Brian is a Fellow with Azul Partners. He brings extensive technology insight, marketing experience, thought leadership and strategy skills to Azul Partners’ clients. Previously, Brian was the longest running and most senior director of Andersen Consulting’s (now Accenture’s) Software Intelligence unit -- a position that required him to pick the best possible software solutions for hundreds of clients globally. Brian has also been the CEO of an Internet firm that specialized in the brokering of large systems consulting projects. There, he raised three rounds of capital, structured several potential merger deals and secured many of the initial early sales for the firm. Mr. Sommer has launched a technology research firm and has worked for, contributed to and advised three other technology research organizations.

Brian knows how to create marketing messages and events that deliver results. At Andersen Consulting, he developed the concept for and executed six global customer technology events. Each event drew in over 500 C-Level attendees from Fortune 500 firms. The first of these events resulted in the sale of 18 large ERP implementation projects. Brian also understands channel and partner strategies. He orchestrated several alliances between Andersen Consulting and technology firms like: Adaytum, PeopleSoft, etc. He has subsequently conducted global channel partner pricing projects for clients and has conducted significant channel education courses for a major global database vendor.

Brian has spoken at dozens of prominent professional association and technology vendors’ user conferences—a keynote speaker for many of them. He has also presented at many major universities (e.g., Harvard Graduate School of Business, Wharton School of Business, Georgia State, etc.), institutional investor conferences (e.g., Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse First Boston) and other forums. Mr. Sommer has been on the steering committee for the University of Texas Information Impact Management program. Brian has been on the editorial advisory board for IHRIM.link and has served on the advisory board of The Review of Accounting Information Systems.

Brian has authored several significant major IT thought leadership publications. He has written software and outsourcing buyer guides for the strategic sourcing and HR-Business Processing Outsourcing markets. Recently, he has produced a number of pieces in the project portfolio management, professional services and Human Resources segments.

Mr. Sommer has a BBA and an MBA from the University of Texas at Austin.