A 9:30am check out, while harsh after the festivities of the night before, was clearly done in the hope that the "partners" could be encouraged into the day's sessions.

This did not work too well. Attendance at the start of the Livebox presentation was somewhat thin, although late arrivals that boosted numbers to a respectable level. The strategic change within Orange/France Telecom means that Partner Camp is now about more than mobility. Livebox is part of Orange's broader convergence strategy. It enables consumers and small business users to connect a range of WiFi enable devices, legacy telephones and set-top boxes to the Internet. The goal is to embrace a wide range of connectivity technologies and offer them in a simplified package; removing the barriers associated with traditional ADSL modems, which can challenge those without some technical understanding.

While many of the initiatives around Livebox are strictly within the wired world, there are several that take advantage of mobility. These initiatives include the ability to monitor security systems or view a web cam in the home from a mobile.

The day closed with a second Pow Wow and the announcement of the winning innovation competition applications. There were two prizes, one sponsored by ACCESS and an overall winner.

The ACCESS prize, which was nominally for the best ALP application, went to Muvee, who supply the instant movie editor seen on many Nokia S60 devices. Their winning application is a reworking of the original concept using a thin Java ME client and a backend server that does the movie editing and preparation work.

The main prize went to Zi Corporation for Qix, again an application which will be familiar to anyone who follows the Symbian world with any interest.

In looking back at Partner Camp, David Oakley of Astraware had an interesting view. This was the third time Astraware has attended the camp. For the first two visits, when the event was Code Camp, Astraware sent members of its development staff, and while the event proved useful technically they failed to really connect with Orange. This time Astraware also brought along one of their partner managers, David believed this made a huge difference, as this year Astraware were able to connect with Orange.

Partner Camp is really two events in one, an opportunity to technical people to get together and thrash through hard coding issues, and an event for business people to network, share ideas and connect with Orange. Reflecting on David's comments, to make the most of Partner Camp any company might want to think about sending both a technical and business person to the event.

Overall my first visit to Partner Camp has been an interesting experience. Almost all of the attendees I spoke to appreciated the way in which Partner Camp offered the opportunity to connect with it through the event, even if that connection did not offer an immediate return. Similarly everyone was stimulated by the ability to network with peers in both competing and non-competing companies. While Orange will no doubt hope that they can maintain something of a monopoly on this style of event, it would be a format worthy of consideration by Symbian, S60, or UIQ.

Details of the presentation from Partner Camp will be made available through the Orange Partner Web site over the next few days. The next Partner Camp will probably be back in the US, in the first half of next year. Judging by the Spanish experience, it should be well worth attending.

Just as a footnote to Orange. For the next camp consider a venue closer to a major air hub, the 9 hour journey back to London however was something of a drag. While the hotel venue was pleasent, I not sure anyone took advantage of the location (or would have done even it the weather had been sunny). Partner Camp works because of the people and the format, not the location.