Asia Pacific User Group Community
The region’s user communities continue to grow and thrive! From India to Japan and south to New Zealand, user group leaders are working together to deliver more information and activities to their members than ever! Please welcome a new user group relationship manager for the Australia/New Zealand region. Kim Salter joined the Oracle team in April and will be working closely with the area customer communities as they prepare for upcoming meetings and conferences. Kim is based in Sydney, Australia

China
ACOUG – the All China Oracle User Group launched an Exadata Special Interest Group (SIG) in China during late May 2012, Growing in popularity in the region, the SIG leadership hosted a successful meeting highlighting the value of Exadata, Cloud Computing and product implementations. Working cooperatively with the Independent Oracle User Group (IOUG) the two groups share information with the communities and discuss the benefits of using Exadata. Attendees received a copy the IOUG ExaBriefing Newsletter at the event. Click here for more information about the meeting.

Working together in India
Two groups in India joined together to host their events in April – the Chennai Java User Group and the All India Oracle user Group hosted their events at Vel’s University in Chennai and welcomed over 150 attendees to the venue. Java Evangelists and technical speakers from the AIOUG provided lots information for all. More information is available at: http://www.aioug.org/aioug_techday.php and http://www.jugchennai.in/2012/04/28/jugchennai-chennai-java-summit-12-with-aioug-tech-day-21st-april-2012-vels-university/

APAC user group leaders in the spotlight:
· Murali Vallath (AIOUG) India: http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1535351126001 
· Bambi Price (APOUC) Australia: http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1384468081001\ 
· Shi Qiu (ACOUG), Hiro Zhu, MySQL China, Peter Cheng, OpenSourceCamp China: http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1561067449001 
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Europe, Middle East and Africa User Group Community
More than ever, the User Groups in EMEA are talking to each other and planning cross border collaboration to share resources and take advantage of guest speakers when they are available in the region! Building on a very successful “PeopleSoft Update Tour” earlier this year, the user groups in France, Benelux, Spain and the UK are beginning to plan for the next regional tour. The conferences provide members with information about the product and promote networking between users. Stay tuned for more announcements regarding User Group Tours for PeopleSoft and the Nordics (DK, SE, NO, FI) later in 2012. Go to www.iouc.org for more information!

More Collaboration
Java User Groups and Oracle User Groups are working together too. Java leaders participate in Oracle user group events and offer suggestions on how to lead Java sessions. In addition, there were some very remarkable user group activities throughout EMEA from March through May 2012. More than 11 user group conferences were hosted – check out all the activity on IOUC.org http://www.iouc.org/p/cm/ld/fid=47 and learn about conferences hosted by:

CUORE (Spain), http://www.cuore.es/
French user group day, http://www.aufo.asso.fr/ , http://www.club-peoplesoft.fr/ , http://www.clubjde.org/
HOUG (Hungary), http://www.houg.hu
MEOUG (Dubai), http://www.meoug.com/
OBUG (Benelux), http://www.obug.be
OUGF (Finland), http://www.ougf.fi/
LVOUG (Latvia), http://lvoug.lv/
DOAG (Germany), http://www.doag.org/de/events/konferenzen/doag-2013-applications/rueckblick-2012.html
Geecon (Poland), http://2012.geecon.org/
UKOUG Exadata (UK), http://www.ukoug.org/events/exa-special-event/
DEVOXX (France), http://www.devoxx.com/display/FR12/Accueil
…

And did you know?....
· OUGN (Norway) hosted its conference on a cruise ship from Oslo to Kiel – 2 days focused on Oracle with only the deep blue sea as scenery!
· MEOUG (Dubai) welcomed a new president and extended its focus to include technology, engineered systems and applications!
· Inaugural event - ‘Devoxx France’ was organized to host 650 attendees but ultimately served 1250 participants! This was a great event for French speaking Java User Group members!

The EOUC on Twitter!
Follow all the leader events and activities on twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/eouc
EMEA user group leaders in the spotlight:
· User groups from Israel, JDuchess (Netherlands) and South Africa http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1535351130001
· User groups talking (mix): http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1537218020001
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Latin America User Group Community
Paola Girotti, Oracle’s user group relationship manager in Latin America has been working with the group leaders to discover new groups, support established groups and evangelize the value of user group membership to everyone in the region! The groups have been busy and we are proud to report that there are a number of new groups in the region! Thanks, Paola and Leaders!
Central America - Oracle User Group El Salvador
With this new User Group, there are now four organizations in Central America:
1. ORAUGCRC (http://www.oraugcrc.org/ )
2. ORAUGGT (http://www.facebook.com/orauggt )
3. ORAUGHN (http://www.facebook.com/oraughn )
4. ORAUGSV (website under construction).
Argentina – new Oracle User Group
This new group hosted its first meeting in 2012 and organized their first event at the Technological National University. Filled with sessions from local ACEs and ACE directors, the event drew more than 50 attendees. Keep your eye on this group – they will participate in the upcoming TOUR of user group conferences in July and you can see them in Buenos Aires. For more information, go to: http://aroug.org/
Grupo de Usuários Oracle Brasil (ORAUG-BR, http://oraug-br.org/ ) hosted a meeting on 21 March 2012 in San Pablo the "Challenges and Opportunities Tax and Business Tax," The meeting focused on promoting the exchange of ideas, experiences, technical and operational knowledge between companies using Oracle Applications, as well as integration among participants, providing excellent business opportunities. More than 190 people attended the meeting.

