This year’s 12 awards are split into four industry categories: Design and Technology, Sustaining Society, Business Category, and E-Services, and will be judged by a panel of esteemed experts including Dr Chris Smith, founder of The Naked Scientist, Richard Pepper, director at Spilt Ink Studio (Funky Pigeon), Diane Modahl , chief executive at Diane Modahl Sports Foundation and Leanda Falcon, UK digital manager for Kellogg’s.
The DEAs are sponsored by hosting and cloud specialist UKFast – a Manchester firm that has contributed to the online success of many of the UK’s most competitive brands for over a decade.
UKFast’s CEO Lawrence Jones – 2011’s North West Entrepreneur of the Year – also sits on the DEAs judging panel. He says, “It is absolutely crucial to encourage entrepreneurialism online and reward those who are paving the way for a strong digital future.”
Winners will be announced on the 16th October in a glittering awards ceremony at the Hilton Hotel in Manchester. Companies can enter the awards for free, just click on the Enter Awards section of the website.

Speaking after being awarded the E-commerce Entrepreneur of the Year award at the 2011 Digital Entrepreneur Awards, sponsored by hosting provider UKFast, Richard said “I’m absolutely delighted, both for me and my team because it’s been a real team effort, both with the team at Funky Pigeon…and the team at UKFast who have helped us get where we are today”

“It’s obviously extremely flattering…I look forward to Monday morning when I go back to the office and show the team what we’ve won.”

Other winners in the region included design agency, magneticNorth, who received the Design and Marketing Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Mobile software firm Myriad picked up the Mobile Web Entrepreneur of the Year Award and online marketing agency Yoma walked away with the Web Development Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

Lawrence Jones, CEO of UKFast, the headline sponsor of the awards and one of Europe’s fastest-growing technical companies, said: “It’s a privilege to be involved in an event that recognises the innovators and entrepreneurs that are changing the face of the internet as we know it. There are some fantastic companies involved in the awards this year”

The awards, sponsored by leading web hosting company UKFast, celebrate the highest levels of British entrepreneurialism. Ayerst Environmental impressed the judges with their dedication to environmentalism while still running a successful business.

Ryder credited the innovative software the organisation uses as the key to their success an continued growth. “The journey’s been a long one in terms of software development…Our industry demands data dissemination we do this with both handheld and PC software, which has made our product unique and given us the edge.” He stated that 2011 was “a significant improvement on 2010, which in a diminishing market is a great achievement.”

UKFast CEO, Lawrence Jones said of the awards: “It’s a privilege to be involved in an event that recognises the innovators and entrepreneurs that are changing the face of the internet as we know it. There are some fantastic companies involved in the awards this year.

WORLDbytes is dedicated to breaking the mould of standard news coverage and give a voice directly to disadvantaged young individuals and groups who lack the means to be heard.

By providing ongoing free film and digital media training the organisation aims to mentor those who have been excluded from society yet are still determined to shape the world they live in.

WORLDwrite want to empower disadvantaged groups and individuals so that they no longer appear in the public narrative merely as statistics.

The company is unique as it is open to all and provides the technology, budget and tuition for those often excluded from society, to produce broadcast quality films and news programmes.

WORLDbytes is keenly supporting and upholding all forms of citizenship journalism – as an important component of democracy and ‘check’ on social injustice.

WORLDbytes has attracted an impressive audience and following across the web, already witnessing an increase in people wanting to watch, comment and get involved. It has ensured news programmes and reports feature across the web beyond the news channel to access further viewers and audiences on all possible video hosting sites.

The site has now had an extraordinary 348,000 viewings and receives an average of 29,000 views of its programme online per month. There is a different tale to be told and WORLDbytes’ motto is “Don’t shout at the telly, change the message on it”.

This entrepreneurial and empowered approach to utilising the web struck a chord with our entrepreneurial judging panel who awarded the company the “Dead Cert” for the Sustaining Society Category at our 2010 awards. The judges felt that WORLDwrite were the ‘one to watch’ for the coming year, and commented on their originality of using the digital medium to empower disadvantaged groups.

The company has grown in just 3 years to become one of the UK’s leading independent producers of gigs, tours and festivals, founded by veteran promoter Stuart Galbraith.

The company produces hundreds of shows per years, spanning a diverse range of tours that include Simply Red, UB40, Marina & The Diamonds, Katy Perry, Metallica, The Eagles and Muse.

The pride of the company is its own flagship event – Sonisphere. Founded in 2009, this epic event has grown to become the largest touring rock festival in the world.

