienced in two months the growth they expected to happen in two years. 

The truth is that cloud computing will keep growing fast in the upcoming years. And with that growth, the market size will also increase and get bigger.

Even today, cloud computing is an excellent opportunity (and tool) to create a business. The number of “as-a-service” businesses such as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), and Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) is increasing day after day.

At Women In Cloud, we’d love to invite you to access the free Cloud Solution Building Suite in partnership with HelloAlice.

HelloAlice’s mission is to ensure every entrepreneur in the New Majority has what they need to launch and grow their own small business adventure.

It contains a series of how-to guides to guide you through every step of bringing your cloud-based idea to life. It’s a great tool to get solid insight from the industry’s experts and tips and tricks to make your journey much easier.

Take a look at what you’ll learn from the Cloud Solutions Building Suite:

For more information, please visit the Cloud Solutions Building Suite. 

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Women in Cloud Announces the #EmpowHERAccess Inaugural Awards: Nominate Today!

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Today, Women in Cloud is thrilled to announce the first-ever #EmpowHERAccess Awards, a unique opportunity for entrepreneurs to recognize those who have facilitated their access and ensured business stability throughout the pandemic.

Women in Cloud (WIC) partners with M12 – Microsoft’s Venture Capital Fund to award those who have created access for women in tech to support their stability and recovery from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

#empowHERaccess is an annual digital advocacy campaign by Women in Cloud to generate greater economic access for women in technology. Launched in 2020, the campaign reached over 600K women all! This year, as part of the #empowHERaccess campaign, we at Women in Cloud invite you to join us in acknowledging and celebrating the many stories of pivot and perseverance during the global pandemic. The application ends on June 30, 2021. So start your nominations today!

Women in Cloud has created eight awards to recognize and commemorate these vital members of our community: 

  1. Digital Transformation Project of the Year Award: This award celebrates excellence in digital transformation through the cloud and AI technologies. This award is sponsored by Microsoft Corporation. 
  2. Cloud Solution of the Year Award: This award sponsored by Insight, celebrates the cloud solution that most successfully innovates through the use of cutting-edge cloud and AI technologies as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. 
  3. Supplier of the Year Award: This award celebrates companies who have managed to be accessible to female entrepreneurs during the recent epidemic and have increased their supplier ecosystem to accommodate their diverse needs.  
  4. Advisor of the Year Award: This award celebrates the advisors and mentors who have continued to support women entrepreneurs during the COVID-19 pandemic by unlocking their rolodex, volunteering their time, and sharing their knowledge. 
  5. Investor of the Year Award: This award celebrates investors who continued to provide economic access to women entrepreneurs during the pandemic by investing $1M+ into women-owned or led technology businesses. 
  6. Innovative Partnership of the Year Award: Sponsored by Accenture, this award celebrates companies that have partnered with women technology entrepreneurs to co-sell their solutions into the enterprise ecosystem. 
  7. Cloud Technology Deal of the Year Award: Our Cloud Technology Deal of the Year will be notable for creating new partnerships, coalescing resources, or injecting funds into innovative cloud businesses. This award is sponsored by Meylah Corporation. 
  8. Women in Technology Outstanding Leadership Award: The award recognizes outstanding contributions to the cloud industry by an individual. Our Outstanding Leader will be an industry leader whose creativity, passion, and innovation are driving the space forward—someone who embodies cloud excellence. M12 – Microsoft’s Venture Fund sponsored this award. 

We welcome you to nominate organizations, suppliers, advisors, investors, and women technology leaders and help us recognize powerful force contributing to your success in the technology industry. Those chosen will be honored at an Award Ceremony on July 16th during the WiCxInspire event. 
Important:

1. Organizations and initiatives can nominate themselves!

2. Nominations are open until 30-Jun-21. Learn more!

3. This year’s award ceremony will be on July16th, 2021 during the WiCxInspire Event

For information on the #EmpowHERAccess Inaugural Awards, click here. 

The countdown begins! 

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How to Scale and be Valuable in the Competitive Industry of Technology?

