 Welcome to JSA TV, live from PTC 23, the newsroom for tech, telecom, and data center professionals. I'm Buffy Harakitas, and joining me today is Kurt Friesen, Director of North America for International Data Center Authority. Kurt, welcome to JSA TV. Thank you, Buffy. I'm absolutely thrilled to be here. I got in on Saturday afternoon, and I've been having a fantastic time ever since. I mean, it really is fantastic, especially when it's like freezing on the East Coast where I'm from. So, I mean, it's about 80 degrees here. The sun is surely shining, and there's nothing like Hawaii. I'm especially here at PTC 23. It is the biggest PTC ever. I had a feeling. I'm glad that you brought that up, because I was going to ask somebody. This is probably my, I think my fifth, maybe sixth one. I kind of lost track. And opening reception last night was packed. And I was like, this definitely is an above average attendance. And I'm thrilled to hear that it's the largest one ever. I mean, for sure. I mean, all the events are packed. The conference floor right here is still packed. So, it's beautiful to see it back in action. You know, one of the best conferences of our space, for sure, to see it thriving and hustling and bustling, just like it was pre-COVID. So, such an honor and pleasure to have you here today with us, Kurt. Why don't you tell us a little bit more about some of your meetings that you've been having at PTC and what the International Data Center Authority has been up to here at this event? Absolutely. So, we just had a meeting this morning with one of the largest colos in the country, actually. And really, the initial point of the meeting was to discuss how IDCA is going to set up training for their entire operations and engineering staff and data center management staff. But actually, what I was thrilled that came out of that discussion was hearing from them that they almost want to insist that even their vendors and their integrators get trained and certified by the IDCA just so that they know that they know what they're doing when they come into their facility, that they have a neutral body that is making sure that they have the right tools and equipment set up. And it also allows them to provide that level of comfort for their customers, as well, to know that everybody is up to date on their training and their certifications. I mean, that's very important because in our space, everything changes almost daily, right? So constantly evolving, technologies are constantly changing, growing in our space. So it's important that it is up to date and that everyone is trained and up to date on their skill set so that they can help transform, right? Well, all about right now, digital transformation. Well, that's one of the main reasons why we come to events like this and why it's important for the IDCA, the International Data Center Authority, to have boots on the ground here at PTC. We're one of the only, I think we are the only platform that actually updates our material on a weekly basis so that it really stays relevant for our students and for our customers. And so it's important for us to really be involved in all levels of the discussions that are happening and really understand what the newest trends are. And it's difficult to be able to do that effectively if we don't actually show up. Right, I mean, you're here live and in person. I'm here live and in person. Your customers are here live and in person. And weekly, you're updating your training materials. Tell us a little bit more about the International Data Center Authority in general and the training resources that you provide and how critical it is for our industry to know. Absolutely. So we have an engineering track and an operations track and then those tracks eventually just cross over so that once you get all the way through the process, which is a pretty robust training platform, you're gonna be fully knowledgeable about every aspect of the facility itself, right? We've been doing that for 10 years and we've trained all the hyperscalers. We've trained the likes of most enterprises and all their data center staff. But I feel like we've also barely scratched surface and there's a lot of people here that really do need these additional certifications. And so that's part of why we show up is to evangelize that platform, but also to make it better and get feedback from our existing students and our potential customers on how we can make the platform better across the board. Great, yes. Is there anything that you wanted to tell us about what we can expect for 2023 from you? Absolutely. We have just actually coming up in Q1 only in, I'll just mention North America. The next training session is actually in Los Angeles next week. After that we'll have Phoenix and Dallas and another training session in New York City at the end of Q1. New York, yes. Tell us what about the training sessions? How long are they? How many attendees do you usually get? So they're live and in person and in addition to that there's a platform? Yeah, so for the last couple of years we've been doing it all virtually for obvious reasons, right? Before COVID we would usually get invited to like a neutral colo site and within that region a lot of other end users and enterprise individuals would show up to that colo facility and be trained in person. We had to switch to a fully virtual platform for the last couple of years but now we're excited to be able to get back in person. But what's nice though is that we know that we can now do it in a hybrid setting. So if somebody can actually show up for the entire course they could do half on site, the other half in their home office or wherever they are by logging in via Zoom. I think the material on some of the higher level certifications is better digested when it is done in person in a classroom setting and usually that's anywhere from 20 to 30 participants per setting. One of our entry level certification is called the DCIS Data Center Infrastructure Specialist. That's two days, 16 hours, so two full eight hour days and it's a prerequisite certification for all the other tracks but it's actually quite robust. I mean, 16 full hours covering every aspect of data center training. And then as you progress further along we have engineering specialists, operation specialists all the way up to once you become a data center authority DCA. All right, well, yeah there I mean there is nothing like being in person to learn, being in person here to network live at PTC 23. So Kurt, thanks again for joining us today. Where can viewers go to learn more about your educational trainings and resources? Everything is online at idc-a.org. Idc-a-org. Idc-a.org. Got it, all right. Well, thank you viewers for tuning in to another fabulous episode of JSA TV live from PTC 23. Happy networking.