*Nominated companies must be based in Boulder or Broomfield counties or in the Denver/Boulder corridor. **Companies may send additional product or service materials (including brochure, video or product sample), as well as longer market description, with nomination.

Send any additional information to:
Chris Wood
The Boulder County Business Report
6610 Gunpark Drive
Suite 200
Boulder, CO 80301
Attn: IQ Awards Nomination

Judges' Criteria for IQ Nominations

The IQ Awards is seeking products or services that are truly “innovative.” Judges look for entries that stand out from the crowd – ideas that are very creative and perhaps even unique.

Awards Criteria
• All products or services must be submitted by companies based or with a major presence in Boulder or Broomfield counties or in the Denver/Boulder Corridor area with close ties to the Boulder Valley area.

• The idea should be one that can lead to a “sustainable” business – one that is not just a design on a napkin but a product or service that has the best potential to help build or grow a successful and profitable company. Although financials are requested with a nomination, a certain level of revenues or profits is not a deciding criteria to become a finalist.

• The product or service should be in the marketplace or at least in a testing or beta situation where actual or potential customers already are using it or trying it out. Nominations will be accepted if the product is only in a prototype stage.

• Companies that previously submitted nominations but were not chosen as finalists are encouraged to enter again.

• A company that has won a previous IQ Award can win again for an entirely new product or service.

• Companies may send a packet of additional product or service materials (including brochure, video or product sample), as well as more detailed market description, to better inform the judges.

Judges' Biographies

BOULDER -- A committee of leading area businesspeople are judging entries for the 2009 IQ (Innovation Quotient) Awards, organized by The Boulder County Business Report.

IQ Awards judges for 2009 are:

		Frances Draper: Executive director of the Boulder Economic Council. She spent 14 years in banking in Denver as a senior executive and served on the board of the Downtown Denver Partnership.
		David Herring: Distinguished career in the high-tech environment with more than 30 years experience in general and technical management and development engineering. He was chief technical officer for Storage Technology. He also has held technical and executive management positions at McData Corp., Amdahl Corp., McDonnell-Douglas Corp. and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
		Paul Jerde: Executive director of the Robert H. and Beverly A. Deming Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Colorado Leeds School of Business. Jerde is a co-founder of Corboy and Jerde LLC, an investment banking firm. Patty Graff, also with the Deming Center, is assisting with judging.
		Jerry W. Lewis: Jerry W. Lewis, a 35-year veteran Colorado journalist, is the former publisher/editor of the Boulder County Business Report and continues as a contributing columnist to the newspaper. Lewis was a founding member of the Boulder County Business Hall of Fame and is a board member of the Imagine! Foundation, a nonprofit serving people with developmental disabilities. Lewis also has been an editor with the Boulder Daily Camera and The Denver Post. He was the business editor of The Denver Post before becoming one of the owners of The Business Report in 1989. He is a journalism graduate of the University of Kentucky.
		Theresa Szczurek: Chief executive of her Boulder-based consulting firm, Technology and Management Solutions, where she works with both emerging and established organizations worldwide. Szczurek is an award-winning business leader, speaker and author of "Pursuit of Passionate Purpose: Success Strategies for a Rewarding Personal and Business Life."