Recently in Awards Category

The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), a global organization leading the way in promoting the development and sustainability of mobile marketing, announced the winners of its Fifth Annual Global Mobile Marketing Awards during the Annual Dinner and Awards Ceremony on November 17 at the Mobile Marketing Forum in Los Angeles.

As the MMA's highest honors, these awards recognize companies and their campaigns for spearheading the adoption of the mobile channel for marketing purposes.

"The MMA, its members and the entire mobile marketing community come together each year to honor our industry's exemplary campaigns and remarkable leaders throughout the world," said Mike Wehrs, president and CEO of the MMA. "We congratulate this year's winners and finalists on their outstanding achievements, and look forward to their continued success as they help advance the mobile marketing channel's evolution in the years to come."

Each year, the MMA's highly anticipated awards ceremony serves as the conclusion of the Mobile Marketing Forum (www.mobilemarketingforum.com). The MMA received hundreds of submissions in 12 categories from companies across the globe. Winners are selected by the MMA Awards Selection Committee comprised of global industry leaders from wireless carriers, technology and content providers, agencies and industry publications.

CES announced its Best of Innovations Winners, Sponsored by CEA, and endorsed by the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA)

The Best of Innovations designation is awarded to products that earn the highest honors from a panel of judges, which include engineers, independent designers and journalists. Award honorees will also be displayed at CES Unveiled.

In the wireless category, there is a wireless handset from Saygus running Android that makes low-bandwidth video calls. When your cell phone rings a ring on your finger lets you know what's up with the OR ring that you can wear on your finger on on your ear. Then there's a mobile social networking solution from MoSoNex that send photos and videos to friend's TVs.

THE WIRELESS WINNERS ARE:

Category: Wireless Handsets Saygus, Inc. Saygus V Phone Model: V1 http://Saygus.com

The first cellular handset in the world to offer low bandwidth two-way video calling on existing 2.5G Networks, the Saygus V Phone is a qwerty slider running the Android OS.

Category: Wireless Handsets Accessories Hybra Advance Technology, Inc. O.R.B. Model: 0041 Design by: Hybra Advance Technology, Inc. http://www.hybratech.com

Ring that user wears on his/her finger. Vibratory alert with E-Ink caller I.D., text messages, and meeting reminders. Flips into headset that fits to users ear. ORB wireless earpiece ring.

Developed by Hybra Advance Technology, Inc. in partnership with AbsolutelyNew's Science+Technology Division, the ORB is a finger-worn ring that twists open to become a comfortable, secure and sophisticated Bluetooth headset for hands-free calling.

CTIA WIRELESS I.T. & Entertainment 2009 in San Diego offered the First Annual CTIA "Fund Fest" 2009, a business app pitch session.

CTIA President and CEO Steve Largent was joined onstage by an expert panel of three judges - Rory Moore, CommNexus San Diego CEO; Any Seybold, Andrew Seybold, Inc. CEO and Principal Consultant; and Quinn Li, Qualcomm Ventures Managing Director. The audience voted by texting.
 
Here's what happend:

• First up was Chander Chawla, from Mjedi, a mobile web platform featuring the actual in-store shopping experience, combined with the instant friends and family recommendation possibilities of social networking. The company microtargets shoppers using UPC code entry scans to track price status, check for other bargains elsewhere, look at competition via online shopping and ultimately aide the individual on their purchasing decision. 
• Next to showcase its product was Terry Goertz and Jeff Fedor from ParkVu. Using their WITH ME and WITH MUSIC online platforms, users can transport all their computer files, music, pictures and video to their mobile device in a single click. The goal is to seamlessly import this information into your cellphone or smartphone. 
• Billing Revolution's Andy Kleitsch pitched his company allowing mobile payments and transactions to be performed on your mobile device.
  
• Chyngle's Todd Sullivan showed how Chyngle will improve an attendee's experience at large-scale venues such as shopping malls, concerts, sports arenas, etc. Chyngle enables stadiums and other venues (even shopping malls) to create customized "white-label" apps to enable consumers to purchase event tickets, order concessions delivered directly to their seats and participate in interactive polling. Chyngle's branded apps use GPS to find the customer's location and helsp discover services and people nearby. CEO Todd Sullivan calls it "in-pocket marketing."
• Last, but not least was Jonathan Javitt from TelCare, a remote sensor monitoring company that connects patients to their caregivers through medical devices utilizing "machine to machine" cellular communications. They're focused on individuals with diabetes - something that affects 28 million Americans today, and is projected to affect 60 million Americans by 2020. 

