ISV Talks
ISV Talks
How A Smaller Crowd Sparked Bigger Conversations At Acumatica Summit
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ISV Talks: Acumatica Summit 2026 Recap
In this ISV Talks podcast episode, I sit down with Sal Buonocore, Marketing Director at Presales Leader, for a candid conversation about our experience at Acumatica Summit 2026 in Seattle, WA. After a week shaped by weather delays, full keynotes and break out sessions, and in-depth conversations, we wanted to capture our own reflections on what truly stood out.
We walk through the moments that defined the week for us: the strength of the community, the learning opportunities, the product vision Acumatica shared for the year ahead, and the announcements that sparked the most discussion. From leadership changes to the new Ascent 2026 partner training program, we share the main takeaways that impacted us the most.
If you’re looking for a candid, firsthand recap of this year’s Acumatica Summit, this conversation is a great place to start.
Watch the full episode here 👉 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_xbFtAzrKs
Welcome to this episode of ISV Talks. I'm Kara Livingstone from Dynamics Connections and your host of ISV Talks. And welcome back, Sal. You've been on our podcast before, but I'm excited to have you back today. So welcome.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you. Thank you. Glad to be back.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So, Sal, why don't you introduce yourself?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Yeah. So my name is Sal Bunicore. I am with PreSales Leader, which is part of the Technology Leader Company's family. And what we do at technology leader companies is we have fractional subscription-based services that can help your Acumatica reseller practice or your ISV solution scale and growth. So we have our bread and butter pre-sales leader that does pre-sales as a service for bars and ISVs. We have a business consulting practice as well that helps with implementations and optimizations. And then I spend a lot of time on the marketing side of stuff. So we just actually, since last time I've been on the podcast with you, we've rebranded and restructured the marketing side of our business. And it's called full stack marketing now. I'm helping run that. And we provide marketing services, everything from fractional agency work to little things, whether it's some videos, some blogs, some graphics, some logos, anything that falls in that big marketing umbrella we can help with. So that's where I live. So I've been in the Acumatica channel for just over two years now, and getting a lot of my experience within that, with marketing for people within the channel, but also doing some ISV partnerships as well and helping ISVs grow within the channel, connect with Acumatica resellers, help them kind of figure out how to grow and kind of roadmap their solution a little bit. So that's been my exposure is specifically with the ISVs and within Acumatica.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I know some ISVs that I work with too, mutual clients of ours. Yeah. So are kind of in this together. So we're here today to talk about Acumatica Summit 2026, what just happened in the month of January. Do you want to tell us the location and dates?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, at least as of the recording of this, it was just last week, which it feels as if it wasn't that long ago. So that was January 25th to 28th, and we were out in Seattle, Washington for the first time, which was a lot of fun. Previously, it's been in Vegas for I don't even, it's been a long time that we've been in Vegas for the Acumaticus Summit.
SPEAKER_00:Six years, six years there.
SPEAKER_01:So I I think all of us were ready for a switch for a change there. I agree. And Seattle, Seattle was wonderful. I gave, I gave too much dirt to Seattle leading up to it because I was kind of like, who wants to go to Seattle in January? That sounds cold and wet, gross. Who wants who wants to go to Seattle? But I'm sure we're gonna hit it in a second. But Seattle was wonderful compared to the rest of the country while we're we're out there. Being an east coaster myself, I was beyond happy to be out in Seattle while everyone back home on the east was getting hit with Seattle. That's good.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we actually had the best weather going on in the whole country across the nation. Yeah. Seattle was great. And and you got to explore downtown and the waterfront a little bit, hopefully.
SPEAKER_01:I I did, yeah. So it was my first time out in Seattle, which was super cool. And nothing against Vegas, but casino life isn't really where I spend a lot of my free time. So I what I loved about Seattle was in the free time I had out at Summit was getting to explore the public market, getting to see all the different coffee shops and bakeries that were around. I I don't want to necessarily call myself a foodie, but I enjoy food anytime I can find it. And just getting to check out all these cool restaurants and such, I I loved it. Seattle was great. If you're a sports person, the Seattle Seahawks played in the NFC Championship game on Sunday when we were out there. So getting to be in the city with that excitement and hype and getting to see all the Seahawks jerseys around that day was really cool. So yeah, Seattle ended up being a really cool place as far as what this the city has to offer. The weather was beautiful the whole time we were out there.
