The three-day conference launched with a relaxed cocktail party Wednesday evening, attended by what Todd Abrams, chief operating officer of Layered Technologies, estimated was about a quarter of the total number of guests registered for the event.

Attendees seemed to enjoy mingling among familiar and new faces while John Pozadzides, Layered Technologies' chief marketing officer, kept the atmosphere even more lively by wandering from group to group with a videographer, interviewing guests for the company's soon-to-be launched video blog.

As with many of these types of partner events, Layered Technologies will be taking this opportunity to share key announcements with its partners and clients. On Wednesday the company reported it has collaborated with Microsoft (microsoft.com) to become the "first hosting provider to launch Hyper-V."

Although it officially hasn't been announced yet, Pozadzides says the company will also be launching its new logo and brand at LT Pact. It seems the name "Layered Techologies" has been shortened to the more "hip" and truncated "Layered Tech," which has been the common colloquial term for the company anyway. The logo has also been re-designed, with a stylized "L" and "T" put together to form a blue square on top of black line layers.

The conference begins bright and early at 8:15 a.m. Thursday with a short opening address by Layered Technologies' CEO Jack Finlayson and a keynote titled "Cloud/Grid Computing: A Classic Disruptive Technology," by Forrester Research analyst James Staten. http://www.thewhir.com/marketwatch/051408_Layered_Tech_Names_Event_Keynote.cfm

The WHIR is on location reporting from the event, so keep updated through our blogs (thewhir.com/blogs/whir-tv/). Also look forward to feedback and interview segments from the conference on WHIRtv (whirtv.com).