An e-learning solution that could revolutionise the way children engage with education has taken out the top gong at the nation’s information and communications technology (ICT) awards – the 2008 iAwards.

Successful entrepreneur and champion of the local industry Peter Kazacos was last night presented with the prestigious CSIRO Tony Benson Award for Individual Achievement in ICT at the 2008 iAwards gala dinner, held in Melbourne’s Palladium Ballroom at the Crown Casino.

“Peter Kazacos is one of the ICT industry’s most successful entrepreneurs, with a long history of support for the local industry,” said AIIA Chief Executive Officer, Ian Birks. “He is a very fitting choice for this year’s award.”

“With his strong background in business development and commercialisation, Peter will be a worthy ambassador for the ICT industry over the coming year.”

Mr Kazacos has more than 30 years’ experience in Australian ICT. He founded KAZ in 1988 and led the company over its 17-year history – guiding it from its beginnings as a small IT services company in NSW, to its evolution into one of Asia Pacific’s leading IT services and business process outsourcing providers and the largest Australian-owned IT services company in the nation.

KAZ grew from 350 employees at its inception – through its listing on the Australian Stock Exchange in 2000 – to over 4,000 employees as a fully owned subsidiary of Telstra.

Prior to establishing KAZ, Peter held a number of senior technical positions in the Australian IT industry with leading Australian organisations. In 2001, Peter was the recipient of the inaugural Australian Entrepreneur of the Year Award in the Technology, Communications, E-Commerce and Biotechnology category. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame at the third Annual IT&T Awards in October 2004, under the category of ‘Champion of the Vendor Community’.  Peter is now the Managing Director of PK Business Advantage, a technology services company he established last year.

“I am extremely honoured to receive this award, particularly given its dedication to Tony Benson.  Tony was an outstanding champion of the Australian ICT sector and I have a great admiration for his enormous enthusiasm, dedication and belief in what we have to offer as an industry,” said Mr Kazacos.

“Australia has a world-class ICT sector and I have been fortunate to work with outstanding teams of people during my career.  I would like to thank them for their contribution to the businesses and industry that I have been involved with over the past 30 years.”

Ron Forrester, General Manager AIIA Government Relations, travelled to Kuala Lumpur for the World Congress in Information Technology 2008 (WCIT 2008) last week; AIIA Board Member Kee Wong also attended.

The week began at a Board meeting of WITSA, where elections were held for both Chairman and the Secretariat.  All candidates made presentations prior to the voting process. The result is that the new Chair (replacing USA’s George Newsome) is Mr Dan Khoo from Malaysia. The Secretariat has also changed from the USA’s ITA (based in Washington) to Malaysia’s PIKOM (based in KL.)

Both Anders Halvorsen and Jim Poisant will be retained as Secretariat staff located in Washington. The next vote which took place was to elect the next location for GPPC 2011 – the candidates cities being Guadalajara in Mexico and Montreal in Canada. Montreal was announced as the winner.

WCIT 08 commenced on the Monday at the KL Convention Centre (KLCC). Over 3,000 delegates from more than 90 countries were registered. The Opening Ceremony featured Malaysian Prime Minister Badawi (who also attended two conference dinners during the week). Plenary sessions were held over the next three days and plenty of business matching took place. Ron also attended a Ministerial breakfast with the Deputy Minister for Science and IT. Presentations were made on areas such as digital divide, environment and future of the Internet. Bill Gates addressed a large session via holographic means – quite a technological event. An ICT exposition with hundreds of booths were spread throughout five exhibition halls.

In the latter part of the week, Ron attended the ASOCIO Board Meeting attended by some 22 countries (including Cambodia who has just been admitted into the ASOCIO family.) Topics for discussion included new membership, skills development, ambassadors program, PR and branding, financial health, multi-lateral trade visits and the relationship with global organisations. Ron led a discussion on public policy (having written two papers on data protection and workforce issues.)

Ron also suggested to the Board that because ASOCIO is an organisation with such disparate membership that countries would only want to be involved in public policy issues which directly affected their country.  As a result it was agreed that each country would sign up to a public policy sub-committee to form policy for that particular issue. A table was drawn up at the meeting and countries signed up accordingly. Three-monthly teleconferences will be held for further discussions.

For more information about WCIT 2008 and its outcomes, contact Ron Forrester on (02) 6281 9408.