SPEAKER_00:I was also saying I grew up in Seattle, so I'm like, okay, bring your rain jacket because it'll certainly be gray and it'll certainly be wet. So we lucked out and we had a little sunshine. And on the Seahawks, they won the the championship there in Seattle at the Lumen Stadium. And I rode the Amtrak train because I live in the Northwest with a whole bunch of people wearing jerseys and crazy hats and all kinds of things. So the Northwest was really behind that. So you're right, there was a lot of excitement downtown.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, it was cool. And even the convention center, first time we were in the Seattle Convention Center, new new building for us. And it was beautiful, phenomenal space, a lot of space. I'm sure some of that attendance being a little bit lower because of some weather difficulties, but beautiful space, beautiful venue. I love walking into the main keynote center and having that whole wall of glass open right when you come in and the beautiful view of the city. You're able to catch it.
SPEAKER_00:It was a glass wall on one side, yeah. And that's where the stairs and escalators went up to the floors. And so yeah. So, yeah, so the Seattle Convention Center has been there a long time. It hosts trade shows, corporate events. They built this separate annex, so it's about a block away from the original Seattle Convention Center. This building's called the Summit, which actually fit well with the Summit. And it was a new venue in general. A lot of people haven't been there for events yet. So we got to experience, yeah, it was definitely a cool place. And that the whole Northwest theme, the totem pole outside, the wood. Yeah, it was it was really cool. What do you think the actual attendance or expected versus actual ended up being? Do you have any?
SPEAKER_01:That's a good that's a good thought. The number I heard getting thrown around while I was there about the ex original expected attendance was in the 6,000 range, which is huge. Wow. I don't think we were close to that. Yeah, I think we were closer to maybe that three, somewhere between two and three thousand people there. So with that, obviously, people can't do anything to adjust the weather when you get snowed in and flights get canceled and such. So it it happens, but I think that created a really cool atmosphere though. It kind of made the convention center feel bigger than it needed to. There's a lot of extra space there. Oh, there's tons of room that we could grow into at the convention center. But I think what made it really cool was because there was less people there that we were able to have more richer, deeper conversations with the people we were able to talk to. So I I comparing this year in Seattle to last year in Vegas, I felt it was quick, short conversations I was able to have with people, even if it was someone at a booth that I was talking to. Yeah. And it felt I had to keep going and get to the next one because someone else was behind me waiting to have that conversation. Yeah. But this year I didn't feel rushed with the conversations I was able to have. It was more casual and relaxed kind of atmosphere, and just being able to catch up and get to know people that way, I felt was more productive and more relational. So I while I'm bummed a lot of people weren't able to make it out. It was kind of a good thing in in disguise, at least for my part, getting to have a lot of conversation with a lot of great people.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. A lot of people that did attend got there a little bit early, had this hint that hey, you might want to get an earlier flight and get there a little earlier. And then some people still struggled and got there late. I think I still was meeting people, I think it was Tuesday, maybe Tuesday afternoon that had just got there. Oh no, that's too bad.
SPEAKER_01:But yeah, there was one of the ISVs that I felt so bad for that I got to connect with. There was one of one of the ISVs who had a booth. There was just one guy there by himself the whole time, and he was so lonely. And I was catching up with him and talking, and the company actually was gonna send out two or three people to be at the booth, but the other two guys got snowed in and weren't able to make it out, and they didn't have anyone else last second to come fill in. So the poor dude had to run the booth all by himself the whole show. And I was like, Oh man, I feel so bad for you.
SPEAKER_00:I know I talked to another booth where she was kind of the same thing, but people ended up showing up, but yeah, some people had to be the whole team. What what do you think? Well, I guess it's kind of unfair to say what's the comparison to attendance the prior year, but kind of different venue said it felt bigger, more spread out. So it's hard to gauge. I've had people ask me, what do you think about attendance? And I'm well, if I had to guess, it was probably pretty similar, but it's hard to know because it was a new place.
SPEAKER_01:And yeah, I I was I was thinking on that too, and comparing the win in Vegas to the convention center, I I felt this the convention center felt bigger. And I don't know if it was because it was slightly less attendance than they were expecting that gave that feeling. But with the wind, yes, you have the big ballrooms for the marketplace and for the keynotes, but to get to everything else, it's all through more tight, narrow hallways and you're twisting and turning. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So that's true.
