SUFFOLK entrepreneur Mike Lynch has been honoured at a major national awards ceremony for his contribution to the UK’s information technology industry.

Dr Lynch, founder and chief executive of Cambridge-based software company Autonomy, was presented with the Outstanding Contribution to UK IT award at the British Computer Society’s UK IT Industry Awards in London.

Autonomy, whose core technology, IDOL, was awarded the IT Infrastructure Product of the Year award at the UK IT Industry Awards 2009, was acquired by Hewlett Packard earlier this year, marking the largest ever software transaction in Europe.

“Mike Lynch’s contribution to UK IT is truly exceptional,” said David Clarke, MBE, chief executive of the BCS. “He has very clearly demonstrated what success looks like for the UK IT Profession.

“Dr. Lynch is an example to us all and especially current and upcoming entrepreneurs; he has shown that with the right attitude, drive and ability, you can achieve truly impressive results in the UK.”

Dr Lynch responded: “I am very honoured to be presented this award by the BCS, the chartered institute for IT and computing.

“Autonomy has grown to be the success it is today thanks to the great talent pool and technical expertise that exists in Britain, and is proof that the UK has what it takes to take innovation to the next level and shake up the industry on a global scale.”

Autonomy is a global leader in software which helps organisations maximise the benefit of the “unstuctured2 information they hold, such as social media, email, video, audio, text and web pages,

Dr Lynch, who has founded a number of technology companies, including Autonomy in 1996, studied Information Sciences at Cambridge University, where he received a Ph.D. and held a research fellowship in adaptive pattern recognition.

He was been awarded an OBE for Services to Enterprise, and holds a number of advisory and board roles in the venture capital industry, serving as a non-executive director of the BBC and the British Library.

Dr Lynch has won numerous other awards, including the Confederation of British Industry’s Entrepreneur of the Year, the European Business Leaders Awards’ Innovator of the Year for pioneering new approaches to search and information processing technology, and Management Today’s Entrepreneur of the Year 2009, as well as an IEE Award for Outstanding Achievement.