Skype's backers walk away with awards

Index Ventures, the venture capital firm that backed VoIP phenomenon Skype and saw it sold to eBay in a deal worth up to $4.1bn (£2.4bn) last year, walked away with the Venture Capitalist of the Year and the Deal of the Year awards at Tuesday night's Investment and Growth Awards in London.

The awards recognise those judged to be leading the way in the areas where early-stage tech companies, investors, advisors, user organisations and others come together.

Hottest UK Technology Prospect of the Year was Icera, a pioneer of wireless software modem platforms for mobile phones, and the award for Hottest Overseas Technology Prospect of the Year went to NetSuite, a provider of CRM software for mid-sized businesses.

The CIO Innovator awards were won by London Borough of Hillingdon's Steve Palmer in the public sector category and Amtrak Express Parcels' Phil Young in the private sector category.

Other winners included Chris Stone of Northgate Information Solutions for Technology CEO of the Year (Small and Medium Cap Firm), and Terry Burt of 2e2 Group for Technology CEO of the Year (Private Firm), an award that saw Chris Brassington, chief executive of Totem Communications, highly commended.

Bango CEO Ray Anderson was named Technology Entrepreneur of the Year, while the teaming up of Vodafone and Fujitsu Services saw them win in the Partnering for Innovation Award.

The Private Equity Firm of the Year award went to Advent International, while Atlas Ventures won Early Stage Investor of the Year and Osborne Clarke won Technology Law Firm of the Year.

The UK Technology I&G Awards are run by the European Technology Forum, a sister company to ZDNet UK. You can see a list of all the finalists and award-winners here.