SPEAKER_01:Vegas felt tighter and more condensed, while Seattle felt some more room and that the conventional center was almost too big for what we needed. But again, weather delays makes it hard to yeah, room for growth, but weather delays, yeah, makes it hard to kind of judge that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, in terms of the people that didn't get there or canceled their registration or whatever, it was about 25 to 30 percent. So that that's a pretty big hit with a conference this size. We'll we'll get to see next year. But yeah, I mean, I think there was a couple times where everybody kind of came out of the keynotes and we're all trying to get on the escalators and it was a little crowded then because you use the escalators primarily to go up and down. Some people use the stairs, but I didn't.
SPEAKER_01:It's okay, I didn't either.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, well, I was telling about this one. This is like a five-story or six-story building. It's pretty amazing, right? And then the glass wall, when you go up that escalator, you can kind of see outside and you get to the top and you're above the rooftops of the nearby buildings. So pretty cool.
SPEAKER_01:That's a lot of steps to walk. So yeah, the escalator was nice.
SPEAKER_00:Do you have any idea how many sessions there were this year?
SPEAKER_01:I'm honestly not positive. Yeah, I I heard a lot of good things from the sessions. So there was a lot of people that I talked to that really enjoyed and learned a lot coming off the sessions, but I don't know. I didn't make it into so we had the marketplace floor, we had the session floor, and then we had the keynote floor, and I didn't get a lot of time in the session floor.
SPEAKER_00:Well, yeah, I I did, and I don't know if you stayed. I stayed through Wednesday. They had more breakout sessions still, and I did attend a few, and they were still pretty full. I went to a session on tariffs, and then probably 85 people. I mean, it was pretty full.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So the the sessions that I was looking at was a lot of good timely information that you for your what you brought up, the tariffs. Yeah, anyone having to do anything with distribution or shipping, that's huge right now. There's a lot of AI conversation happening and practical, tangible use. That was kind of the big theme I feel for for the conference was how does AI work and actually support and provide real-time automation and help there? So a lot of great breakouts within AI around AI and how that works within the system as well. Yeah. I'm so diving into some Excel functionality pieces that they kind of talked about too, and expanding on some of that announcement stuff they shared within the keynote too.
SPEAKER_00:Great. So the overview of the three days, then we'll talk about the keynotes because I think there's some more to talk about there. Yeah. It started on Saturday, right? There was the hackathon.
SPEAKER_01:And then how was it kind of the over I'm I'm gonna leave the hackathon alone because there's I'm not a def developer guy, and those some of my friends who were able to do that said it was great. They crush it, but they're talking stuff that I don't fully understand. So we'll just leave the hackathon alone. But day one, or we'll we'll call it kind of day one Sunday. The marketplace opened in the evening. It was a great kind of walking around catching up with people. And then Monday, you had the opening keynote for day for the official day one, then the led into open marketplace, a handful of breakout sessions. Day one also has the awards that happen on day one, which was really cool. Um, a lot of partners that I get to work with won different awards this year to celebrate them and be there for it. Our consulting service was actually up for an award this year. We were one of the finalists for the implementation award. We didn't win for a company that's a service of ours that is two years old to be just nominated is huge. So yeah, we were beyond excited for that. But yeah, it was cool to see the awards. Some surprises, some that I saw coming from a mile away because of how amazing that partner ISV is. But the awards ceremony was really cool to be a part of and um get to cheer on some friends and partners there. Day two, kind of repeats of that. The keynote on day two is focused around the Acumatica and what new things they're bringing to the products. I I noticed this year they consolidated. Previous years they went through every single vertical, and this is what we're bringing and doing. And so I appreciated them consolidating it. So field service and construction shared and presented together, what's the what's the new stuff coming to their distribution and manufacturing presented together. So yeah, it was nice to have a consolidated high overview of some of the new functionality that's coming to Humatico. But then it was cool. It was kind of like a call to action then was hey, we're doing this breakout session later today. If you want to learn more about this cool new feature, come learn about it. So yeah, for someone who doesn't always get into the weeds of every detail in every single vertical, it was nice to get the big picture of this is what's happening. And then if you want to learn more, come spend an hour with us at the breakout session, which was super helpful. So, yeah, day two's keynote was great. Some more breakout sessions, the famous party on the on the evening of day two. Right. Which, if if I'm gonna be honest and confess, I'm not a big party person. So me and one of my coworkers who are sports fanatics the last two years have dipped out and went to the local hockey game those those evenings. So I was partaking in some Seattle culture celebrating the Seattle Kraken that that night. But um I heard the party was great, but yeah, so that evening was great. Me and the pre-sales leader, tech leader team headed out Wednesday morning, but Wednesday was full of some more some more sessions in the morning, but then the closing reception at the very end kind of that early afternoon time slot. So kudos to Acomatica, they cram a lot into three two and a half days, really do Monday, Tuesday, and half a day Wednesday. So yeah, it was packed.
