Saxby honoured in CNET Networks Awards extravaganza

Sir Robin Saxby, the man who led chip-designer ARM onto the world stage and, in 1998, the stock exchange was last night honoured with the Outstanding Contribution to the UK Technology Industry at the UK's top event recognising the best in tech.

Speaking remotely from ARM's offices in Maidenhead, Saxby paid tribute to the thousands of engineers across ARM and its many licensees, as well as looking to future generations and the opportunities the UK has in fusing tech and creative industries' know-how.

Other well-known UK brands were also recognised in the CNET Networks UK Technology Awards as both user and supplier-side gongs were handed out.

The winners at a glance...

♦ Enterprise Hardware Product of the Year Pillar Data Systems - Pillar Axiom Storage System
♦ Enterprise Software Product of the Year NetSuite - NetSuite
♦ Networking Product of the Year Aruba Networks - Aruba 200 Mobility Controller
♦  Security Product of the Year Qualys - QualysGuard Enterprise Version 4.0
♦ Mobile Product or Initiative of the Year eCourier - eCourier.co.uk
♦ Internet Innovation of the Year Zopa - Zopa
♦ Public Sector Technology Project of the Year The Royal Hospitals - Integrated wi-fi for Royal Hospitals, Belfast
♦ Financial Services Technology Project of the Year Alliance & Leicester - Securing online banking customers with RSA Security
♦ Telecommunications Sector Technology Project of the Year Orange/AKQA - Orange Integrated Shop
♦ Technology Partnership of the Year BP and Intel
♦ UK Technology Marketing Campaign of the Year Mason Zimbler - The Adobe Acrobat 3D Launch
♦ UK Technology PR Campaign of the Year Lewis PR - Salesforce.com: Turning an industry on its head
♦ CIO of the Year Philip Clarke - Tesco
♦ Outstanding Contribution to the UK Technology Industry Sir Robin Saxby, ARM

Tesco's top IT man Philip Clarke won CIO of the year, while BP and Intel won Technology Partnership of the Year, mainly for co-operation around mesh wireless networks in challenging locations such as oil rigs.

Across the Financial Services, Telecommunications and Public Sector user award categories, the winners were Alliance & Leicester, Orange and The Royal Hospitals, Belfast - the latter for the innovative use of wi-fi and location-based services across its campus.

Online lending and borrowing exchange Zopa - which has cut out the middle man in that market in much the same way as a Betfair or an eBay - walked away with Internet Innovation of the Year, while another upstart start-up, eCourier, will have to find more room on its mantelpiece as it picked up Mobile Product or Initiative of the Year.

Other winners across areas including security, networking, software and hardware were Qualys, Aruba Networks, NetSuite and Pillar Data Systems.