Tech Innovation Is Alive And Well

What do these three companies have in common: Yosemite Technology, Hawking Technology and Catbird? Well, quite a few things if you really stop and take a hard look. For starters, they are all promising, new technology companies trying to get attention in the IT market and build their brand and visibility. Second, they are looking for partners and firmly believe their future depends on selling their products through the channel. And third, they were all recognized as winners in this year's VARBusiness Technology Innovators competition and honored during an awards ceremony at our XChange Tech Innovators conference. (VARBusiness is a sister publication to CRN and is operated by CMP Channel along with XChange.)

ROBERT DEMARZO Can be reached via e-mail at rdemarzo@cmp.com.

I am going to take a wild guess that many of you do not know these companies. But they are all worth taking a look at whether you visit their Web site or look over a summary of their products on our Web site. There were other winners you may not be aware of, too—including Switchvox and Extricom—but there were also some household names, such as Samsung and Panasonic.

Let me tell you a little about this year's competition. A few months back, we issued a call for entries, asking companies to submit their most innovative products—new launches or upgrades—that were released over the past year. The product had to be shipping by Sept. 30, and, of course, we wanted to make sure the companies were engaged with the channel. We have been doing this for years with the number of applicants growing—this year we hit a record 400—and the intensity of the competition has grown to a fevered pitch. Like the recent Jets-Patriots controversy over stealing sideline signs, we actually had one large vendor that went so far as to accuse a rival of falsifying its application. Don't laugh when I tell you that such behavior convinced me that our competition had really arrived. Winners have bragging rights for a full year and receive priceless endorsement from our organization,which draws attention from our loyal readers and online community. By the way, the easy part is writing about the winners. The hard part is borne by our editorial team, which must carefully review each application, compose a group of finalists and then decide upon a winner.

SLIDE SHOW: 2007 Tech Innovators Awards SLIDE SHOW: 2007 Tech Innovators Finalists

What is different about this competition and the event we wrap around the theme of technology innovation is that it has a singular purpose—to talk about how new technologies can help solution providers meet their growth goals. Many of the solution providers that attend are what I would describe as high-performance organizations looking to grow faster than the industry average. One of their attributes is their willingness to take a risk on new vendors and technologies. At Tech Innovators, if you have the goods, you get the gold.

Let me know about the best new technology you've seen in the past year and I'll include it in my next column. Robert C. DeMarzo (rdemarzo@cmp.com) is Vice President/Editorial Director of the CMP Channel magazines.