The day before the official Cloudworks tour began, a couple of us flew over to join the U2 concert in town – in addition to making the final preparations before the others arrived. One can quickly get used to having a home office in a hotel in London.
A hopeful bunch
There was an expectant crowd that met at Gardermoen on Thursday. It was a mix of those who had lived in London and those who knew the city well from previous trips. There were also several who had never visited London before at all. Since London is a city you quickly fall in love with and few people get tired of, the city was perfect for our first foreign trip together!
Dagfinn, Gaurav, Paulina and Nancy were all excited on the plane to London
Okta invited us to dinner
Our partner Okta, one of the leading providers of cloud-based products in identity and access management, invited us to the fantastic restaurant Crazy Bear Fitzrovia our first evening. We had a wonderful time together and the discussions floated across the table between all the tasty dishes. A real “flying start” for our trip!
Tobias and Dot in Okta took us out for a lovely dinner at the Crazy Bear Fitzrovia restaurant
Floating in the cloud
Friday was in many ways the ultimate highlight of the trip, giving the whole team a real boost that can hardly be described with words – nor measured in money.
Three of our partners have offices in London, and we had some good and inspiring meetings with them. We chose to stroll between meetings in both sun and rain to enjoy the streets of London while discussing, laughing and planning Cloudworks’ future.
Ernesto and Dot in Okta with us after today’s meetings
In addition to an exciting morning at Okta, we also went to Meta’s head office to discuss the collaboration we have with them around the communication and collaboration platform Workplace from Meta.
A small drink in the Meta bar with Sophie, Jennifer, Nico and Mike working with Workplace
Afterwards the day continued to Netskope. They offer solutions to secure data in cloud solutions and are one of the leading suppliers in their field.
Good discussions with Andy and Camilla about Netskope and their solutions
Our inner dancer
Pumped up after the day’s impressions and filled with motivation, we went to the exciting restaurant SushiSamba. After a quick elevator ride up to the 38th floor, we were able to enjoy a fantastic meal with a 360-degree view of the city. We enjoyed the rest of the evening with inspiring talks, laughs and a bit of dancing too, and we basically did not want the evening to end.
Having a good time at SushiSamba
Musical and shopping
On Saturday, we got together to summarize the meetings we had the day before with our partners. We had been given plenty of exciting opportunities for our further collaboration, and we discussed among us the best approach to take them further.
The rest of the weekend was spent sightseeing and shopping. We continued to eat and drink well, and many enjoyed The Musical The Wicked, as well as code-cracking at The Bletchley Bar. We even had a birthday child among us, and the glass was raised to celebrate Paulina’s big day!
Code-breaking in uniforms sets the mood
Rich in memories
After sharing all those moments together, we are rich in memories and feel more attached to one another, and we look forward to our Christmas party in just a few weeks! And of course, also looking forward to our next company trip. Where we will go next, we don’t know– maybe it will be Las Vegas? Can at least hope ?
