You could be the star of the next Leading Lights Awards!

As you may have already read, Light Reading's Leading Lights Awards program, which annually recognizes companies and their executives for their outstanding achievements in the next-gen communications industry, is going through a major change. (See Turn On Your Leading Light and Reader's Choice Rules.) We're kicking two awards to the curb, opening the whole thing up, and letting you -- yeah, YOU -- pick the ONE PERSON we single out as our Person of The Year for 2007.

Maybe that lucky person is your boss. Maybe it's someone you manage. Maybe that person is one of your competitors. Maybe it's an unsung hero among your colleagues. Maybe it's YOU!

We're open to any possibility, so don't be shy about nominating ANYONE, so long as that person contributed to the business of next-gen communications in a big way during 2007.

The Person of the Year will be nominated using our standard Leading Lights entry form. Anyone with influence on any facet of the telecom industry is eligible. Anyone can nominate anyone else. Nominate yourself, if you have no friends.

Got it? Good. Now pay attention because the deadline is coming up soon.

Even though our nominations process for the rest of the Leading Lights Awards will be open until September 28, we will stop taking nominations on Person of the Year on Aug. 10. At that point, we'll come up with a shortlist of nominations, and we'll publish the shortlist and an accompanying poll on our site on August 20. The Person of the Year poll will close on October 19.

All of the Leading Lights Award winners will be announced before an audience of service providers, analysts, and technology and business press at an exclusive, invitation-only gala dinner to take place at Heavy Reading's 2007 Executive Summit, at the W Hotel, Union Square, in New York City. (For registration details, email [email protected].)

As announced earlier today, our 10 awards categories are: Reader's Choice Person of the Year, Best Investment Potential (public company), Best New Product (one each for both public and private company), Best New Service (both public and private company), Best Marketing (both public and private company), Best M&A Strategy (public company), and Top IPO or M&A Candidate (private company).

Again, don't wait to submit your nominations. The deadline for Person of the Year nominations is August 10. The deadline for all other award entries is September 28. Submit your nominees here today.

Good luck!

— Phil Harvey, Managing Editor, Light Reading