Largent came back up onstage to confer with the expert panel of judges and tabulate text-voting results

Chyngle  was voted the winner and won the first annual grand prize. Maybe there will be a Chyngle app for CTIA next year. The People's Choice Award winner was TelCare. 

All five CTIA Fund Fest finalists received a complimentary exhibit and marketing package for a 2010 CTIA event valued at more than $25,000 and a block of public relations consulting time from Media Strategies, Inc.

CTIA-The Wireless Association announced the winners for the first annual CTIA Hot for the Holidays awards program, revealing this year's must-have mobile consumer electronics products and applications.

Winners across seven categories included "hottest:"

• Bluetooth Accessory - iLane from Intelligent Mechatronic Systems.
• Camera Phone - Nokia N86 8MP.
• Mobile CE Device - Eye-Fi Explore Video Card.
• Mobile Consumer Application - Jitterbug LiveNurse.
• Mobile Internet Device or Netbook - MiFi 2200 Intelligent Mobile Hotspot for CDMA 1xEVDO RevA from Novatel Wireless .
• Novelty Accessory - Slim Data USB Card from Kempler & Strauss.,
• Smartphone - HTC Touch Pro2 .

Garnering the most online votes, Magneat from YOUnison was named the CTIA 2009 Hottest Web Pick. The Samsung Reclaim earned the most text votes onsite in San Diego and took home the CTIA 2009 Hottest in Show award.

It you want to buy the HTC Touch Pro2 as gift,  beware .Although the HTC Touch Pro2 received excellent reviews, it has been out-of-stock for a while and is not expected to be in stock until later this month.

CTIA-The Wireless Association announced finalists in the CTIA Fund Fest competition. The apps cover billing, app development, music, shopping and healthcare.

CTIA Fund Fest finalists will deliver five-minute presentations about their new mobile concepts, and the judges' panel will engage each finalist in a Q&A. The finalists are:

• Billing Revolution- Billing Revolution has everything you need to begin processing credit card transactions on mobile phones.
• Chyngle- Chyngle is a B2B mobile application platform which enables any venue to create a branded, custom mobile application to enhance the customer experience during events, increase venue and vendor revenue and communicate directly to attendees through their own interactive in-pocket marketing channel.
• Mjedi - scans shopping items and then gives notifications of when it on sale.Gaves are also shared on Facebook.
• ParkVu- puts iTunes library on BlackBerry smartphones.
  
• TelCare - TelCare connects patients to their caregivers through the use of medical devices utilizing "machine to machine" cellular communication. The company's first product will be announced shortly.

Overall wireless customer care performance has improved considerably as customers report shorter hold times and improved rates of problem resolution on the first contact, compared with six months ago, according to the J.D. Power and Associates 2009 Wireless Customer Care Performance Study-Volume 2 released today.

Alltel, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless rank highest in wireless customer care performance, in a tie, each with a score of 747. Alltel performs particularly well when contacts are resolved through customer visits to the retail store and ARS, while T-Mobile's strength is in transferring customers from an automated response system to a live service representative. Verizon Wireless performs well with regard to identifying customer problems quickly and resolving them efficiently with service representatives. 

The study finds that overall customer care performance has improved considerably to 735 on a 1,000-point scale, up 12 points from the first wave of the study released in February. Satisfaction improves across all methods of contact, as a result of increased first-contact problem resolution and shorter wait times. More than three-fourths (76%) of calls to customer service are resolved on the first contact, compared with just 66 percent six months ago. In addition, hold times now average 5.55 minutes, compared with 6.58 minutes in February 2009.