Growing from zero to eleven major festivals, playing to a million people across Europe in just two years, Sonisphere has become one of the most grandiose success stories in music festival history.

As well as the fastest growing, Sonisphere is widely regarded as one of the most ‘connected’ festival brands, with its customer-base.

Underpinning everything from the start has been a fully integrated digital strategy that has not only engraved the brand into the hearts and minds of UK rock fans, but has also laid new ground that is re-defining the way all music festivals communicate and build affinity with their audiences.

Some of their most creative and innovative ideas include: related mobile applications, bedroom jam competitions, and even USB “Stickets” for admission to certain festivals.

Mobix supplies strong multi-factor technology for securing cloud services and mass-market authentication, for web, mobile web and/or voice channels. It safeguards access such as log-ins and transactions such as payments.

It has recently secured a strategic partnership with Orange Business Services that, the firm says, puts it in a position to lead in this market, especially with regard to two-way and “out-of-band” authentication.

Mobix is working with Orange to launch Authenticall – a new patent pending two-way, two-factor strong authentication product for telephony whereby both the agent and the customer are pre-authenticated prior to the call being connected.

The customer can even choose the timing and location of the call (PC SIP, mobile, home phone or work phone). Mobix says this results in more calls per agent, fewer abandoned calls, reduced fraud potential and greater customer satisfaction.

From the caller’s perspective, agents also spend less time or no time at all authenticating customers. Authentication takes between 20 and 120 seconds per call so the cost savings can be significant. Given that, on average, a one second saving per call equates to £1 million per year across a 20,000-agent operation, the development is undoubtedly significant.

Rewise Learning provides innovative educational training resources and services via its website www.learnthrumusic.co.uk under three brands: LearnThruMusic Educational Services, LearnThruMusic Workshops and Sing In Success – a corporate team-building training service.

To date the company is the only UK organisation that combines music and technology to produce educational resources for people aged 14-21 and in 2009, over 15,000 people used LearnThruMusic GCSE English resources.

In 2010, LearnThruMusic workshops were launched and Dicks tells us they have been a big hit in UK Universities, colleges and the third/public sectors.

To date workshops have been run with organisations such as The Princes Trust, Swansea University and a number of Welsh colleges.

Nathan John Dicks is also pursuing other entrepreneurial projects alongside Rewise Learning including marketing events/campaigns for companies, business consultancy and motivational speaking (primarily for events that focus on encouraging young people to be entrepreneurial).

Dicks said: “My entrepreneurial approach was formed from a deep self belief that I could achieve my ambition with hard work, solid research, passion and dedication.

“The general concept of Learn-Thru-Music is based on taking advantage of a massive gap in the market – the provision of learning resources that utilise music and technology to engage young people in learning and revision.”

The Hire Standard is a small business performing search and selection within the highly competitive recruitment field.

Faced with the effects of the recent recession and the government’s budget cuts – and the resultant recruitment freezes across the public and private sector – The Hire Standard hit the phones and focused on generating new business. But competitors had the same idea and The Hire Standard’s existing clients suggested they needed to focus on another method of attracting new business.

“Speaking with our existing clients, this was quickly noted as not the way to ride the recession out, as our competitors were doing exactly that in volume. Instead, we looked at ourselves, our service, our brand and why we not only love where we work, but also what makes us different,” The Hire Standard told us.

The Hire Standard embarked upon an entire re-launch of its brand with the aim of creating a visual feast that captured its audience, reflects its approach and speaks in a “real” voice to both clients and candidates. Its aim was to “Re-invent Recruitment”.

In the opinion of the DEA judges, The Hire Standard achieved its goals magnificently.

The company was founded in November 2003 and is an independent new media marketing agency supplying new media consultancy, campaign management and corporate training services. Core services include search engine marketing, search engine optimisation, social media marketing, mobile marketing, display advertising and application development.

One of the core services provided by 77Agency is social media consultancy, with a particular focus on the use of Facebook for marketing. This includes the set-up, development and management of Facebook Pages, Applications, and Ads.

77Agency was recently listed as “One To Watch” in the 2010 NMA Top 100 Interactive Agencies and we agree!

77Agency was one of the first agencies to identify the potential of social media for marketing and to develop software to enable the management, analysis and optimisation of large, complex advertising campaigns on Facebook.

The approach that sets 77Agency apart is its ability to identify trends within the new media marketplace at an early stage and develop the necessary tools to ensure that it provides the most efficient and effective service for its clients.

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