Company-X is acknowledged as one of the Top Tech Companies of 2022 by ExportNZ.
Co-founder and director Jeremy Hughes was presented with the award at the 50th anniversary celebration of ExportNZ at Zealong Tea Estate, Hamilton, on June 9, by ExportNZ director of advocacy Catherine Beard and Employers and Manufacturers Association board member Colin Birch.
Company-X was nominated by New Zealand Trade and Enterprise because of its growth through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Company-X supplied software and hardware that enabled clients teams to work from home and provide remote assistance to team members or clients still in the field.
During the pandemic Company-X won a Reseller News Innovation Award for Voxcoda, a software as a service solution that turns text into humanlike voices, and the Best Professional Service Innovation Award at the Hamilton Central Business Association CBD Awards.
Members of the Company-X team won the Women in ICT Awards during the pandemic and the Microsoft Most Valued Professional Global Skills Challenge.
“I’m honoured Company-X was recognised with this award and feel extremely proud,” Hughes said.
“For me it’s confirmation of our amazing team and the fantastic work they’ve
been doing.”
Company-X co-founder and director David Hallett added: “Our team has successfully navigated the headwinds of the COVID-19 pandemic, winning awards and achieving growth. It’s wonderful to be recognised for this.”
Multi-award-winning software specialist shares tips and tricks in new book
Company-X senior software developer Jiadong Chen has written the ultimate guide to creating games with Unity 3D, 2D, augmented and virtual reality technologies and the Microsoft Game Stack.
Game Development with Unity for .NET Developers was published by Packt in May.
“I was approached by Packt via LinkedIn,” Chen said. “I decided I would write the book because it felt like a good opportunity to express my knowledge in this area.”
Microsoft, Azure Architecture Center Senior Program Manager of Architectural Publishing Ed Price is raving about the book.
“Our author, Jiadong Chen, used to work at Unity Technologies as a Field Engineer. He’s been working in this .NET and Unity gaming stack for over 9 years. He’s a member of the .NET Foundation, and he’s been a Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) for 6 years. (That means he’s been awarded every year since 2015, based on his impact to the Microsoft developer community.) As you can imagine, his MVP award category is Developer Technologies,” wrote Price.
Chen also won Microsoft’s Most Valuable Professional Global Cloud Skills Challenge in 2021 with a prototype app using artificial intelligence to diagnose pneumonia.
“In other words, Jiadong is the perfect person to teach you how to use the .NET Framework and Microsoft developer stack to learn how to develop with the Unity game engine and how to take your games to the next level!”
Chen wrote the book to familiarise software developers with the Unity game engine and give them a high-level understanding of the Microsoft Azure Cloud.
Reviewer Justin Horner said The Ultimate Guide was the perfect description of the book.
“While I’ve read quite a few Unity-specific books, few go as in-depth on the fundamentals of game development and how to integrate with Azure cloud services,” Horner said. “It covers so much that even if you have experience with Unity, there’s probably something here to expand on your knowledge. I can easily recommend it.”
Game Development with Unity for .NET Developers is available from Amazon.com priced $32.39 in Kindle edition and $44.99 in paperback
AUTHOR: Company-X senior software developer Jiadong Chen.
Company-X and the Road Efficiency Group finalist in coveted innovation awards
The team who built the world’s first national roading performance reporting and data quality assurance tool is celebrating being named a finalist in New Zealand’s most coveted innovation awards.
Hamilton software specialist Company-X and its client the Road Efficiency Group (REG) was a finalist in the Reseller News NZ-Wide Innovation Award for the REG Insights portal in May.
REG Insights gives Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency, city, and district councils the ability to interrogate data quality and measure performance trends on a national framework. The project took the entire roading sector on a journey and significantly moved it forward in the area of evidence-based decision making.
The latest award recognises partners delivering customer innovation headquartered outside of the two most-populated metropolitan areas in the coun-try. REG Insights was one of a handful of projects that also won Company-X the Hamilton Central Business Association Best Professional Services Innovation Award in February.
Waimakariri District Council chief executive and REG chair Jim Harland said the placement in the awards was a tremendous acknowledgement of a decade’s work providing better information across the transport sector.
Waka Kotahi Senior Investment Auditor and REG Insights Product Owner Tony Lange said it was fantastic to be acknowledged for what the partnership between REG and Company-X had produced.
“When we work with Company-X there’s always fresh thoughts coming into the conversations,” Lange said. “The sector is really appreciative of the information that they’re getting out of it.”
Waka Kotahi System Manager and Sector Excellence Workgroup chair Roger Brady said he was “really stoked and excited” about the recognition REG Insights had received.
“It’s a small recognition of the great work that REG has done over the years,” he said. “The foundation has been set a long time ago, and it’s great to see the rewards being reaped, the recognition given.”
“This is just another accolade for Company-X’s unique work”, said REG Programme Manager Andrew McKillop. “Their skills, coupled with the depth of asset management knowledge within the REG team, leads to a truly transformative partnership creating valuable tools for the transport sector.”
REG Insights was also a finalist in the Excellence in Govtech Award at the 2021 New Zealand Excellence in IT Awards.