The study also finds several key wireless customer care patterns:

• Nearly one-third of contacts pertain to the customer's cost of service.
• Among customers who contact their carrier by phone two to three times to resolve an issue, 17 percent report they are likely to switch wireless carriers in the future. In comparison, just 10 percent of customers are likely to switch when the issue is resolved in one contact.
• Fifteen percent of contacts result from calls or text messages originated by the wireless carrier. Those customers who contact their carrier after receiving these communications are more satisfied (744, on average), than customers who do not receive proactive contact from their carrier (730).  

IDSA, BusinessWeek, Target and Autodesk announced the winners of the 2009 International Design Excellence Award (IDEA) competition. The commitment to sustainability was the hallmark in product winners.

Samsung of South Korea was the top winner from the corporate world, claiming eight awards, while Apple claimed seven.

In the communications category there was no gold winner but the iPhone 3G S won the silver award. Bronze winners were Samsung and Peek. The Social Campaign Smartphone allows people to demonstrate their support of a particular social cause and encourage others to make donations to that cause. Users indicate the social cause they are supporting (reducing environmental pollution, providing relief to the poor, etc.) through the customized back attached to their phones. The phone back provides content about the cause, which users can share with family and friends.The Peek Mobile Device won Bronze. The Peek is a mobile email device that provides users with unlimited text and email capabilities. It is intended for people on the go who want to stay connected but don't need a feature-heavy smartphone. The device is extremely thin and light--25% slimmer than the iPhone

In the netbook category Samsung's Kiwi N310 won a Bronze Award. Kiwi is a 10.1-inch mini laptop that brings together a high-tech electronic device with the convenience of a day-to-day product, such as a bag or wallet. The design uses a cute, familiar shape and natural colors to ensure a comfortable experience.

The Mobile Excellence Awards (www.mobilexawards.com)  announced its partnership with Trendsmedia, the events and publishing division of The Yankee Group

The MEAs will take place on December 7th, 2009 in Los Angeles, CA, and will celebrate the best of the best in mobile entertainment by honoring the best in mobile entertainment, creativity, and breakthroughs from all walks of the mobile ecosystem. Judged by industry luminaries, the awards show celebrates the best in categories that include Best Start-up, Mobile Innovator, Mobile Advertising, Mobile Video, Social Network, Games, Music, Original Programming, Community and Fan Content, Promotion, Mobile Product & Services, including the prestigious Mobile Ambassador and People's Choice awards, amongst many others. This year's MEAs added an additional seven new categories in Mobile Technology and Mobile Entertainment.

"MEA's engagement as a partner in 4G World 2009 underscores the key role that mobile entertainment plays in the 4G wireless industry," explains Eliot Weinman, President and Founder, Trendsmedia - Yankee Group Events and Publishing Division. "We are pleased that MEA has chosen 4G World 2009 as a venue to announce the finalists in this important program of recognition for the mobile entertainment industry."

The MEAs are sponsored in part by GoTV Networks, Saffron Digital, Azuki Systems, and supported by industry-leading companies such as The Yankee Group, ShowStoppers, ITV Alliance, 4G World, Billboard, Mobile Monday LA, Mobile Marketer, Wireless Week, MobiAdNews, MobilizedTV, Axis PR, Interactive Branding Agency, Mesh, amongst others.

Submissions for the MEAs are now being accepted at www.mobilexawards.com. Contact the MEAs at info@mobilexawards.com, 310.276.2220.

AT&T announced its Fast-Pitch Platinum Award winners at CTIA.  Winners received a share in $70,000 of prize money and opportunities for inclusion in an AT&T distribution channel.

Fast Pitch Platinum Award Winner--Consumer Category
TuneWiki is a social media player that offers song lyrics synchronized to the music playing, a one-click music video link, and music maps and charts based on actual playback count. It delivers new playback experiences on PC, Google Android, Apple iPhone/iTouch, Intel MID and a variety of other music-enabled mobile devices.

Fast Pitch Platinum Award Winner--Enterprise Category
Boopsie won the $25,000 grand prize in the in the enterprise applications contest. Boopsie is an application platform that revolutionizes mobile search for enterprises.  Boopsie uses a multi-prefix incremental search from the device and then creates special indexes from any target data store to pull up results incredibly quickly. Moreover, it allows companies to quickly create applications to share information with their employees or customers--Boopsie has examples of this capability with their real estate multiple listing service application and WorldCat library applications.