SPEAKER_00:It was packed. I did attend the celebration party uh at the if they had a whole it was at the convention center, kind of flipped the ballroom into a party. Uh, but that it was really cool. They had it kind of lit up sort of a ski lodge theme, which actually for the Northwest, we had a lot of skiers and mountains, and so it was really pretty neat. They had that theme and lots of great food. If you're not a seafood person, Seattle might not be your favorite, but they had a lot of you know seafood throughout the conference options there. But I thought the food was excellent. And then they had a separate area kind of in that balcony where the ballroom is. That balcony was also turned into kind of an area. And it was, I went out there just to find the bathrooms, and then I was there's a whole nother area. But they had curling thing where people were doing curling, you know. Yeah, they had a little fire pit area where they had these little bubbles, the middle fire pits in there was real cozy, and they had hot chocolate and cocoa. See what you missed.
SPEAKER_01:That that does sound a little fun. Yeah, I specifically wanted to go to the hockey team because my favorite hockey team was in town playing the Seattle Kraken. But with how they performed, the Seattle Kraken rolled over them. So the party would have probably been a better choice for sure.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Well, you get in there and they have the music so loud. So it was nice to have an area kind of go out and sit and talk. It was nice because you had the option, and I get a little bit okay. I'm trying to talk to somebody and I can't hear them. I'm going, what? What? So got to see some of my friends, and a lot of people did leave that next morning. So you said the the marketplace open pretty much to breakfast both Monday and Tuesday, right? So we had the welcome reception Sunday, and then which I really you have a whole day. A lot of conferences they start at noon and you don't get two half days, and it's always a rush. So I didn't feel rest. Plenty of time to go visit the booths and go back and read visit with people again or sit down and meet. I saw a lot of people around the edges, they had little meeting tables, and the marketplace was cool because they had kind of northwest themes, little booths, fruit booth, and a popcorn booth, Starbucks booth.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that was cool. They had the Starbucks booth, so famous Seattle coffee chain. You had Pike Brewing Company, had a little beer tasting booth there. So another Seattle. Yep, the fruit. They they crush it. And it was cool because you had the so if you're looking from above in the middle, you had the ISVs and bars, the booths that they were doing for the marketplace, and then all around was tables and the one corner had Starbucks, the pipe brewing fruit, all that. But it was cool because it was kind of we come in for breakfast. The food they had there was great the whole time. You grab breakfast, sit around table, get to meet someone you didn't know, or catch up with someone you haven't seen in a year. And then as breakfast ends, you just kind of walk into all the booths and get a checkout and learn some new solutions or meet some new people there. And then the bells go off and it's oh, it's keynote. Cool. Yeah, go off for the keynote, and then yeah, you get a casually go around again or dive into some of the breakout sessions if you wanted to after the keynote. Yeah, felt I I don't know if this was year one versus year two for me being at Summit, but just felt low-key. Maybe I kind of knew what I was doing, how the lay of the land sheep would operate and work a little bit more. So yeah, your old hat at it now, right? Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:The flow was good in the booth, so that was really good, right?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. There's a lot of great merch swag options from a lot of the people there. Yeah, I I purposely today wore my Seattle hat that I got from Avid Exchange. Exactly. I'm giving them the swag of the year award in my book. They they had three different hat options with four or five different badge options that they were live, they were stamping on for you as you went through. And so Avid Exchange, kudos to you guys for some awesome swag. Trailed's always a favorite swag stop of mine. Um, and they just rebranded over the summer. So, new color, new logo. I was they're one of our partners, and I was giving them a little bit of a hard time after their rebrand of hey, all my trail merch is all out of date now. I need a bunch of new trail merch. Come on. Great. Um, so so I was able to pick up some updated trailed socks this year, and that that was a good hit. So, yeah, a lot, a lot of great swag options from the ISVs out there. So kudos kudos to them for the hard work and coming up with those ideas.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think I think they have fun with that. I don't know. You know, and I'm always on the hunt for something different too, and so it's always good. Yeah, and then for partners, resellers primarily, of course. They they said they have 500 partners. That was one of the things I noticed on the keynote. So I think they count ISVs in that number, right? I think they did. Partners is the generic umbrella for everybody that's a partner for sure.
