Last night,  members of the WBA enjoyed a very exciting evening at the first Wi-Fi Industry Awards gala dinner and networking event at the Wi-Fi Global Congress at San Francisco’s Grand Hyatt Hotel.

The awards recognized outstanding achievement by operators and vendors within the Wi-Fi Industry and attracted entries from vendors and operators from across the world encompassing the whole public Wi-Fi ecosystem.  After a very delectable dinner, Shrikant Shenwai, WBA CEO, kicked off the awards ceremony with a welcome speech expressing his gratitude to all the entrants and thanking the crowd for making this year’s Wi-Fi Global Congress an amazing success.   He then introduced the lead judge, Joe Madden to announce the award winners in the 5 Categories: Best Next Generation Hotspot Initiative Award, Best Wi-Fi Service Innovation Award, Best Wi-Fi Technology Innovation Award, Most Innovative Hotspot Venue and Best New Ventures or Business Plan.

Category 1, Best Next Generation Hotspot Initiative Award, was won by True Corporation and Cisco for True Pioneers Next Generation Hotspot.  Cisco’s John Smith made a heartfelt speech introducing True, who then thanked the audience overcome with happiness at the announcement and acknowledgement of True’s work.

Category 2, Best Wi-Fi Service Innovation Award, was awarded to KT for Olleh Premium Wi-Fi Services and this too brought forth a warm and grateful speech and lots of photos of the KT team!

Category 3, Best Wi-Fi Technology Innovation Award, which had the most entries, went to Cisco and their Aironet 3600 Next Generation Design.  Cisco’s John Smith returned to the stage as his colleagues gave him hearty applause again to accept this award greatly thanking his team and WBA for all their support.

Category 4, Most Innovative Hotspot Venue, had an all London-based shortlist, but there was a great burst of applause as the winner, BT was announced, for their worldwide recognized “olympian effort”, the London Olympics 2012 coverage.  The award was accepted by Chris Bruce, who was understandably moved that BT and all the team were recognized by their industry partners and WBA for that which was also held with such great national pride.

Lastly Category 5, Best New Ventures of Business Plan, was presented to Devicescape for the Devicescape Wi-Fi Offload Solution which was a wonderful surprise for them  and accepted with
with broad smiles and more photos!

There were two other Chairman’s Awards  saved for the end  and there was a another huge round of applause when the first was  announced in the Operator category, for Orange and Cedric Gonin skippped to the stage.  He gave a moving speech about how much the WBA has grown and how proud he is to be a part of it.  This was followed by the second award in the Technology Partner category being presented to Intel and continuous applause for Necanti Canpolat as he graciously accepted the award inviting his team to the stage and more photos!

An evening event that made evident the old and new friendships and partnership that have been forged during Wi-Fi Global Congress 2012 in San Francisco.  Excellent food combined with entrants and winners encapsulated the innovative thinking that has become a cornerstone of the mobile data boom.

We would like to extend again our congratulations to all the winners and thank all those who entered the inaugural Wi-Fi Industry Awards.  We look forward to 2013!

Information about the Wi-Fi Industry Awards and 2012 winners can be found at https://wballiance.com/category/wba-releases/.