NAVTEQ, announced at an award ceremony that T+1 Solutions is the Grand Prize winner of The Americas edition of the 2009 NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge. T+1 Solutions won in the category of Enterprise which is one of five categories: Content, Enterprise, Entertainment & Leisure, Navigation and Social Networking.

The winning application, Taxi4me, is a mobile taxi ordering service that helps consumers anywhere in the world connect with trusted taxi companies. The desired time and destination is sent from a user's mobile phone to a taxi brokering server. Local taxi companies then submit competitive bids and proposed routes back to the consumer.

The three runners-up also selected by the judging panel include:

• DialPlus Inc. (Social Networking): DialPlus enhances the standard phone call experience by automatically and simultaneously providing dynamic, contextually relevant visual information about the called or calling party before, during and after the call is over.
• Creativity Software (Entertainment & Leisure): Rough Guides Mobile Travel Guide is a location aware city guide with user-generated content and social networking features.
• Colombia Games (Social Networking): ToGetThere allows people to share car rides and create a trustful community that helps to save the earth by traveling together.

The 4^th Annual CTIA Emerging Technology (E-Tech) Awards were announced at CTIA Wireless 2009.

Taking this year's Best in Show award is Top Global for its 3G UFO Personal Hotspot, which provides instant mobile access to the Internet. The winner of this prestigious award was determined by more than 40,000 combined online and text votes submitted by CTIA show attendees and wireless industry professionals. iLoopMobile and OpenMarket provided text-voting capabilities for this year's program.

The first place best phone/smartphone was that keyboard-tastic HTC Touch Pro2, followed by the BlackBerry Curve and Samsung Memoir. The winning lifestyle product was the Novatel Wireless MiFi 2352 Intelligent Mobile HotSpot.

According to Juniper research Apple iPhone game volume was remarkable. The decline in Java downloads in Western Europe and North America in 2008 was offset by the remarkable volume of downloads generated through the Apple App Store for the iPhone.

Their report also noted that the levels of gameplay per download via iPhone were far higher than for any other handset. Volume and other factors combined to bring Juniper's Future Mobile Gold Award for Mobile Games to Apple.

The Silver Award for Mobile Games was given to Fishlabs, for its groundbreaking work in the development of premium 3D titles and its mobile gaming community, myFISHLABS.

Michael Schade, CEO & Co-Founder of Fishlabs said: "To receive the Juniper Research Future Mobile Awards in the Games Category into second place right behind Apple for innovating the mobile games industry is a great achievement for our company and our products. From the very beginning Fishlabs was constantly pushing the envelope in terms of quality and innovation for both, our games themselves but also the way we sell our products to consumers. With our award-winning mobile games portfolio and our revolutionary free try & buy download model we will change the game of the mobile games industry."

Frost & Sullivan has awarded Sprint the 2008 Award for Market Leadership in the Consumer LBS Market for its open approach to developing GPS applications for mobile phones.

Sprint offers a wide variety of consumer GPS applications and  recently announced that it will offer developers open access to two location aggregation platforms.

Frost & Sullivan projects that the U.S. market for wireless carriers' consumer LBS applications will reach approximately $3.3 billion in annual revenues by 2013.

Sprint LBS services include: Sprint Navigation, which provides GPS-enabled, turn-by-turn driving directions with 3D moving maps, one-click traffic rerouting and more than 10 million local listings. Sprint Family Locator, which enables a parent to use their phone or PC to find the location of a family member, which is displayed on a map along with the address, surrounding landmarks and accuracy of the information within a specified radius.

Tipping Point's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) will be sponsoring the Pwn2Own hacking contest for the 3rd time.  It will be held during the CanSecWest Security Conference March 16-20th in Vancouver, BC. Hackers are invited to crack into browsers and mobile device for the chance to win $10,000 and the actual devices along with one year of phone service if a phone is a hacked.

Device and software makers don't have to worry because, ZDI will purchase all winning vulnerabilities  and hand them over to the affected vendors, and coordinate public disclosure. 

