On the evening of Tuesday 10th November, a very smartly attired party of ten from ‘Active Web Solutions’ attended The National Business Awards Ceremony sponsored by Orange. Hosted at the glittering Grosvenor House Hotel in London, AWS attended as finalists in the ‘Best Use of Technology in Business’ category, honouring the development of their life-saving ‘MOB Guardian’ technology.
 
Hosted by the very capable Kirsty Wark and featuring Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling as key-note speaker, The National Business Awards are the UK's premier, cross-industry business awards programme and held in high regard. As regional winners already, AWS were hopeful of their chances on the big night - competition was stiff however, as they knew they were competing against some of the most successful and innovative UK companies.
 
The nomination for their regional award-winning entry ‘MOB Guardian’ stemmed from, quite literally, a life-saving project. The UK fishing industry is one of the most dangerous with one of the highest fatality rates. Around 30 fishermen are lost at sea every year in UK and Irish waters. The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) needed a solution that would provide their Search and Rescue operations with an accurate location of vessels at sea and an automatic alerting system that would notify them when a crew member fell overboard. The RNLI turned to Active Web Solutions and working together, developed a ground breaking automatic alerting system to enhance the RNLI’s search and rescue operation.
As the evening progressed, the twelve hundred attendees dined on a delicious three-course dinner, accompanied by fine wine and even better company. The tension mounted palpably as the evening’s events drew to an exciting conclusion with the winners being announced. The first category to be announced was the ‘Best Use of Technology in Business’ category in which AWS were finalists. As Kirsty Wark took to the stage and opened the envelope a hush fell over the room... leaning forward to catch every last word, the diners seated at table 82 in particular held their breath, eager to hear the winner announced. Sadly, it was not to be AWS’s night, with the award gong to another, very commendable and worthy project assisting police with forensic intelligence. Despite the obvious disappointment, the team rallied immediately and had a superb evening all the same, celebrating and commiserating alike with fellow competitors.
As the ceremony drew to a close, the brave and able of the twelve hundred attendees headed for the dance floor, while the rest chatted and made the most of a fantastic evening laid on by Orange. Although not national winners on the night, AWS can certainly be very proud to be regional winners and take heart in the knowledge that since its introduction, the their MOB Guardian system has helped to save 9 lives to date. Richard Prodger, Technical Director at Active Web Solutions commented;

“We are very passionate about the system we have put together with the RNLI and having our system recognised as innovative and well engineered by a panel of well respected independent judges, gave the whole team involved a great deal of satisfaction and pride. Entering an award of this type, where the competition is very tough and one is up against established brand names, serves to demonstrate to us that, as a small company, we can still make a difference. Having now made that difference, particularly with regard to those fishermen’s lives that the RNLI were able to save as a result of what the team has achieved feels like winning in it-self”.