An Open Letter to the i2 Community From Our CEO

It is with heavy hearts that we must inform the i2 Community that, at i2 Group’s demand, we will not be allowed to attend the i2 conference in D.C. in two weeks. Without any reason, a week ago we were informed by i2 Group that they did not wish to pursue any initiatives or joint marketing efforts with Blue Light. So, unfortunately, we will not be able to attend the i2 conference as our tickets were cancelled as well on Friday .

So, how did Blue Light go from receiving accolades last year for literally “keeping the brand alive during the IBM years” and receiving a set of commemorative sterling silver bagpipes and being told by a senior i2 developer that our Blue Fusion i2 plug-in was “f@#%Ing evolutionary” to being removed from the conference that we developed and ran until last year to keep the i2 brand alive? We aren’t sure. 

But after almost 20 years of supporting this product, it is a good question.

With millions of dollars invested in a company that has become recognized around the world as the “i2 Experts,” we are shocked at the i2 Group’s treatment of Blue Light.  After 18 months of asking and two meetings in the UK, we still have not received any paperwork as an i2 Partner, although we are recognized by i2 Management as the only “real” i2 Value-Added Reseller in North America. 

Additionally, despite partner demands that such an arrangement wouldn’t work, i2 Group leadership insisted on a competitive environment between them and their partners. Since then, their sales teams have interfered with, and we have lost, numerous deals that we have worked on with our partners for months costing us hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue. Despite delivering hundreds of courses and training thousands of students around the world, we were informed that i2 would develop their own services and technical support teams and compete with us for the services we have been providing since 2004 although the i2 team had limited experience providing such services and lacked the requisite Facilities Clearance for classified support.

Finally, at the D,C, conference last year that we, Blue Light, put together and ran for i2, we were incredulous when the CEO of  I2 informed us that i2 Group would not consider offering our award-winning product, Blue Fusion, because they felt that their sales team would only focus on Blue Fusion sales (the easier product to sell due to its innovative features). So, to resolve this dilemma, i2 Group management informed us they would try to develop a similar product, although we have two patents on the technology and have offered Blue Fusion as an i2 plug-in since 2015.

We are a cleared U.S. integrator, will continue to be one of the largest resellers of i2 (we have a contract with IBM allowing us to do so) and continue to create the most innovative solutions for the military, intelligence community, law enforcement, and security companies globally. Blue Light owns the largest i2 training platform in the world and our patented product, Blue Fusion, continues to grow and be implemented around the world as the most significant improvement to i2 Analyst’s Notebook in decades. As a stand-alone product, Blue Fusion will continue to provide i2 Analyst’s Notebook users with the only “no code”, federated searches of disparate data for i2 Analyst’s Notebook.   

In the end, as a small technology company owned by veterans and analysts, we will not leave you, nor let you down.  While we cannot attend the conference this year, we are there for you through our i2 Users Group (www.i2UG.com) which Blue Light owns.  You can find us online, at numerous data and intelligence conferences throughout the world or just reach out to us at www.bluelightllc.com or www.bluefusion.com.

See you soon, The Blue Light Team, Your i2 Experts.