Latin America user groups in the spotlight:
· Andrea Baron - Argentina JD Edwards User Group, Eduardo Hahn of Grupo de Usuários de Tecnologia Oracle do Brasil (GUOB) http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1561061068001
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North America User Group Community
A Collaborative Effort - Oracle Primavera Special Interest Group hosted by OAUG & Quest International Almost one year after the initial meeting of the Oracle Primavera SIG (OPSIG), the jointly supported SIG is thriving. It is a great example of a successful collaborative effort between two users group with a shared product focus. The group currently has over 700 members and continues to grow. The SIG successfully coordinated the Primavera Track at the COLLABORATE12 conference and delivered 50 sessions to nearly 400 enthusiastic Primavera users during the Collaborate conference in April 2012.
“The rapid growth of the Oracle Primavera SIG (OPSIG) is evidence of the valuable role users groups play in providing education and networking resources for users of Oracle’s acquired product lines,” said OAUG President Mark Clark. “Coordinating efforts with the Quest users group to support user-led program and content development certainly accelerated the timeframe in which we were able to deliver value to Oracle Primavera users.”
“Quest and OAUG have a great partnership around the Oracle Primavera user community. Through open lines of communication and a great working partnership, the community continues to build and thrive within the Oracle family,” said Jeff West, Quest President.
In addition to hosting onsite meetings at COLLABORATE and Oracle OpenWorld, the group hosts bi-monthly webinars for their members. For more information on upcoming meetings please visit the website – Oracle Primavera SIG.

Another Successful Year! COLLABORATE 12
This important event drew. Over 5500 participants to Las Vegas in April 2012 and provided everyone with a week full of activities including educational sessions, hands on labs, a full exhibit hall, usability lab, support sessions and a busy and vibrant Oracle booth! Together the Independent Oracle User Group (IOUG), Quest International User Group and the Oracle Applications User Group (OAUG) hosted another successful conference. Oracle SVP & CIO Mark Sunday’s Keynote was delivered to an enthusiastic group of attendees who enjoyed hearing his update on “IT at Oracle. Plans are already underway for next year’s COLLABORATE13 event to be held in Denver, Colorado.

Oracle Exadata Special Interest Group – a global resource sponsored by the IOUG!
The IOUG Exadata Special Interest Group continues to expand its membership to over 4000 members. Its leaders are true evangelists – reaching out to new and experienced Exadata customers and encouraging them to learn about the products, network and share tips and techniques. The Exadata SIG will have a dedicated room at the annual Oracle OpenWorld User Group Forum on Sunday, September 30th, 2012.

This year, Oracle and IOUG have partnered to bring you ExaEverything 2012, a comprehensive, year-round community and knowledge base supporting the Engineered Systems product family, including Oracle Exadata Database Machine, the Exalogic Elastic Cloud, and the Exalytics In-Memory Machine. Click here to learn how to become a member.

Higher Education, Campus Solutions and a global presence
The Higher Education User Group HEUG Education Series offers an exciting line up of webinars for their members. This program is designed to help members grow their knowledge of PeopleSoft/Oracle products all year long. This series brings together thought leaders from within the HEUG membership, Oracle, vendor partners and HEUG management to provide useful webinars that will help members with implementing, maintaining or upgrading their PeopleSoft/Oracle solutions. The Education Series is always looking for speakers to share their expertise with the HEUG community. Please feel free to send your suggestions or proposals to support@heug.org.

Oracle and IOUG worked together to present a special seminar series in May that featured highlights of the IOUG Security Survey: Enterprise Data at Risk. Oracle security experts discussed why organizations are at risk and how database security best practices can help reduce that risk. During this event, attendees had the opportunity to participate in an exclusive Q&A session with Oracle security experts while networking with industry peers.
Enterprise Systems Design – a Quest Leadership Community Executive Series
Quest will launch its first executive series of 2012 designed solely with C-level and direct reports in mind. The series will focus on enterprise systems design and how the role of ERP has transformed over the years. For more information, click here or contact leadershipcommunity@questdirect.org.
Health Sciences User Group (OHSUG)
The Oracle Health Sciences User Group welcomed the Enterprise Adoption User Group from North American and EU members to be part of community. A special interest group “EA Focus Group” was formed to facilitate the transition and knowledge sharing among members. Save the date for the OHSUG 2012 Annual Meeting: November 4-7, 2012, Fairmont Monte Carlo, Monaco. With the theme “Building Bridges to Patient-Centered Technology,” the OHSUG Board invited Mark Poulton, ADAMAS Consulting Ltd to deliver the keynote at the conference. More information is available at: https://www.ohsug.org/events/annual-meetings/2012-annual-conference

 
 
 
Oracle Excellence Awards: Call for Nominations
 
The Oracle Excellence Awards recognize individuals in key roles for their extraordinary efforts and contributions to enterprise technology solutions. Awards will be presented at the 2012 Oracle Open World at San Francisco. Nominate a colleague or yourself today! Deadline for nominations is 17 July 2012! 
 
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Upcoming User Group Events

Spanish:

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/es/community/user-groups/otn-latinoamerica-tour-2012-1634120-esa.html

Portuguese:

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/pt/community/user-groups/otn-america-latina-tour-2012-1649294-ptb.html