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Brainshark

Gold Stevie Award Winner 2012, Click to Enter The 2013 American Business Awards

Company: Brainshark, Inc., Waltham, MA
Entry Submitted By: Davies Murphy Group
Company Description: Brainshark provides the leading cloud-based software for creating, sharing and tracking online and mobile video presentations. Thousands of companies – including a third of the Fortune 100 – rely on Brainshark to increase the impact and reduce the cost of their sales, marketing, training and HR communications. For more information, visit www.brainshark.com.
Nomination Category: Products & Product Management Categories
Nomination Sub Category: New Product or Service of the Year - Software - Mobile On-Demand Application

Nomination Title: Brainshark’s SlideShark App

Tell the story about this nominated product or service (up to 500 words). Describe its function, features, benefits, and performance to date.

With more than 30 million PowerPoint presentations created daily and 25 percent of iPads used for business purposes, the incompatibility of PowerPoint on the iPad severely hindered mobile professionals – including sales reps, consultants, educators, presenters and road warriors across industries – all of whom need to view and present PowerPoint's on-the-go.

SlideShark, a free iPad app launched in October 2011, solves this problem.

There’s no longer a need to flatten presentations into PDFs or grapple with conversion techniques that severely distort presentation elements – Brainshark’s SlideShark app lets users view and share PowerPoints on the iPad the way they were meant to be seen. SlideShark enables users to:

• Preserve animations, fonts, graphics and colors in PowerPoint presentations
• Tap or swipe to advance animations and slides
• Deliver presentations to larger audiences while connected to a TV or VGA projector
• Share slides online for on-demand viewing and track results
• Distribute content to teams and analyze usage (Team Edition)

The app works in three steps:

1. Upload – Users upload PowerPoint files to their free, secure online account.
2. View – Users use the SlideShark App to download, view and present their slides on their iPad.
3. Share – Users can share presentations online for on-demand viewing by others and track results.

SlideShark has seen a groundswell of demand – with two downloads/minute, 24x7, and ranking among the top productivity apps in Apple’s App Store. In addition to garnering overwhelmingly positive feedback from users – and an average 4.5 out of 5 stars in the App Store – SlideShark has received rave reviews from analysts and media alike. Coverage has appeared in Forbes, USA Today, New England Cable News, InformationWeek, ZDNet, Macworld, Mobile Enterprise, PCWorld and more – with more than 295 media mentions. In addition, SlideShark has been honored with awards from MediaPost, Mashable and MobileVillage.com.

Continuing its pace of rapid innovation, Brainshark has continued to introduce new SlideShark features, based on the needs of users, including:

• Share online – Users can easily share links to presentations by email and social media that are viewable across devices.
• Track results – Instant email notifications alert users when shared presentations are viewed. SlideShark Plus and Team Edition users also receive details on who viewed which slides, in what order and when.
• Laser pointer – Users can press and hold their finger down while presenting and a red laser pointer will appear and follow their finger.
• Hide or re-order slides – Enables users to customize a presentation for different audiences.
• Support for iPad uploads – Users can upload email attachments or files stored in cloud storage services (DropBox, Box, etc.)
• Search and favorites – Helps users find content easily.
• Refer-a-friend – Earn extra storage for sharing the app.

Building on this SlideShark app for individuals, Brainshark recently unveiled a multi-user version: SlideShark Team Edition. This includes powerful functionality for centralized content distribution, team-wide access to content, valuable usage analytics and more – designed to support the needs not only of individuals, but of enterprises as well.

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Provide a brief (up to 100 words) biography about the leader(s) of the team that developed this nominated product or service:

Brainshark developed SlideShark using internal resources to help millions of iPad users view and show the PowerPoints they rely on. Brainshark’s staff, who collaborated to build, test and promote the app, includes members of the product management, engineering and quality assurance (QA), marketing, IT, customer support and executive teams.

Key individuals who played a driving role include:

• Joe Gustafson, CEO, Brainshark
• Greg Flynn, SVP Products & Services, Brainshark
• Chris Caruso, CTO, Brainshark
• Andy Zimmerman, CMO, Brainshark
• David Klein, Senior Director of Product Management, Brainshark
• Jay Wilder, Director of Product Marketing, Brainshark