British company beats Microsoft to innovation award

 

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By Tim Danton

Posted on 30 Mar 2007 at 16:42

UK company OneClick Technologies fended off the might of Microsoft to win the Environmental Innovation Award at last night's eWell-Being awards. OneClick was nominated for its IntelliPlug, which can automatically shut down power to peripherals when a PC goes into standby mode.

"OneClick won because it's a simple device that can be retro-fitted and has the potential, without the consumer having to do anything at all, to save a huge amount of wasted energy. And that's for both individuals and organisations," said Jonathan Selwyn, director of Sustain IT, the organisation behind the eWell-Being awards.

In the opposing corner was Microsoft with Windows Vista, nominated for its improved power-management - and that, by default, PCs and notebooks will switch into standby mode after an hour. Typically, this will cut consumption from 100W to less than 5W.

However, Vista proved a controversial nomination as Microsoft has been criticised for its green credentials, due to the increased hardware demands of Vista compared to XP.

"Windows Vista is a significant upgrade of a product that's used by millions of people worldwide, and again without the user having do an awful lot it will reduce their energy consumption. Given the level of use of the product, it's going to save huge amounts of energy worldwide," explained Selwyn.

Zybert Computing was another finalist in the Environmental Innovation award, for its low-power server aimed at SMEs: the Z1 Gem typically uses only 45W, roughly a quarter the power consumption of a typical server.

Other winners on the night included walkit.com, in the Climate Change & Environmental Efficiency category, a website that plans a walking route from A to B. "I got the idea for the site after watching colleagues dive into the Tube or taxis when I knew the meeting they were going to could be reached on foot," said Jamie Wallace, the site's director.

Click here for the full list of winners, or buy the Independent on Monday 2 April and read The National eWell-Being Awards supplement.