Premier Farnell announces Pedro Rodrigues from Portugal as the Live EDGE 2008- Electronic Design for the Global Environment - Challenge winner. Mr Rodrigues is awarded a unique prize package including a $25,000 USD cash prize and support services valued at an additional $25,000 USD from experts in the fields of design consultancy, marketing, legal and commerce to drive the design towards production. The winning design is an Intelligent Standby Energy Saver – a system that automatically detects the standby mode of electrical equipment and disconnects the power when it is not required.

The first highly commended $5,000 USD winner of the Live EDGE challenge is John Tillson from England. His entry, a PowerShift Power Controller is designed to switch off critical loads during supply/demand imbalances, easing the burden on national power grids at times of peak demand. The system works by detecting the peak times of electrical power usage, then switching off any suitable electrical appliances to lessen the total load presented to the power grid.

The second highly commended $5,000 USD winner is Antonio Lalguna from Spain for his design of an automatic irrigation system to improve Photovoltaic systems. This device is aimed at improving the efficiency of solar panels by 30%, using a rainwater harvesting system to automatically clean and cool off the panels.