SPEAKER_01:I that that's what it seemed. They were wrapping everyone who touches the Acumatica system a little bit. I'm even sure some service partners probably get wiggled into that number too.
SPEAKER_00:Counted everybody, yeah. That's all right. That was 500, really. People got excited about that. And you mentioned the awards, that was great. A lot of people were runners up and pretty proud that they were in the finalist category. So I don't know, how about you?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I I was super excited for Trail winning ISP Partner of the Year. Being able to see some of the hard work that they were doing over the year was really cool to see that award award go to them. WM Synergy, one of Acmatica's top resellers. They had a phenomenal year in the manufacturing vertical. So I was not shocked to see them win Manufacturer of the Year, but also super happy for them to win that. There are a bunch of great people over there at WM Synergy. Lumber getting the ISV Alliance of the Year Award. I thought they were gonna win IS uh construction ISV of the year. Well, um, that that went to Workforce Go, I think. And then to see them win ISV Alliance of the Year was wow. Kudos to Lou and the team over there. They've been trucking really hard the last couple years, and to see all that effort pay off finally was really cool. Yeah, it obviously us getting nominated for the implementers award was a big deal for us. So it was proud to be a part of the list of the other consultants that in the consulting firms that were nominated for that as well. I'm totally drawing a blank on who won that. But yeah, great group of consulting firms to just be named with was exciting. So yeah, the awards piece was pretty cool. And as I said, we work with a handful of researchers. Sellers. We work with a handful of ISVs. So to have a lot of the people we work with get not just nominated, but actually win some of these awards is really special. And it was cool to see some of the people who made the President's Club this year and get to celebrate them. Um Portello had a huge year getting rookie partner of the year and also making President's Club in the same year. So yeah, a lot a lot of cool stuff to celebrate from these ISVs and partners from 2025 that were great to just experience and see happen.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, definitely. I I know also kind of a big announcement was the Ascent program. So did you find out any more information about that?
SPEAKER_01:Or yeah, so that so we've we've been able we've been able to have a pretty cool relationship over the last year with Acadica. So we knew that was coming a little bit, but to actually get the date on it, to actually get kind of what they're expecting and their their hope and their vision for it was actually that was kind of the first time we got to hear it. And that was really cool to hear that. Cited that it's gonna be in Colorado. The Gay Lord Resort there is phenomenal. I'm I'm a little bummed because I'm trying to decide do I go to Ascent or do I do my family vacation? I think my family will appreciate it if I keep the vacation on the books where it is. So a little bit bummed that I'm probably not gonna be able to make it this year as a first one. But yeah, I I I'm excited to the training piece is really cool. So if I had to encapsulate what this summit looked like, I felt like there's a lot of end users, Acumatica end users that were at Summit this year. And I feel like that number keeps growing and growing and growing. So there's a lot of end users and a lot of prospective end users, people who haven't made the switch to Acumatica yet that were there. So there's a huge end user base at Summit. So a lot of its product features trying to sell Acumatica and how can the ISVs help sell Acumatica to a lot of these people and retain people within Acumatica. So to be able to have something descent in August of this year will be, I think, super needed and really exciting to get some of that hands-on training for the partners for the ISV and just dive into some of the more of the nitty-gritty stuff that an end user doesn't necessarily care about. Not not knocking the end user as much, but just some of the stuff that makes the software happen that they get to use. They don't need to know or want to know what's all that back end look. So to get in some of that nitty-gritty stuff, I think it's gonna be huge. So yeah, bummed I'm gonna miss it this year, probably, but yeah, happy that Academic is offering it.
SPEAKER_00:And the dates for this first event is when?
SPEAKER_01:It's August 17th through the 20th.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_01:Yep, yep. So not not far away. August feels it's far away right now. It's not yeah.
SPEAKER_00:What's what's kind of the process to attend that?
SPEAKER_01:If you do Acumatica set, one of the the first option there that's gonna pop up is their landing page for it. And you can apply and register there. It's open now through the end of February is registration. Then it's also an approval process. So it's not just registering your in because there's a limited number. I think they're tapping at 800, 850 people for this first one. And they're gonna they have they're approving people who register. So I would get your registration in as soon as possible. So you have the best chance of getting approved. You're gonna be asked to have who your Acumatica sponsor is. So be ready to have that as you you go in. But yeah, so it I'm I'm excited for it. Yeah. And the fact that it's kind of this no-frills training hands-on experience for the partners in ISVs is what's gonna make it so there's there's some sponsorship opportunities in there for ISVs and the partners.
