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Trethowans Award for Excellence Through Innovation contenders

IT plays a vital role in the success of many of the world’s leading businesses, from exploiting fresh ideas and launching new products to finding new ways to cut costs and increase productivity.

Innovation is key to boosting turnover and profitability. And in the difficult trading conditions of recent years, those companies that have invested in innovation are set to reap the rewards as the recovery comes.

The most innovative firms in the region are being showcased in the Trethowans Excellence Through Innovation Award.

Judges have been looking for a company with a creative and different way of working, not only to keep ahead of the competition but also to keep them fresh and to be responsive to customer needs.

Leading Southampton and Salisburybased law firm Trethowans employs more than 140 people across its two sites and has just undergone a branding refresh after positioning itself for substantial growth with recent investment in both its people and IT.

Bluestar

Bluestar runs bus services linking Southampton with Winchester, Eastleigh, Romsey, Hedge End, Totton and the Hythe and Waterside area.

Its frequent services in and around Southampton have established Bluestar as a major provider of bus services in those areas.

Acknowledging the traditional way of collecting bus fares was old, outdated and not always reliable it has recently launched smart online ticketing.

Its Key smartcard makes paying for bus travel simpler and more reliable.

Instead of buying a paper ticket and fumbling for change customers can now buy their bus travel online in advance.

Each time they travel they present their key to the ticket machine and their journey is automatically recorded.

Bluestar’s website and social media sites were kept updated throughout the process to launch the Key.

Box-it Data Management

Established 25 years ago, Box-it Data Management is a specialist document management solutions firm.

The company is based in Winchester but provides a local service across the UK and Ireland through 14 regional offices.

Its comprehensive services and solutions span both digital and paper document (and record) management, facilitated through its own long-established cloud based product Omnidox.

The award winning system also now allows firms to outsource labour intensive processes whilst maintaining total control and accountability of them.

Box-it’s clients range from SMEs through blue chip organisations and government agencies.

Vertical Leap

Vertical Leap is a specialist search marketing agency.

The Portsmouth based agency helps its customers improve their visibility on Google and other search engines through its innovative use of search engine optimisation, paid search,and content marketing.

Its unique concept - content-driven search marketing – integrates search, social and content marketing which is now widely accepted as the most effective method of achieving results and ROI.

The service is delivered on over 350 campaigns for 200 customers with a 97 per cent customer retention rate by a team of search specialists, designers, and professional journalists, and is powered by a proprietary technology called Apollo.

SEaB

SEaB is an international specialist working in the renewable energy and energy from waste sectors.

The company is based at the University of Southampton Science Park in Chilworth on the outskirts of Southampton.

SEaB Energy has developed Muckbuster, a fully automated anaerobic digestion system, housed in a 40 foot shipping container.

Muckbuster converts food and biowaste into energy and liquid fertiliser.

A unit typically processes between 200 and 1,000 tonnes of organic waste per year, with higher tonnages handled by multiple units.