I first joined Borland back in 1997. I left for a couple of years in 2000, but was tempted back in 2002, and I’ve been there ever since.

The company name has changed under me a couple of times since of course, but I’ve now spent the last 14+ years working with largely the same bunch of passionate people building tools we love, to help other software developers. There were bad days of course, like any job, but on the good days I couldn’t believe someone was paying me to do it.

Well, everything changes, and last Friday was my final day as an Embarcadero employee. This was something that I’d been discussing with our new owners pretty much since the deal was closed in October, and thinking about for even longer.

I know some of you may think this is a signal that I’m not happy with the new owners, the direction of the product, etc, but it’s really not. Probably the best way I can try to convince you of that is by telling you what I’m going to do now.

I’m not leaving the Delphi community. I’ve been part of this community since 1994. Longer than I’ve been married, longer than I’ve been a father, and it’s indelibly part of me now. However I wanted to return to what I truly love doing: building software, helping other people build software, teaching people to build software.

So, with that in mind I’m starting a Full Service software company focussed on software developers. By Full Service I mean we do everything from providing products, training people to use those products, providing mentoring and guidance to development teams, and even taking on entire projects for people if that’s what’s required.

The company is called Code Partners, and the first vendor we’ve signed up as part of that full service offering is Embarcadero. We’re now the exclusive distributor for Embarcadero in Australia, New Zealand and South East Asia. RAD Studio 10.1 Berlin is all loaded up and ready to go (with an exclusive promo to celebrate the Code Partners launch), and we’ve already got training offerings available, with more in the pipeline. If you’re interested in more info, check out the website (yes, it’s a little v1.0 at the moment but it’ll improve) and connect with us on your social media poison of choice to get notified as we roll out more offerings.

I am sad to leave Embarcadero. I’ve never before had the privilege of working with a group of people so committed to building amazing software. I’ll consider Code Partners a major success if I can build even a part of that culture there.