HT-NEXT Awards Program to Honor Visionary Hotel Companies & Innovative Products

1/10/2017
Hospitality Technology (HT) magazine and HTNG are pleased to announce that nominations are open for the HT-NEXT Awards Program including both the 2017 Hotel Visionary Awards and the HTNG TechOvation Award. The Awards Program, sponsored by Datatrend Technologies, will take place at HT-NEXT on April 11, 2017.
 
Through a two-part program, the HT-NEXT Awards honor both hotel companies and the technology suppliers that serve them. Showcasing these innovations in one joint awards presentation presents a broader picture of the inspiring advances that are being made in both technology and strategic implementation. 
 
“This awards program is a testament to the outstanding work that both technology suppliers and hotel companies are doing to provide experiences that exceed guest expectations,” says Dorothy Creamer, Editor, Hospitality Technology magazine. “As we focus on the importance of frictionless experiences, technology combined with the thoughtful implementation and analysis of technology will be the differentiator.” 
 
“Datatrend is thrilled to support the HT-NEXT Awards Program and the Hotel Visionary and TechOvation honorees,” says Charlie Cox, President, Datatrend Technologies. “We help bring next-generation technologies to market friction free, working with hoteliers and solution providers to develop and deploy innovative applications ranging from guest experience to operational efficiencies. So, this awards program is a perfect complement to Datatrend’s role in hospitality technology innovation.”
 
Sponsoring the HT-NEXT Awards is a natural fit for and well aligned with Datatrend’s role in accelerating technology innovation and deployment in the hospitality market. The HTNG TechOvation Awards offer a great venue for emerging innovators to gain visibility and also pair them with resources, partners and clients to accelerate adoption in the marketplace. With hotelier brands and management, the Hotel Visionary Awards has recognized some of Datatrend’s decades-long hospitality clients for innovations in technology-improved operations as well as guest-facing technologies; Datatrend helps hoteliers with consulting, design and deployment of these technologies across end-to-end systems…from data center to “edge.”

The Hotel Visionary Awards are open to hotel companies (including corporate brands, property management companies, and owners). Past award winners include: Starwood Hotels & Resorts, Hilton Worldwide, La Quinta Inns & Suites, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, Fontainebleu Hotel and more. 
 
Hotels may self-nominate and are encouraged to do so. Technology vendors/suppliers may also nominate hotel companies, but are not themselves qualified to receive the Hotel Visionary award. Honors are presented in two categories: Customer-Facing Innovator and Enterprise Innovator. The Customer-Facing Innovator award is presented to a hotel company that has leveraged customer-facing technology innovations to differentiate and/or improve customer service.  The Enterprise Innovator award is given to a hotel company that has leveraged technology beyond standard practices to improve overall hotel operations.
 
Companies interested in submitting a nomination should fill out the nomination form no later February 3, 2017.
 
HTNG’s TechOvation Contest was created to recognize and reward technology innovation in the hospitality industry. To enter, companies must submit a 90-second video showcasing the product, which will be hosted on HTNG’s YouTube channel. HTNG members and non-members will be able to vote on what technology they find most innovative.

The three videos with the most votes, along with seven contestants selected by a panel of judges, will advance to the next round and will have the opportunity to present their technology live at HT-NEXT. Three finalists will be chosen and the winner will be selected via a live audience vote.   Companies and individuals are encouraged to participate as a contestant, or help select the winner by “liking” videos online and voting at the HT-NEXT Conference. Initial applications and payment must be submitted by February 9 and video submissions must be logged by February 15. Online voting ends on March 5 and semi-finalists will be announced on March 6. For more information visit HTNG’s TechOvation Webpage or contact HTNG at [email protected].

HT-NEXT will take place April 10–13, 2017 at the Rosen Shingle Creek in Orlando, Florida. HT-NEXT is the first industry-leading event uniting HT’s Hotel Technology Forum and HTNG’s North American Conference into one immersive networking and educational event for hotel executives and solution providers. Visit www.ht-next.com for more information.
 
 
About Hospitality Technology
Hospitality Technology (HT) is the only publication dedicated to covering the role of information technology in improving business performance for hotel and restaurant operators. The Hospitality Technology editorial portfolio includes: a print publication that publishes nine times annually and reaches more than 16,000 hospitality industry executives, three networking and educational events (MURTEC, HT-NEXT and Restaurant Executive Summit), a comprehensive website, e-newsletters, web seminars, and several exclusive annual reports and studies. Visit Hospitality Technology online at www.hospitalitytech.com. Hospitality Technology is published by Chicago-based EnsembleIQ.
 
 
About Hotel Technology Next Generation
The premier technology solutions association in the hospitality industry, HTNG is a self-funded, nonprofit organization with members from hotel and hospitality companies, technology vendors to hospitality, consultants, media and academic experts. HTNG's members participate in focused workgroups to bring to market open solution sets addressing specific business problems. HTNG fosters the selection and adoption of existing open standards and also develops new open standards to meet the needs of the global hospitality industry.

Currently more than 400 corporate and individual members from across this spectrum, including most of the world's leading hotel companies and technology vendors, are active HTNG participants. HTNG's Board of Governors, consisting of 22 top IT leaders from hotel companies around the world, itself has technology responsibility for over 2.5 million guest rooms. HTNG publishes workgroup proceedings, drafts and specifications for all HTNG members as soon as they are created, encouraging rapid and broad adoption. HTNG releases specifications into the public domain as soon as they are ratified by the workgroups. For more information, visit www.htng.org.
 
 
About Datatrend Technologies 
Datatrend Technologies is a national IT consulting and integration partner helping hospitality operators and solution providers with friction-free deployment of intelligent infrastructure and edge technologies. Datatrend specializes in data center consulting, infrastructure solutions, and network cabling/wireless deployments to enable IoT, cloud, analytics and application performance – delivered with thought leadership and quality support. For 30 years, Datatrend has helped hotel brands, owners/operators and franchisees, as well as technology solution partners, to design and deliver next-generation solutions in thousands of properties across North America, supporting key operational workflows and exceptional guest experiences.
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