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I have faced unimaginable challenges as a female minority Engineer, Inventor, and Small Business Owner, but maintained the right attitude and stayed-the-course that led me to victory. I have been ignored, rejected, and pushed into the rubble of non-existence, but I maintained an exhilarating presence in the community as I continued to polish my skills and expertise, to remain relevant to the new trends of technology. My inspiration ignited during the 2020 Microsoft Inspire Conference as I attentively listened to the motivational presentation of Gavriella Schuster.  I was truly inspired to learn how she faced her challenges and embraced her victories.  I immediately connected with Gavriella Schuster through the online portal, after her presentation, of which she in-turn introduced me to Chaitra Vedullapalli and the Women In Cloud community. Since my membership with Women In Cloud, I have been extremely elated to be among such an elite group of women in tech.

The Women in Cloud community opened the door wide open for me to participate, collaborate, and contribute to the growth of women in the technology industry. With this opportunity, I hope to make the following achievements:

  1. I desire to break down the barriers that many Women in Cloud may experience with regards to rejection; non-inclusiveness; prejudging their ability to deliver robust solutions; and not receiving adequate resources to deliver exceptional products and services that would validate their value and worth. While this problem is bad among many women in tech, statistics prove that the problem is worse among female minorities in tech.
  2. I hope to show the Women In Cloud how they can remain valuable, even when faced with fierce opposition.
  3. I desire to empower and inspire our youth to embrace innovation, along with obtaining a heart and passion that is needed to maintain value and competitive advantage.
  4. I desire to partner with Women in Cloud to make a notable investment in the less fortunate communities that hold great value. Talented and smart women have been buried by the system due to lack of resources, opportunities, and the prejudging of their ability to deliver exceptional products and services. I hope to change the image with how many women in tech are seen and embraced as second class citizens, to being embraced as valuable, profitable,  and key players to the team. 

Furthermore, I would like to collaborate with Women in Cloud and push for policy advancement in the following directions; 

  1. Representation: A policy that would yield percentages in lieu of ratios, meaning that a percentage of women are required to occupy various roles and leadership positions within organizations.
  2. Equal Access: A policy that would ensure that women receive the same resources as men to build their businesses and products.
  3. Mentorship: A policy that would encourage men and women of great power and leadership to mentor at least one woman per quarter, allowing them to sit on boards of successful companies, to learn how to operate a successful business.

I think every single person needs to be given a fair chance to explore technology. Collective Power means to unify different skills, abilities, and resources, to achieve that common goal; inclusion and economic opportunity.  But how do you stay at the top of your game?

I invite you to attend my talk at the Women in Cloud Digital Summit 2021 if you can identify any of the following:

  • Rejection
  • Your contribution to the team/project was not taken seriously
  • You were talked over / You were not heard
  • Your suggestion/recommendation was not considered
  • You were made to feel like you didn’t belong to the group or department
  • A male team member took your idea and made it seem as though he conceived the idea
  • You were given the menial work rather than the tech work 
  • You like being a woman, but you are a beast (force to be reckoned with) when it comes to tech
  • How to achieve your goal(s) when surrounded by male chauvinist men
  • How to be great in tech  and not make the men feel inferior to you
  • How to deliver an exceptional product/service as a collective team
  • Haven’t experienced any of the items that are listed, but would like to sit in my session to hear what I have to say

Through this talk, I want to educate and help women navigate the roadblocks to increase their value and worth. The three key takeaways would be;

  • Learn how to embrace the culture, without losing your identity
  • Learn to deliver greatness, without intimidating your peers with your abilities
  • Learn ways to be a team player and recognize the team for their contributions

While many women have faced horrific challenges, we are also women who will embrace great victories. This session will help you get one step closer to your victory.

“Soon after the completion of Disney World, someone said, ‘Isn’t it too bad that Walt Disney did not live to see this?’ Mike Vance, Creative Director of Disney Studios replied, ‘He did see it. That’s why it’s here’. Vision is seeing the invisible” – Johnathan Swift

Your vision will drive you. Come join me at the Women in Cloud Digital Summit 2021; bring your vision and unlock access to achieve that vision through collective power. 

