A record 65 nominations were received for the awards and the 4 winners were announced on the 12th June at the UK Open Source Awards in Edinburgh.
The 2019 UK Open Source Awards, 10-year history 65 nominees were whittled down to a shortlist of 14 contenders across 4 categories thanks to the judging panel of Allison Randal, Dawn Foster and Head Judge Jonathan Riddel.
The successful 16 nominees who have made the short list were:
-
Individual
– for outstanding contributions to open source:
- Mandy Chessell
- Simon McVittie
- James Morgan
- Tracy Miranda
-
Company
– for outstanding contribution to open source either through
product development or contributions to projects:
- Cloudsoft Corp.
- Open Healthcare
- The Apperta Foundation CIC
- Outlier Ventures
-
Public Sector and Third
Sector – for an
outstanding open source project in the UK public sector or third
sector:
- Ripple Foundation
- The Apperta Foundation
- Inside Outcomes CIC
- NHS Digital
-
Student – a
cash stipend of £1,500 will be awarded for an outstanding
contribution to open source from a currently matriculated UK
student:
- Antreas Antoniou (University of Edinburgh – School of Informatics)
- Andrew Brock (University of Edinburgh and Heriot-Watt – Edinburgh Centre For Robotics)
- Nathan Hughes – (Aberystwyth University)
- Yiannis Simillides – (Imperial College London)
The independent judges had this to say:
“Many of the student projects contain impressive research and using open source ensures that this work can be easily used by future researchers and students,” said Dawn Foster who herself has a Phd in contribution to the Linux Kernel.
Head Judge, Jonathan Riddell, of the KDE community commented “We had four impressive lists of nominations to whittle down to the shortlists. It took us a good week of deliberations to pick some truly spectacular projects and we had to by-pass some very worthy candidates but these do represent a beautiful spread of the state of the art. Well done to all 65 nominees.”
“I was impressed by the number of nominations based around helping the NHS, the entrepreneurial spirit working for the public good using open methods is exactly what we were after.”
The awards were won by: Simon Mcvittie, individual award, ABEHR, which works with Apperta Foundation won the company award, Ripple Foundation won the public sector award and Nathan Hughes won the student award, receiving a stipend of £1500 from Opus VL.
Peter Coates, Managing Director of the Apperta Foundation commented that “OpenEyes remains the most successful and most highly regarded open source clinical application in use within the NHS, it simply wouldn’t exist without our unique collaboration model that has made it a reality.”
Jason Brown, Founder and CEO of ABEHR Digital added that “ABEHR Digital are thrilled to win the ‘Best Company’ category in the UK Open Source Awards for the OpenEyes Electronic Medical Records project. Our teams welcome the recognition for their work and expertise which demonstrates how front line clinicians collaborating with health-tech companies like ourselves and the Apperta Foundation are driving excellence in open source software design and delivery – providing real benefits for NHS professionals and patients on the ground right now. It’s the perfect synergy.”
Winners of the Public Sector and Third Sector award, Ripple Foundation said “We are delighted to receive the award for Public Sector Contribution from the UK Open Source awards after review from open source expert peers.”
Phil Barrett, Director of Ripple Foundation explained:
“Ripple Foundation as a not for profit, is on a global mission to transform healthcare tech, towards an open platform approach. While the use of open source is maturing fast in many sectors, the public/ healthcare sector has much catching up to do and we are proud to be at the forefront of this shift, internationally.”
Dr Tony Shannon, Director of Ripple Foundation went on to say:
“Along with colleagues in allied organisations such as the Apperta Foundation, we’ve been pushing for a 1% open platform investment fund from the public health tech spend across the UK and Ireland for some time now. The time has come for the state to acknowledge the key role of open source as an enabler for innovation and improvement in public and health care services and we believe the timing for this small #1percentfund step to shift the market is long overdue.”
The Awards are made possible in 2019 by the sponsorship of Microsoft, Collabora, Codethink, Open UK, Open Invention Network, Opus VL and NHSX.
“Open Source is eating the world and its fab to bring together 65 nominees from so many different sectors and communities, all contributing to and benefiting from open source. Next year we look forward to the awards being even bigger and better and taking the awards to London!” said Amanda Brock, CEO of Trustable, the Awards co-organiser and Open UK Director.
“The strength and breadth of the nominees demonstrates the growth and positive impact Open Source is making to businesses, students and organisations. It’s great that the UK Open Source Awards can bring all these communities together which share common values to celebrate their achievements.” but said Dale Murray, CEO of SalesAgility, the Awards co-organiser.
“”Given that it celebrates the innovation that arises out of open source software, and focuses on the individuals and organizations in the UK that make it happen, I am pleased to have been part of the UK Open Source Awards. Kudos to all of the nominees, award winners, and event organizers. The UK OSS community is strong and vibrant and reflective of the global community of innovation in which it participates.“ said Keith Bergelt, former awards keynote and CEO of one of this year’s sponsors Open Invention Network.
The UK Open Source Awards 2019 were organised by SalesAgility and Trustable Software.
