Ημερομηνία: 16/3/2007 2:25:00 μμ Περιοχή: Λονδίνο Βρετανία Από: PRN

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Source: Euro-CASE Reference: PIV249597-UK British, Swedish and Austrian Entrepreneurs Win the EU's "Nobel Prize" for ICT BRUSSELS, Belgium, March 16/PRNewswire/ -- A communications solution that offers businesses access to fixed-line phone services anytime, anywhere, an automatic scanner that digitises books in minutes and a software translation system that avoids the need for reprogramming are the Grand Prize Winners of the European Information and Communication Technology (ICT) awards for 2007. These three Grand Prizes, worth EUR200,000 each, were won by British, Swedish and Austrian firms. Seventeen more prizes, of EUR5,000 each, were awarded to ground-breaking technologies from five other countries. The 20 prize winners were selected by the European Commission from a record number of 450 applicants, from 30 countries. "Information and communications technology opens up a world of new possibilities - new ways of working and new ways of living," said Information Society and Media Commissioner Viviane Reding as she awarded the prizes in Hannover. "Innovations such as these are essential if Europe is to stay ahead in the global game. These prizes recognise European industries continuing capacity to develop and deploy state of the art ICT products." For the first time the European ICT Prize awards ceremony took place at CeBIT, the world's largest ICT trade fair in Hannover, Germany. The three Grand Prize Winners (of equal merit) each receiving an award of EUR200,000 are: - Telepo's Business Communication Solution: for extending advanced voice and messaging for the mobile workforce by integrating mobile and fixed-line communications. Telepo, based in Stockholm Sweden, has offices in Finland and Australia. - Transitive Corporation's QuickTransit: for software translation without source code or binary code changes. Transitive, founded in 2000, has its headquarters in Los Gatos, California and a research and development team in Manchester, UK. - Treventus Mechatronics' ScanRobot(TM): for lowering costs and increasing speed for digital library creation through automatic distortion-free book scanning. Treventus, founded in 2006, is a spin-off of the Vienna University of Technology and is based in Austria. Background: The European ICT Prize, the EU's own "Nobel Prize" for innovation in information and communication technologies, is funded by the European Commission's Framework Programme for Research (see IP/06/1590). Since 1995 this has been organised every year by the Commission together with the European Council of Applied Sciences, Technologies and Engineering (Euro-CASE). The judges are independent experts who recommend the winners and grand prize winners to the Commission. The Executive Jury was chaired this year by Professor Wolfgang Wahlster of Germany. Contact CAROL PENDER Johnson King Public Relations T: +33-(0)1-53-16-11-14 E: carolp@johnsonking.fr Source: Euro-CASE Contact: CAROL PENDER, Johnson King Public Relations, T: +33-(0)1-53-16-11-14, E: carolp@johnsonking.fr