SPEAKER_00:So marketplace, right?
SPEAKER_01:There's a lot Yeah, there'll be some a little, a little bit of sponsorship opportunity, but just the chance to gather and yeah, dive into the thing that we all love, get to do and do together is gonna be really exciting and unique. That outside of some one-off stuff that maybe a partner's put on or an ISP's put on, it's gonna be exciting to actually have something acumic and backed this. Um, so I I'm I'm I'm all in. Outside of not missing my family's vacation this year, I'm all in for this idea and hope that this is the first of many. So yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it sounds they have plans. This is kind of the first event, kind of an in-person hands-on workshop. You said kind of workshop style. So let's not gonna have the big party and ice sculptures or whatnot. It it's really meant to me. Let's bring your laptop, let's sit down and work on learning a certain skill, or and it's really any roles. They had, I saw they had marketing, sales, developer, implementers, founders. So it's really covering kind of every role and then also industry too. So they're trying to figure out, well, maybe they kind of focus on the manufacturing before certain training and yeah, application process so they can gather insight into who would be attending so they can make sure they got the right kind of content. Um, I also heard that it's gonna be a train the trainer style. So you could take the material back and train your team. So maybe don't have everybody enroll the first time. Maybe somehow you're your key people. And I also heard the cost wasn't gonna be very much. We're trying to, again, keep it no-frills, probably a thousand. I mean, they're not they're not making money on this, so a thousand dollars or less. There's travel costs and everything. Yeah. And I I know one of the reactions I had, I went to the partner networking meeting on Wednesday, and some of the partners were giving them feedback. Hey, you kind of surprised us. We already have our budgets. You kind of opened you're saying you're opening up the application process to everyone. We kind of have to work with our team to figure out who should attend and then have them apply. So, anyway, it was good feedback. First time they're doing this. So they asked for grace.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's fair.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. And I I think it's great because so our our bread and butter service that we work with partners with is fractional solution engineers. So we come and help with the discovery demo process and run a sales opportunity all the way through closing. So we've we understand Act Manica pretty in-depth on all the verticals, and then have a huge breadth of understanding of what ISVs are out there. So even outside of the sales process, we have customer success managers, we have sales reps emailing our SCs that we work with, asking, hey, I'm trying to figure this out for my customer and what what's out there for this? What how do I do this? And just being able to have an opportunity where uh partners can send people to get trained to understand Acumatic better and deeper is because especially if you're at a bigger partner, there's only so much you can train in-house on that while also keeping the regular day-to-day systems going and moving. So that I even though there's some hiccups as any first-time programming event happens, yeah. I I think this is gonna be really well recepted and well received once once we figure this out and get the timing of those announcements that are going and such. So it's gonna be great.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. So those kind of first in-person event, but they'll have some some future events, virtual, maybe hybrid in the future. So anyway, kind of keep your eye out as they roll that out. But yeah, this first, and I thought you said the After Summit has now really become a user conference for the users, which is probably true. They kind of made it for everybody, but it's hard to address all the needs. And partners and ISVs are focused on customers and helping customers during that event. So it's nice that they have now a partner-focused event.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and and not knocking the summit because it is taking more of that end user, end user approach in direction. W with the ISVs and the partners that come, because there's an end user focus, depending on what breakout sessions you go to, feels more surface level to a partner who has a deeper understanding of Acumatica. So that that is maybe the one, if you want to call it a negative that I heard from the summit a week ago was hey, I I love the topic that was gonna be shared, but I don't feel we really got into it to the level that I wanted to. And yeah. So you you can't make one, you can't do one thing for everyone. It's that's just impossible. So with that summit, taking that end user focus, yeah, makes the scent in August gonna be much more build up some of the excitement for the scent a little bit more and have it be more valuable to the partnership.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, make it a priority of skill, get more skills to the different levels of consultants and developers. And on the sales side, I know I heard a partner saying, hey, we need more how to sell AI first, right? It usually comes on afterthought. We're trying to sell the ERP. And then the question is, well, what are you doing with AI? So you help us sell that. So that was good feedback because now that they're rolling it into the product and have kind of a definitive rollout plan, helping the the partners understand so they can articulate that for customers, I think is a good thing.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, for sure. Which, yeah, was kind of the big theme of summit this year. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:AI, AI first.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, AI first and academic instances can be data, data, data, data, data. But going from just a record of data to this idea of how can we understand it and process it even better, and how can we make the data something usable for us? And there was so many features. Being being a marketing sales guy, but probably my favorite feature they talked about with AI with in the one keynote was kind of within the CRM activity tracker where you could open up the tab and be like, oh, I have 10 months worth of emails. What's the last thing that's happened? What do I need to know to be able to respond to this?
