John-David Lovelock is a research director in Gartner's Technology and Service Provider Research group.

Mr. Lovelock has 30 years of experience within the IT industry, including working eight years in a variety of healthcare environments. Prior to joining Gartner, Mr. Lovelock co-founded and managed a boutique-consulting firm that specialized in large software solutions with a special emphasis on the healthcare industry. This included planning and implementing ERP systems, authoring custom software solutions, and developing long-term IT strategies at large and midsize hospitals. As a consultant, Mr. Lovelock participated in many challenging projects for companies worldwide, including Europe, North America, the Caribbean and South America.

Rishi Sood is a vice president in Gartner Intelligence, where he is part of the U.S. State and Local Government, U.S. Federal Government, and Global Public Sector programs. In this capacity, Mr. Sood provides strategic direction for his clients by helping them understand key business issues, leading technology trends and drivers, demand for IT solutions, industry best practices, competitive landscape, and future scenarios for public sector organizations. Within the state and local government marketplace, Mr. Sood specializes in the following agency segments: health, human services, tax/revenue and public safety. Mr. Sood's key technology areas include e-government, CRM, outsourcing, homeland security, ERP and agency-specific solutions. Mr. Sood's key business issues include economic development, governance, sourcing and customer service. Within the U.S. federal government market, Mr. Sood focuses on the civilian, defense and intelligence agency segments. His key technology areas include e-government, security, RFID, CRM, IT services, outsourcing, data warehousing and ERP. Mr. Sood's key business issues are e-government, homeland security, transformation and sourcing. He frequently presents at major industry conferences and is a regular contributor to leading IT services publications and also writes a monthly column called "Across the Digital Nation" for Washington Technology magazine.

Mr. Sood joined Gartner with the acquisition of G2 Research, where he was vice president, managing the firm's Global Industries group, as well as chief analyst for state and local government.

Herb Strauss is a vice president and principal national security analyst in Gartner Intelligence based in McLean, Virginia, where he focuses on issues, policies, trends and technologies that affect the national security establishments of central governments and collective security alliances, worldwide. Mr. Strauss researches, analyzes, publishes and presents Gartner research on relevant topics affecting the regional and increasingly global government industry, national security market segments and the companies that provide related information management/technology consulting and systems integration services. He is a member of Gartner's global research communities in Emerging Trends & Technologies and Consulting and Systems Integration.

Mr. Strauss has 30 years of diverse public and private sector experience in planning, managing and delivering a broad range of information management and information technology related professional services and solutions to private and public sector clients. Mr. Strauss joined Gartner in 2003. Prior to joining Gartner, Mr. Strauss was a principal with the American Management Systems Corporation (AMS), supporting a key public sector enterprise architecture engagement as a senior subject matter expert and planner with the Business Management Modernization Program of the Department of Defense. Mr. Strauss also held a variety of executive and operational positions in government consulting and IT services during the seven years he worked for the Electronic Data Systems Corporation (EDS), a leading global IT integrator. As a managing consultant with EDS's Government Consulting Services and later as vice president with the federal business unit, Mr. Strauss led EDS's services, supporting the US DOD, DOJ, US Intelligence Community and other components of national security establishment. In his previous experience, Mr. Strauss served for 20 years as a commissioned officer in the United States Marine Corps, where he specialized in operations, intelligence, and the identification and application of advanced technologies. During his military career he served in unilateral operations, as well as in multinational, NATO and United Nations command and staff assignments around the world. He has served in extended assignments with the Offices of the Secretary of Defense, Director of Central Intelligence, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency. Mr. Strauss is a combat veteran of the Persian Gulf War, where he served with allied special operations forces in the Defense of Saudi Arabia and the Liberation of Kuwait (Desert Shield/Desert Storm). Mr. Strauss' last assignment at Marine Corps Headquarters was as director of program planning and resources for the Marine Corps' C4ISR/IT-Telecommunications mission areas.

T. Jeff Vining is a research vice president in Gartner Research, where he covers homeland security and law enforcement.

Bio
Prior to joining Gartner, Mr. Vining was the executive director of a federal government-sponsored advisory council tasked with identifying emerging technologies for public safety application. Before this position, Mr.Vining served as an attorney advising the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of the U.S. Navy and the Arkansas State Police. Mr.Vining previously served on the International Association of Chiefs of Police Highway Safety Subcommittee and currently serves on the GOVSEC/USLaw Advisory Boards and participates in a local community emergency response team and serves on a local government emergency preparedness committee.

Over the past two decades, Mr. Charles has helped hundreds of technology manufacturers succeed in the government marketplace. His breadth and depth of expertise on every dimension of the government technology ecosystem provide technology manufacturers with a clear focus and a cohesive strategy for the greatest success. Mr. Charles is adept at mapping technology product maturity with appropriate channel strategies, optimizing the right mix of contract vehicles, navigating procurement and compliance regulation, and developing strategies for success in both the long and short terms. An avid speaker at industry events, Mr. Charles leads immixGroup's federal team training workshops and authors a monthly column in Washington Technology.

Prior to founding the immixGroup, Mr. Charles served as vice president of contract management with Selbre & Associates. He received a BA in Communications & Business, Magna Cum Laude from Temple University and has completed extensive coursework in government procurement at American University, George Washington University, University of Virginia and the National Contract Management Association.

As President and Chief Operating Officer of Sun Federal, Bill Vass joins Chairman Scott McNealy in continuing to help government organizations solve their unique challenges through sustainable computing and military grade built-in security products like the Trusted Solaris(TM) OS, identity management software and the latest industry leading Sun Fire(TM) systems and StorageTek(TM) solutions.

Previously, Vass served as Chief Information Officer of Sun Microsystems, Inc., where he was responsible for all aspects of Sun's global IT infrastructure and line-of-business application development, support and maintenance, including information service delivery and security. Under Vass's direction, the IT department was dedicated to working with business partners to accelerate Sun's business by aligning Sun's technology deployment strategy with its business strategy.

Vass was previously named by Computer World as a Premier 100 Leader (2004). The list honors those who mentor and motivate with challenges that lead to positive impacts within their IT organization. Premier 100 honorees are recognized as stand out leaders who envision innovative solutions to business challenges, and effectively manage and execute IT strategies. At Sun, Vass has been key to Sun's success in driving the internal Mobility with Security solution and is frequently invited to participate as keynote at industry conferences and other speaking opportunities.