European Office 365 Connect 2014 has been postponed until the beginning of April and this gives you another chance to take advantage of an Early Bird discount.

The conference, organized by NC Communications who also run the annual SharePoint Connections in Amsterdam, has content for current and propective users of Microsoft’s Office 365. This cloud-based system combines online versions of Office, SharePoint and Exchange alongside other Microsoft products with strong collaboration features. The conference is designed to help you plan upgrades and avoid mistakes while making the transition to Office 365. In addition to the daily sessions, the conference has an expo area, two keynotes and evening social activities.

In addition to online SharePoint, Exchange and Office, the conference has sessions on Lync Online, Yammer, and Microsoft Project Online. The sessions are based on the real-life experience of the lecturers, and cover key topics for success with Office 365, including migration from on-premises to the cloud; working in hybrid environments, building and using apps; search optimisation; security & identity management; incorporating Windows Azure; and using PowerShell.

The keynote on day one is being given by Michiel Rozema on The Value of Power BI. The keynote looks at how Office 365 can make use of data inside and outside an organization, bringing it to the surface so business users can create insights and share results. The keynote also introduces Power BI for Office 365, the Office 365 cloud-based version of the BI tool based on Excel.

On day two of the conference, the keynote from Seb Matthews looks at how Office 365 can be used to taking your business to the cloud, asking and answering questions such as What does it mean to actually move to the cloud? What are the benefits of choosing Software as a Service and more importantly what are the pitfalls? The organizers say that in the keynote, Seb will provide you with the best bits of his experiences with Office 365 and why your business should, or shouldn’t make the jump to the Cloud, with practical tips, real-world honesty and great advice.

The sessions in the conference cover a wide range of topics including how to develop SharePoint Online applications; developing, building and deploying apps for Office 2013 with Visual Studio 2012; Information protection and control in Office 365; what’s new in Lync Server 2013 : online, hybrid & voice; and how to (remote) control Office 365 with Windows Azure. There are sessions on building SharePoint Online apps with Napa, on managing Office 365 with PowerShell, and one claiming to show how to build a hybrid configuration with Exchange 2013 in (less than) 70 minutes.

The conference is now being held at the Philharmonie Theatre, Haarlem, The Netherlands, on April 1 - 2.  If you book for the conference before January 31 you can save 100 euros on the cost of the 2-day conference (499 instead of 599). Save an extra 10% by using discount code BY633, which is exclusive to IProgrammer.