SPEAKER_00:Summarize this for me, right? Well, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly. And just have that quick summary, refresh your mind of it. Not it's not replacing your brain of how to respond and handle the situation, but it's helped giving you that information to make a knowledgeable, knowledgeable response to whatever the request is or what needs to happen.
SPEAKER_00:Sure.
SPEAKER_01:What's being asked? So AI, I we were taking bets that our team was during each keynote of hey, who's what over under 20, 20 and a half uses of the word AI? Who's got it? Because that's the hot button topic. But yeah, yeah, a AI is here to stay, and it looks it's doing some pretty cool and helpful things within acumatican now.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I say how it's kind of a kind of a phased approach. Now it's assisting and guiding, and then we're still human in the loop, kind of, but doing more automation and then eventually get to autonomous, right? Where it's kind of doing some functions independent of a human. So we'll see what that all really means. I I I thought you said about the moving from system of record, and I said this a few times, to system of intelligence, right? Yeah. That was pretty cool. Well, what about other events? I know you mentioned all the kind of the main sponsored byvents, but what else was happening around the Summit?
SPEAKER_01:I I think, yeah, I think that's some of the fun of Summit is everyone throws some kind of event. Granted, some of the partners, some of the resellers throw their own event for their clients who are out or ISVs that they are super close with. So there's some closed events that are special invite, but there's a lot that are open invite as well. So it was it was fun. This year on Sunday, the Presales leader team threw an event at a sports simulator sports bar. That was really cool. We got to work with, and it was sponsored by um some great ISVs, Pay Stand, Great Links, Trail, uh Kenzie help sponsored, uh, Travia Software. I think I think that was everyone. If I missed someone, I apologize. But it was a great for me, that was a really fun way to kick off some before everything hit, before just the rushing in conversation after conversation, just to have a chance to hang out, have some fun, but also start some of those conversations with some of the partners and ISVs that you wanted to talk to before everyone gets overwhelmed with everything. And yeah, that that was a blast. Five iron golf uh was a phenomenal venue for that, and just thankful for the ISVs that helped put that on with us. Yeah, Monday, there's a handful of events in the evening. I got I bounced around between a couple of them. Stack is an estimation takeoff solution within Acumatica for construction companies. They threw co-sponsored happy hour with Felixo. If you don't know Felixo, they're phenomenal. One of the best XL push-pull solutions out there. They threw a happy hour at the observatory, which was a super cool speak easy feel bar that was on the 35th, 36th floor, where they had a deck all around the top that you could go out and look and get this beautiful view of the city all lit up that evening.
SPEAKER_00:And the pitch of sound. Yeah. Wow.
SPEAKER_01:It was a beautiful venue. Food and drinks were great. The conversations were even better. Walked from there down to the aquarium that night. Avalera and Bill.com co-sponsored event at the aquarium with dinner drinks. That was a really cool setting. I didn't get a walk around, but they basically rented out the aquarium.
SPEAKER_00:Right.
SPEAKER_01:So you had these massive fish tanks. It was super cool. I love that. Had some great conversations with some partners and ISVs there. That same night, there's, I know there's at least three other partner events that were happening as well. Yes, learning some of the solutions and some of the partners out there at these special events, but it's cool because you get to actually get to meet and know the people personally. And it's what how I've kind of looked at those events was cool, I'm gonna go hang out and build up a relationship with the people at Stack and get to know them better as people. And then we'll schedule some business conversation for next week when we're back home and then actually get to talk about partnerships and such. But yeah, there's a lot of great events. The ones that stood out for me was outside of our own event at the sports simulator, was the Avalara Bill Aquarium, just because the venue was amazing, and then Stack and Flixo because of that speakeasy, really cool, rustic y bar kind of film.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you you some you got to go some really highlight events. Oh yeah, a lot of the partners and ISV sponsor these little events around the town. So did you have a favorite one? Uh I think the one that you hosted was my favorite. Yeah. They're not going to be able to do that.
SPEAKER_01:I was gonna say, I will not be offended if ours does not win your your favorite.
