The Mother of Invention

Necessity is the mother of invention; at least that's the adage.

So where does necessity come from in the channel? Ask any of the finalists for the VARBusiness Technologist of the Year Award and they'll tell you that it comes from solution providers.

VARBusiness debuts its Technologist of the Year Award to recognize an individual who is pushing the boundaries of technology, pioneering new innovations and techniques, and delivering new products to the channel that will help grow business and profits.

Nearly 100 vendor technologists were nominated for the award, representing a virtual who's who in R&D, product development and technology marketing. The editors spent days poring over the entries looking for just the right mix of innovation that both advanced the state of the art and provided VARs with a practical product that served their needs and those of their customers. The quality of the nominees was so high that we could only narrow the list to a top 10.

Our Technologist of the Year winner, Novell's Nat Friedman, demonstrates the best characteristics of innovation and channel communication in the development of SuSE 10 Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED). It's the first practical GUI for the open-source platform, which is a remarkable achievement all by itself. But Friedman and his team moved beyond their narrower initial vision to incorporate the needs and desires of Novell's partners in the project. The result of that collaboration is an operating system that has all of the basic features and functionality—and a suite of business-productivity applications—of Microsoft Vista, but at one-eighth of the cost.

While there can be only one winner, the accomplishments of the other finalists are nothing short of remarkable.

> Raritan's Swen Anderson created the first chip-based management controller for KVM and virtual support.

> APC's John Beam built the InRow Cooling unit, which moderates data-center temperature with greater reliability and efficiency.

> SonicWall's John Gmuender developed a continuous data-protection suite specifically for the channel.

> AMD's Phil Hester has overseen all of the chipmaker's product development, and opened new markets and opportunities for whitebox builders, and server and PC resellers.

> Oracle's Michael Hichwa oversaw the development of three applications that make database development easier.

> Lexmark's Tom Knight oversaw the creation of the customizable interface on the company's new line of multifunction printers.

> Network Appliance's Sajai Krishnan launched the StoreVault S500, the first all-in-one storage appliance purpose-built for SMBs.

> UGS' Bill McClure scaled his company's enterprise-class product-lifecycle-management suite into a practical and affordable version for SMB customers.

> IBM's Thao Nguygen built Contracts Online, a Web-based application that makes it easier for solution providers to do business with Big Blue.

The technology these people have brought to the channel is impressive. The common thread among all of them is the involvement of solution providers in the development of their creations. Each worked extensively with VARs to learn what they need, what the market needs and where existing products are falling short of expectations. Anyone with enough know-how can bring a high-tech product to market, but it takes a channel-committed technologist and vendor to realize and embrace the value of solution providers in the technology-development lifecycle.

The VARBusiness Tech Innovators Awards wouldn't be possible without the participation and contribution of our panel of solution-provider judges: Manny Villa, president of Viatech; Valeh Nazemoff, vice president of business development, Acolyst; Kevin McDonald, vice president of business development and worldwide channels, Alvaka Networks; Tim Huckaby, CEO, InterKnowlogy; Subhash Kothari, president and CTO, Reliant Tech; Brian Okun, regional sales director, Prevalent Networks; Greg Carter, vice president, Iteration2; Shiv Kumar, executive vice president, ZSL; and Steve Hunt, president and CEO, 4A International.