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Enterprise, workplace, productivity: The 16 next big things, from smart contracts to a one-stop benefits card 

Zoom’s platform for big events, Trimble’s precision position, Project44’s supply-chain visualizer, and more.

Enterprise, workplace, productivity: The 16 next big things, from smart contracts to a one-stop benefits card 

BY Fast Company Staff4 minute read

Let’s just say it: The innovations that target business use rather than consumer scenarios usually aren’t all that glamorous. But by applying new technology to old problems, they have plenty of potential to quietly improve our lives. These products and services tackle everything from boring meetings to the important work of making apps and websites more accessible, each in their own inventive way.

The companies behind these technologies are among the honorees in Fast Company’s Next Big Things in Tech awards for 2022. See a full list of all the winners across all categories here.

Winners: Enterprise

Essential Accessibility
For creating an accessibility toolkit for apps and websites
Making websites and apps accessible is critical to serving the more than one billion people worldwide who have a disability. Essential Accessibility’s platform steers organizations through the process, from identifying necessary changes to testing to policy compliance. It also integrates with widely-used products such as Jira and Azure DevOps, so accessibility can become fundamental to a company’s processes rather than an isolated effort.

Ironclad
For adding digital intelligence to the contracts of all kinds
Ironclad’s digital contract platform modernizes the necessary but hugely time-consuming process of dealing with everything from NDAs to marketing agreements. It uses AI to digitize existing contracts and offers a centralized collaborative space for both parties involved in a negotiation. And it’s built on Microsoft Word’s DOCX format for compatibility with the ecosystem businesses already use.

Project44
For tracking the 90% of goods that get to us by sea
The March 2021 blockage of the Suez Canal by a stuck container ship—and resulting supply-chain chaos—inspired Project44 to create Port Intel, a dashboard for visualizing global seaport data in real time. Today it tracks 700 ports, 5,000 vessels, and 350,000 containers, giving customers new insight into their supply chains and how to optimize them.

Trimble’s DA2 connects with smartphones to make precision positioning more accessible.

Trimble
For bringing hyper-precise positioning to smartphones
Professionals such as surveyors need Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) positioning that’s accurate down to the centimeter, which requires advanced positioning services that go way beyond garden-variety GPS. Trimble’s DA2 receiver brings the company’s Catalyst service to iPhones and Android phones, giving a wider range of users the industrial-strength precision that was formerly limited to more complex, high-end systems.

Zoom
For giving big-time events a virtual (and hybrid) platform of their own
Inspired by the pandemic-era boom in virtual meetings, Zoom Events builds on the familiar Zoom experience with features for ambitious virtual and hybrid events. Those include everything from tools that let producers and panelists talk in private to the ability to conduct pledge drives, with a live feed to spur contributions. In less than a year, half a million attendees participated in 30,00 event sessions.

Honorable Mentions: Enterprise


1nce
For making Internet of Things connectivity ubiquitous and affordable

OnGo Alliance
For turning unused spectrum into useful new wireless services

UnitQ
For helping companies build better products based on user feedback

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Winners: Workplace and Productivity

Bluescape
For enabling visual collaboration across industries
Going beyond videoconferencing and screen sharing, Bluescape offers a virtual whiteboard where coworkers securely share and collaborate on high-resolution images, documents, and videos. Used by organizations from major film studios to the federal government, Bluescape makes remote collaboration closer to being in the same room than being on a call.

Canva
For making video creation approachable for all
What Canva has long done for still-image design tasks—make them simple for anyone who can wield a web browser—it now does for video. Its Canva Video Suite includes templates, stock imagery and audio, and other elements that let anyone piece together professional-looking mini-movies with a few clicks. Since Video Suite’s introduction in October 2021, Canva’s 85 million users have embraced it and used it to create millions of videos a day.

Giide
For taking the pain out of audio slideshows
Audio slideshows are often a great format for presentations and tutorials. But they often require complex video-editing software or custom programming. Giide enables anyone to combine voice recordings with content like images, text, and web links, then share it online—all without having to write a line of code.

Level
For making workplace benefits actually easy to use
Benefits for expenses such as healthcare, education, and transportation are difficult to navigate for employers and employees alike. Level lets employees track benefits through one app and provides a single card to pay for eligible purchases across categories. For employers, an admin dashboard makes it easy to track and tweak offerings.

Moth+Flame
For using VR to build better diversity trainings
Boilerplate videos on diversity, equity, inclusion, and bias can only be so effective. Moth+Flame worked with the National Urban League to use virtual reality and natural language processing to build realistic simulations that better capture what it’s like to have difficult conversations, making trainings more memorable and powerful.

Tango
For enabling seamless creation of documentation
Modern businesses are built around web-based processes, but documenting how these work can be laborious and error-prone. Tango offers a browser extension that lets anyone capture images for step-by-step guides as they work, then edit and annotate them with a few clicks.

Honorable Mentions: Workplace and Productivity

Density
For helping track how real-world spaces are used while preserving privacy

Evisort
For making corporate legal contracts easy to organize, track, and understan
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