Record number of entries reflects growth as the UK economy becomes increasingly digitalised

The shortlisted finalists for the UK’s 2013 Next Generation Digital Challenge Awards have been announced today. The awards showcase the best in next generation digital access infrastructure innovation and run alongside the annual NextGen Conference - the UK's leading event for Next Generation broadband activity.

This year there has been a record number of entries underlining recent research reports suggesting the UK economy has far more digital enterprises (and jobs) than previously reported in government data. The 2013 awards includes three new categories for enterprises and projects in digital skills, digital innovation and open data, to reflect the growing utilisation of infrastructure investment in urban, rural and mobile connectivity.

All finalists are now invited to prepare a case study summary submission to the independent judging panel. The judging panel will review every entry and apply a standard marking scheme that assesses the complexity of the challenge, the extent of innovation and the evidence of achievement.

The annual Next Generation Digital Challenge Awards process started in February with an open call for nominations. The finalist’s case studies will be presented in a special session at NextGen13 prior to the conference dinner and awards ceremony on October 14th.

Two key sponsors for the 2013 awards are the Knowledge Transfer Network for ICT and Go ON UK. The former facilitates the UK’s innovation communities to connect, collaborate and find out about new opportunities in key research and technology sectors. The latter is an organisation aiming to make the UK the world’s most digitally skilled nation.

NG Events Director, Marit Hendriks, said, “We are delighted with the surge in response this year, underlining the themes we mapped out in our paper on Economic Revitalisation and our input in June to the Intelligent Community Forum’s annual summit in New York.”

The award entries and a full shortlist of successful entries is available here: http://www.nextgenevents.co.uk/awards/shortlist-2013