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| The innovation engine |
March 14, 2006 |
By Peter Wolchak
This issue of Backbone is our second in what has become an annual celebration of innovation in general and of the Branham300 in particular.
The Branham300 is the premiere roundup of Canada’s top-performing technology companies, ranked by revenue. We are once again very pleased to publish it.
The 300 is made up of the Top 250 IT Companies overall, Top 25 IT Multinationals operating in Canada, and the Top 25 Up and Comers. This third category is especially compelling as it points to some future directions for technology. Many of the innovations are online offerings: broadband access, real-time collaboration, mobile technology and IP telephony. Also represented is the darker side of the online world: more than one Up and Comer is focused on security and intrusion detection.
Pay particular attention, also, to the Movers and Shakers category. While all the companies in the Branham300 know how to make money, this list focuses on those which jumped the most number of spots on the revenue ranking, compared to last year. In other words, the financial picture is pretty rosy for those sitting in the comfy boardroom chairs at these 20 firms.
The Branham rankings are based on financial data provided by companies or gleaned from public sources. If your company did not submit its results to Branham this year we encourage you to do so next year. You have to play to win, and maybe one year from now Canada will see your company in the pages of this magazine.
Other innovation
In other innovation news: e-paper may actually be on the horizon.
Yes, we know e-paper is like the flying car from The Jetson’s or Scotty’s transporter — lots of wishes, no products on the shelves. But real progress has been made on e-paper and products, when they come, will be cool.
Today we have LCD and plasma screens. They are nice to look at but are large, heavy and expensive. And they gulp down electricity. E-paper technology will offer lightweight, high-resolution, flexible screens that only draw power when an image changes.
To understand the significance of that, imagine reading Stephen King’s latest horror show on a handheld computer. Today the unit’s LCD screen sucks battery power continuously, even though the display only changes when a page is turned— say every 60 seconds. An e-paper display, on the other hand, requires juice only once a minute. That greatly increases battery life.
That means e-paper, once it is both reliable and cheap enough for prime time, will be used in everything from outdoor signs to rollable e-magazines to the art hanging on your wall.
Another innovation showcased in this issue owes more to old-style sensibility than to bleeding-edge smarts. On page 50 Larry Keating says he is resting a new business line on the shoulders of customer service.
The company plans to launch a line of notebooks sold not on the basis of new features or bottom-line pricing, but on the promise of superior customer service. Tech providers, Keating says, have failed to provide good after-sales support, opening the door to any company willing to do so.
Innovation bites back
And while we celebrate innovation’s winners, it is clear that for some to surge ahead others must fall behind. This is the case at GM, suggests Jim Harris at the end of this issue. Hybrid cars are pioneering a new and growing market, while GM’s reliance on big steel does not seem to be doing its bottom line any good.
This issue is a compelling review of 2005 and a look ahead to what’s coming, but it is also a call to action: seize a vision of the future or watch that future pass you by.
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| Top 300 Issue |
 
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