SDForum "Tech Behind Digital Media" Competition

Calling all private digital media companies!

SDForum, a leading Silicon Valley not-for-profit organization providing an unbiased source of information and insight to the technology community for the past 23 years, is on the quest to find top digital media companies with exceptional technologies driving new media. The organization has partnered with Vator.tv to find great technologies behind new media companies to participate in SDForum's upcoming conference, The Business of New Media II on December 11th. SDForum provides a venue for engineers, executives, researchers, technology leaders, and venture capitalists to exchange information on emerging technologies and best practices. Newforth Partners is a sponsor.

SDForum reaches 12,000 software professionals annually through more than 20 events each month. 

It's easy, quick and simple to PARTICIPATE: Register and hit "upload a pitch" and create a profile for your submission. Then return to this competition and hit "participate." The more comprehensive, the more likely to get votes, ratings and be reviewed.

The SDForum organizers continue to be on the lookout for tech gems across the new-media space. So, if you have a neat technology that changes the future of media, and frankly, a cool technology with legs, then join this competition.  

What do you win? Winners of the SDForum "The Tech Behind Digital Media" search competition will win the opportunity to present at the SDForum "The Business of New Media" event on December 11 in Mid Peninsula. The presenters will have the opportunity to make a presentation in front of 120-plus attendees, consisting of investors, major technology enterprises and potential partners, other startups as well as the press and other executives in media and technology.

The winner will also be featured in the Vator Reports, the show on innovation and innovators.
 
Who should participate? Anyone can participate. We encourage students - high school, college, graduate - to entrepreneurs and inventors from around the world to anyone with an new-media company, really.

What to submit: Submissions are in the form of a video pitch or PDF or PPT. But we really encourage video so Vator can highlight and feature some of the pitches throughout the duration of the contest. Also, the video pitch will likely receive more votes, ratings and views.
  

How to win: Vator competitions use the "wisdom of the crowds" approach to find true gems. The Vator community winnows down the selection process for the final team of judges, consisting of SDForum CEO Susan Lucas-Conwell and other members of the SDForum team, Vator co-founder and CEO Bambi Francisco. and Robert Hoffer, Managing Director at Newforth (sponsor for this competition). At the end of November, 7 companies will be selected based on the number of votes, the number of views, the highest ratings, most positive comments, the quality of the pitch presentation and the market opportunity. The judges will make the final decision as to who will present.

So, get the Vator community to help find those winners. These video pitches will be public so the Vator community can help vet the deals. So, for those pitching, encourage your colleagues, customers or experts in your field to provide comments, vote and rate your video pitches and/or to upload their own video pitch about why your video pitch is the best. For those who don't want to share their secret sauce, share what you can. But remember: Success is 2% idea, 98% execution. In other words: Ideas are one thing, executing is everything.

What should you include in your 2-minute pitch?

• You can include anything, really. But here are some guidelines:
• Be original
  
• Demonstrate your value proposition, why will your technology change the face of  media as we know it today?
  
• Make it fun and entertaining
  
• Explain the market size/opportunity
  
• Avoid interview style presentations (boring!) 
  
• Why are you better than your rivals? (And don't say you don't have any!)

        
The competition starts Oct. 29, 2007 and ends on Nov. 30, 2007.

 

Thank you to Newforth Partners for being a sponsor for this competition.