In an attempt to catch what some British politicians wistfully call the Nasdaq Mentality, the UK computer industry held Wednesday what it hopes will become its annual award ceremony for the most exciting young companies and most exciting initiatives in IT. The winner of the innovator of the year award went to an 11-man company, Insignia, which has developed a technology for adding voice and video to web sites. Three quarters of the stock of this company is still in the hands of the founders, who are seeking venture capital. In the category of electronic commerce, the company of the year went to Lincoln Software, a company which in a previous incarnation used to be known as Ipsys. Lincoln, with revenues of just $2.6m a year, is now seeking further VC finance to grow. In the deal of the year, the rather surprising winner was Logica, which took over the US company Carnegie Group Inc for a discount. Most UK analysts expected Psion, which partnered with Ericsson, Nokia and Motorola, to win easily. The hottest UK prospect of the year went to a company which many people argue is no longer British – the enterprise applications specialists Constellar, now managed largely from California.
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