Channel Awards 2003 - Categories

This year's categories and the voting system.

The Channel Awards categories for vendor, distributor and reseller awards have been brought into line with each other.

The awards will recognise the most outstanding organisations with a specialist focus in the SME and corporate sectors, and the best-performing company in each category overall.

Perhaps more important, though, are the changes to the judging process. The main awards, for the top vendor, distributor and reseller, will be decided on a straight vote: i.e. whoever gets the most votes wins.

For most other awards, the readers of Computer Reseller News and its sister title Computing will be asked to vote for one of six companies on a shortlist selected by a panel of judges.

This shortlist will be drawn up after the judges have scrutinised detailed entries that have been submitted by readers of CRN or by the vendors and distributors.

Details of the award entries will be published after the shortlist is announced on 4 August, so readers will be able to see why each company has been selected and why they think they should win.

In addition, two awards - Editor's Choice and Channel Personality - will be selected by the editor of CRN.

A shortlist for the Outstanding Product of the Year will be drawn up by a technical panel from CRN's publisher, VNU, and the two CRN/Syscap Approved Technology Innovator of the Year awards will be chosen by the judges of the monthly awards.

Awards categories for this year:

1. Vendor of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the vendor that has done the most overall in 2003 to help channel partners develop profitable business.

2. Corporate Vendor Partner of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the vendor that has done the most in 2003 to help resellers develop profitable business in the corporate market.

3. SME Vendor Partner of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the vendor that has done the most to help resellers develop profitable business in the SME market in 2003.

4. Specialist Vendor of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the specialist vendor that has done the most in 2003 to help resellers develop profitable business.

To qualify, vendors must derive half or more of their business from a focus on a particular area of the market, such as security, storage, networking or accounting software.

5. Outstanding Product of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the product that has done the most to help resellers excite customers and develop business in 2003.

6. Distributor of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the distributor that has delivered the best service overall to its channel partners in 2003.

7. Corporate Distribution Partner of the Year
CRN readers will vote for the distributor that has done most in 2003 to help resellers develop profitable business in the corporate market.

8. SME Distribution Partner of the Year
Readers of CRN will vote for the distributor that has done most to help VARs develop profitable business in the SME market in 2003.

9. Specialist Distribution Partner of the Year
Readers of CRN will be asked to vote for the specialist distributor that has done the most to help resellers develop profitable business in 2003.

To qualify for this award, distributors must derive half or more of their business from a focus on a particular area of the market, such as security, storage, networking, software and so on.

10. Reseller of the Year
Readers of Computing will be asked to vote for the reseller business that they believe has delivered the highest professional standards of service and support overall to its customers in 2003.

11. Corporate Reseller of the Year
Readers of Computing will be asked to vote for the reseller business that they believe has delivered the highest professional standards of service and support to corporate end-user organisations in 2003.

NB: Corporate resellers are defined as those targeting companies with more than 250 employees.

12. SME Reseller of the Year
Readers of Computing will be asked to vote for the reseller business that they believe has delivered the highest professional standards of service and support to SME business in 2003.

NB: SME resellers are defined as those targeting companies with fewer than 250 staff.

13. Technology Innovator of the Year - Public Sector
The winner will be selected by the CRN/Syscap Approved Technology Innovator of the Month judging panel from the 2003 monthly winners that delivered projects in the public sector.

14. Technology Innovator of the Year - Private Sector
The winner will be selected by the CRN/Syscap Approved Technology Innovator of the Month judging panel from the 2003 monthly winners that delivered projects in the private sector.

15. Channel Personality of the Year
To be presented to an individual who has made a significant contribution to the development and success of the channel as a whole.

16. Editor's Choice
The winner of this award will be selected by the editor of CRN. It will go to the vendor or other channel-focused organisation that has made an outstanding contribution to the channel.

All CRN reader votes will be audited by the Audit Bureau of Circulation.