The Zero Day Initiative will pay $5000 per browser bug, and $10,000 per mobile bug. The first person to crack any of the mobile devices will also get to keep that device along with a one year phone contract.  The first person to crack any of the browsers will get to keep the laptop it was running on.  All winners will be asked to sign and agree to the general ZDI Non Disclosure Agreement.

Research In Motion (RIM)  received the GSMA Chairman's Award at the GSMA's Global Mobile Awards ceremony. This award, established in 1995, is the Association's most prestigious award and recognises outstanding contribution to the growth and development of mobile communications around the world.

INQ Mobile won the GSMA's award for "Best Mobile Handset or Device" for its INQ1 Social Mobile.

The INQ1 won the award over four other shortlisted contenders including the Nokia E71, T-Mobile G1, RIM BlackBerry Storm and LG KS360

The company launched the INQ1 in October of 2008 and it became known as the world's first Facebook phone.

The INQ 1is an HSDPA handset that provides one-click access to fully integrated applications including Facebook, Skype, Windows Messenger and Last.fm. The intuitive navigation offered by the switcher key and menu carousel, along with instant information provided by the home screen widgets and the integrated phonebook, deliver an experience so intuitive that it's easy and fun to stay connected.

There's more news from Mobile World Congress which has 49,000 registered attendees. The Winners of the Mobile Peer Awards were announced. Here are the winners:

Babajob.com: Social networking and job location web with lots of mobile features is theWinner of "community" award for start-ups that are "early stage."

Babajob -- Also winner of  "jury" award for very early stage companies;

Orbster : Winner of the "audience" award for early stage companies, it uses GPS for games and other entertain.

Fring: Winner of the community award for companies that are "emerging," or slightly more advanced in stage. Fring allows users to make free mobile calls with fring, IM with Skype, MSN Messenger, ICQ, Google Talk, SIP and Twitter Contacts.

Popcatcher -- Winner of jury emerging for emerging companies. It records music from the radio for MP3 players and mobile phones.

Unkasoft -- Winner of the audience award for emerging companies.It converts advertising into mobile games.

Forum Nokia announced  finalists in its Calling All Innovators global mobile developer contest.

• GreenDrive (EMEA) - An application that promotes vehicular fuel efficiency by sensing current and impending road conditions that influence fuel consumption and providing real-time driving directions for the shortest route in the quickest time legally allowable.
• Ticketek Mobile Ticketing (Americas) - A Series 40 and S60 Java event-ticketing application that reduces paper consumption by allowing consumers to use a barcode stored on their phone to gain admission to events.
• Green Phone (APAC) - An S60 application maximizing battery life through improved regulation of device backlight, WLAN, Bluetooth and charger power consumption.
• TigerMap (China) - An eco-friendly city guide application that makes choosing public transportation easier, combining up-to-the-minute mass transit information with recommendations of the best restaurants, entertainment, hotels and shopping in more than 150 cities throughout China.

ZAGG ,producer of mobile electronics accessories, including the popular invisibleSHIELD announced that it has been named "Company of the Month" in the January 2009 edition of The Bowser Report.

Based in Newport News, Va., The Bowser Report compiles fundamental analyses on small-cap companies trading on the NYSE, NASDAQ and ALTERNEXT (formerly AMEX), and passes buy recommendations to readers. Now in their 33^rd year, The Bowser Report is the only newsletter for stocks trading at $3.00 per share or less.

invisibleSHIELD isn't just another screen protector. Custom-cut Full Body Shields, available for many devices, offer protection for your phone. They claim that with their patent-pending full-body contour wrap, your smartphone or computer will always look like it did the day you bought it.

Readers of Global Traveler magazine selected Verizon Wireless as providing the world's best wireless service. This is the second time Verizon has won the honor.

The survey, now in its fifth year, gives Global Traveler readers the chance to voice their opinions on the best in many categories of business and luxury travel.

Verizon was the only wireless carrier to be recognized by the magazine. Verizon offers a number of international solutions for customers whose business or leisure travel takes them to points around the globe. The Global Travel Program works for the occasional or infrequent global traveler who needs to stay connected to home and the office.

Existing Verizon Wireless customers traveling in a GSM country for less than 21 days can receive a global device for short-term use. A nominal shipping fee applies, but there are no daily rental fees or security deposits with this program.