SPEAKER_00:But actually, yeah, I really the venue, the the probably the favorite thing, and to be honest, is that we could watch the football game because those sports bar and the seahawks are playing.
SPEAKER_01:So that was our our thought process too. It was the the negative of not being in Fegus is Fegus has a bar on every corner, every casino. So every I I would remember I remember everyone would gather together at these different bars and watch the NFC and AFC championship games on Sunday because Summit always falls on that weekend. Right. So that's gonna be a little bit more harder to do at in Seattle. So let's put something together during the NFC championship game, hang out and watch it, have some conversation. If you don't want to watch the game, there's sports simulators. If you don't want to do that either, there's gonna be a lot of great people to get to know and hang out with. Yeah, there's even a lot of people that I didn't know at our party that I gotta meet for the first time. Excited to dive into those relationships more over the new year here.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. It was a great way to kick off the whole event. So, and the other events were great too, but by the third day, I was kind of my feet were tired. I was tired.
SPEAKER_01:So there's there's only so many times you can have the same conversation over the same training.
SPEAKER_00:So exactly. So that's kind of nice to have an activity that was really great. What do you think is your main takeaway from this year's summit?
SPEAKER_01:I was looking at this, and actually, because I don't want to miss quote them. PSI is a family service firm that's doing phenomenal work. They won customer of the year this year. Yeah. And she had this amazing quote. Sorry, I'm pulling it up real quick because I it was so beautiful and it hit exactly kind of what our company is and what we do and how we approach technology. She says, she said in her keynote that technology should never overshadow the mission. And as soon as I heard that, I was like, that's beautiful, because that's exactly how we try to do business and do life. And it I kind of even got that sense with even the day one keynote as well. Technology never should overshadow the people. And John Case said it over and over where what we do is because of the things that you're asking for and that you're trying to do with the software. Amazing takeaway for me is technology should never overshadow mission. So that's how we live, that's how we do business. And yeah, that beyond any tech announcement, tech release, that was thing number one for me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it should support the mission. I love that too. That was really great. Customer quote and customer that won impact award, right? It's really great. Yeah. Next year, tell us where it's gonna be and the dates and uh Yeah, we're coming back to Seattle again.
SPEAKER_01:I now that now that I've done it once, I'm not as pessimistic about that. I'm actually kind of excited to come back and do it to Seattle again and hit up some of the bakeries and the restaurants I didn't get to hit. I'm excited to see. Hopefully, weather's good for this for next year in 2027, and we're gonna have to we're gonna have a full convention center this year. So I'm excited to see what that looks like. That's actually gonna be at the end of January of the 24th through the 27th next year. So I'm sure Acumatica is gonna hit us up as soon as registration and opportunities for sponsorship are available for that. But I'm excited for it. I'm excited for round two in Seattle.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Now people've been there have a little idea what to expect. It'll be it'll be fun. It'll be fun to have everybody return to the Pacific Northwest. I always get comments from people this last week on hey, I didn't travel from the East Coast and it was such a long day of travel, but hopefully it was worthwhile that that you got there.
SPEAKER_01:It was it was long, excited, but it was it was worth it. So I'm located in Pennsylvania. I flew out on Saturday before the snow hit the East Coast, so I didn't have any travel issues. But Sunday morning I woke up to a text being three hours behind my wife's time. Woke up from a text with a picture that had my car in the level of snow along the side of it, and I got texts about every hour with updates of where it was. And I was just, I am so glad to be out here. That Sunday Saturday and Sunday was upper 40s and sun in Seattle. It was just this is beautiful. So yeah, Seattle is beautiful, the weather is great. I'm excited to come out again and have another great summon out there.
SPEAKER_00:Well, thank you, Sal, for joining me today on this episode of ISV Talk. So kind of do a recap that was fun on the Acumatica 7th, 2026. If you want to reach out to Sal or their team, Sal, you want to go over your contact information?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Yeah, Carol, thanks for the opportunity to come on again. If you would want to reach out to me, hear about some of our marketing services, hear about how we work with ISPs and partner with them in our alliance program, uh, you can reach out to me. My email is sal.com. T-E-C-H L E A D E R C O dot com. And or you can check out our website, techleaderco.com. So would love to hear about what you guys are doing in the marketing world right now to promote your services and solutions. Also, if you're in ISV, we'd love to hear how you are trying to grow and engage in the channel as well.
SPEAKER_00:Perfect. Well, thank you so much, Sal. And I appreciate the conversation again. And folks, I'll see you on the next episode of ISV Talks. Bye, friends.