A series of local development companies were recognised in awards from Facebook, Gen-i and FileMaker last week:
Facebook backs Podclass
A locally-developed marketplace for online classes and video podcasts has landed a Facebook platform grant.
Developed by open source specialist Catalyst IT, Podclass was one of only 10 applicants to win a grant from the more than 1,000 received.
Catalyst IT developed Podclass for Gary Gil, founder of San Diego company Podclass.
Built on the open source elearning platform Moodle, Podclass provides a marketplace for anyone with expertise to provide online classes. Video content and social networking features in Podclass make it suited to Facebook's user base.
Catalyst is a significant contributor to the Australian-based Moodle open source project.
Digital Fusion wins FileMaker awards
Local software developer Digital Fusion has won the FileMaker Excellence Award for Solution Of The Year at the international FileMaker developers conference in Phoenix, Arizona.
Reactor is a plug-in for the FileMaker Pro database system. It was chosen it for it's innovation, quality and contribution to the FileMaker Pro platform.
Reactor integrates Web 2.0 features into FileMaker Pro databases, allowing the SMEs and corporate work-groups to build web technologies in their solutions.
Reactor includes a set of ready-made controls that developers can use out of the box. Ready-made controls include a Gantt Chart, Day Calendar and a Live Search features.
Digital Fusion says it has sold several thousand licenses for the Reactor software, and won contracts to do additional customisation work for a number of offshore companies.
Gen-i names Incubator Awards finalists
Ten start-ups have been named as finalists in the 2008 Gen-i New Zealand Incubator Awards. The winners to be announced in Wellington on 5 August. the finalists are:
Start-Up of the Year: Blackhawk Tracking Systems Limited (Auckland); INRO Technologies Limited (Auckland); TracPlus Global Limited (Dunedin). Start-Up Exporter of the Year: CropLogic (Christchurch); Hector’s World (Auckland); TracPlus Global Limited (Dunedin)
Innovation of the Year: iMonitor Limited (Auckland); PowerbyProxi Limited (Auckland); TracMap NZ Limited (Dunedin)
Start-Up Entrepreneur of the Year: Carmine Masiello — eBUS Limited (Auckland); Chris Hinch — TracPlus Global Limited (Dunedin); Neil Fitzpatrick — Oh! Group Limited (Wellington)