Book Your Spot today with a 15% discount, and get on board to witness the Collective Power of Women in the technology industry from around the world! 

I highly recommend the following Interactive Experiences for you to participate in and expand your network: 

  1. 28 January: Learn about Tech Industry at their opening plenary with Former Prime Minister of Canada, Rt Honorable Kim Campbell and Corporate Vice President Gavriella Schuster 
  2. 28 January: Explore Cloud Jobs at #CloudJobs Fair & Recruitment Lounge
  3. 28 January: Meet Black Founders
  4. 29 January: Master your pitch at #RockYourPitch Experience
  5. 29 January: Get access to mentorship from Cloud Industry leaders
  6. 30 January: Get your kids to participate in Youth Mentorship Circle
  7. 30 January: Make New Friends at Scavenger Hunt 

Also, join WIC Digital Network to be part of the global economic access movement.

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Women in Cloud Accelerator – Class of 2018

On March 2nd, Women In Cloud Accelerator was launched with the Class of 2018 participants.

We congratulate and extend a warm welcome to the following companies who were qualified and attended the immersion session:

  • Clever Databases
  • Stylyze Inc.
  • Plantmatch, LLC
  • RightSciences
  • Daysaver
  • Agile Impact Group
  • Bitlume Inc
  • Computing Kids LLC
  • genneve
  • Automaton Marketing Inc.
  • Red Sky
  • Visual Media Group, DBA

The Women in Cloud, an organization dedicated to fostering women-led businesses to leverage cloud solutions and services to inspire their success and growth, launches their new Accelerator Lab.  The Lab is an immersive 6-month program to assist women-led companies to start and build their businesses with Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Microsoft distribution channels.

“Super excited to accelerate our business and learn more about how we can learn from the Cloud and improve our business proposition, and I hope to get more clients,” said Amelia Neighbors, from Clever Databases.

The Accelerator Program has proven methodologies, resources, and tools to grow a business in the Cloud.  What is “Cloud”? According to Microsoft, “cloud is the delivery of computing services-servers, storage, databases, networking, software, analytics, and more-over the internet, the cloud”. What is it about Cloud computing and why is it so popular? The Women in Cloud Accelerator Lab, answers these questions and coaches women-led businesses, who want to accelerate their B2B solutions using Cloud Computing. The Accelerator Lab includes a 1-day workshop, targeting coaching, free migration to Azure, up to “100 hours of interactive training to discuss strategy, lead generation, co-selling, deal negotiation and pitch preparation”, and much more.

Feedback from the participants of 2018 Class:

“When successful women come together great things happen. Red Sky is thrilled to be part of Women in Cloud Accelerator program sponsored by Microsoft, HPE and hosted by Meylah. This is the missing link for our growth and boost in revenue leveraging the Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program and secret sauce of the mentors. This is a huge opportunity for us to build our cloud business and utilize the support of these great partners along this exciting journey.” Sharon A. Davison, Ph.D. CEO Red Sky

“For the first time, I can see tangible ways to leverage the expansive networks of Microsoft and HPE to take my business to a B2B audience. They’re helping me visualize what a go-to-market cloud partnership looks like to grow my business.” Jill Angelo, CEO of genneve

“The journey to building a business in the cloud requires both a willingness to learn new ways of thinking about our business and a deeper understanding of the opportunities available.” Rebecca Ralston, CEO of Agile Impact Group

 

Gretchen O’Hara, VP Go-To-Market Strategy, One Commercial Partner at Microsoft, and one of the driving forces and founders of Women in Cloud, declares,  “We are deeply committed from Microsoft on this initiative, one of the things I am very excited to announce, is I have been working personally to get a Microsoft Executive assigned to each and every one of you as a mentor and advisor of this incubator, and I have been able to accomplish that.”

To learn more about Women in Cloud and the Accelerator Lab, go to www.WomeninCloud.com

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