I am delighted to write a few words to preface this 2008 Best Business Award souvenir booklet on behalf of the Hong Kong Computer Society. It has once again been an honour for the Society to organise this particular award category and I am most grateful to the experienced and able Organising Committee for its hard work. It has proved itself swift and sure in handling the complex arrangements that have led up to this celebratory event.

These are challenging times for the world economy, and Hong Kong's smaller scale enterprises in particular need all the support they can muster if they are to leverage their skills, talent and initiative to make an impact in a flat or declining market. I am most grateful to the winners for the keen way in which they have championed this year's Awards.

The Awards are however just one element in what must be a studied effort to critically assess and promote the strengths and competitiveness of our homegrown industry. I look forward in particular to increased support for the small and medium scale IT enterprises that are doing so much to put Hong Kong on the map.

I do encourage you to study the details of the products and applications that you will find in this booklet. While all are bringing definite benefits to our society, some have shown themselves to be strong global warriors, even to the extent of setting benchmarks for a major industry worldwide.

Finally, I offer my warmest congratulations to this year's recipients of awards and certificates and wish them even more success in the years to come.

May I first thank all my panel colleagues for the expeditious manner in which they undertook the task of sifting through the entries and carrying out painstaking and constructive judgements and assessments. I am also grateful to the chairman and members the Organising Committee for their unfailing support throughout the entire process.

The fact that fewer entrants gained an award or a certificate of merit than in previous years reflects both the reduced number of entries received as a result of a tight submission timetable and also a slight overall decline in the quality and presentation of the submissions, but I would like to reflect briefly on two outstanding entries - the Gold Award winners.

In awarding the Best Business Grand Award and (Product) Gold Award to PremiumSoft CyberTech Limited for their Navicat for MySQL, we are acknowledging the many values of a product from a small but spirited young home grown company that thinks out of the box, understands and implements the benefits of thorough beta testing, and is now competing on equal terms with the world's best of breed products. This is a success story that typifies Hong Kong's "can-do" spirit.

Next, the Airport Authority Hong Kong has shown its capacity to set global standards to increase efficiency and help reshape industry practice with its Integrated RFID Baggage Reconciliation and Management System. It boosts Hong Kong's image among its airline customers and the world's travellers - a point that deserves the fullest emphasis in an Award scheme which tests business products and applications against a very wide range of benefits.

I congratulate the winners and hope that next year many more entrants will be ready and willing to follow their example and those of the other worthy winners and so help forward the interests of their companies and those of Hong Kong at large.

Despite the decline in entries this year, due in part to overall timetabling constraints, I am delighted that so many different success stories have emerged. In the Grand Award, we see, for example how a small local enterprise can challenge the world and win, and do so without any Government funding. This is exactly the spirit that we need to help us pull through these difficult times and it must suggest that any support that can be given to our deserving SMEs will be well leveraged by them. The brilliant technical story told by the other Gold Award winner is also most impressive, showing that very large organisations can also demonstrate high levels of creativity.

One lesson that emerges from this year's exercise is that, in their presentations, entrants would be well advised to give a thorough 360º evaluation of what they have achieved. Good packaging always enhances good content! Entrants are called on by the terms of the competition to demonstrate a wide range of benefits, and frequently they attach undue importance to the functional and technical side. We need to hear direct from our entrants the really important message that Hong Kong's IT practitioners have truly brought societal and economic benefits to the community.

Success is still in the air despite severe economic challenges. If Hong Kong's IT practitioners can continue to put their internal and external customers first, present their unique selling points in a really compelling way to these customers and within their industry sector, and look for continuous all round improvement, including flexible adjustment of their business models, they will be well placed to survive and succeed in an increasingly volatile world.

This year's Best Business Awards have been a particularly testing project for the members of the Organising Committee, given the very tight time constraints within which we were asked to work. The obvious enthusiasm and eagerness of the participants has made it all most worthwhile, however, and I would like also to thank each committee member for showing such dedication to the task.

It would appear that this tight schedule is also in part responsible for a falling off in the number of entries this year. I believe that if would-be entrants can be given more time to prepare their entries, the number of participants will then better reflect the continuing strengths and spirit of Hong Kong's IT industry.

I would like to thank the judges and assessors for the professionalism and breadth of vision they brought to their work. We have appended the most salient of their comments to the account of each product. As you will see, they pinpoint many success stories and will undoubtedly encourage our local entrepreneurs to create products and applications that bring real benefits to the community and also help position Hong Kong as a force to be reckoned with in the global IT arena.