DiversityNXT, the only telecommunications industry conference bringing diverse suppliers into the mainstream spotlight, wants to let communications corporations in on a secret that some sourcing managers in the industry have known for years: Diverse suppliers can be a formidable weapon for rolling out quality products and services at warp speed while controlling costs.

This evening on the main stage, DiversityNXT will celebrate the successes of diverse suppliers and celebrate corporations reaping the rewards from this unique universe of product and service providers. The event will kick off with a high-definition video, DiversityNXT: Diverse Suppliers Launch IPTV, which features 25 diverse suppliers helping to propel the communications industry into the next generation of IPTV. In addition, Glow Networks, an end-to-end consulting and engineering firm for telecommunications service providers and equipment manufacturers, will receive this year’s NXTSolutions Supplier Award. In fact, Glow helped a major equipment vendor with multivendor interoperability testing for rolling out one of the world’s first WiMAX and IP multimedia subsystem networks. Eight years ago Motorola, the winner of the NXTGen Corporation Award, answered the Supercomm challenge to spend at least 10% of its procurement budget with diverse suppliers. Today, procurement managers for Motorola aggressively seek out diverse suppliers.

The capstone of the event will honor Robert L. Johnson, founder and chairman of The RLJ Companies, with the first DiversityNXT Trailblazer Award for his major contributions in paving the way for minorities when they had very few, if any, opportunities.

Yesterday, Krish Prabhu, CEO of Tellabs, addressed the DiversityNXT Executive Forum of industry leaders and moderated an in-depth discussion about the challenges and opportunities for supplier diversity participation in next-generation communication supply chains.

“While we are shining a spotlight on the wide array of technology-focused diverse suppliers, we are also facilitating discussions among the industry’s largest communications corporations about how to leverage the nimbleness and inventiveness of diverse suppliers and seamlessly integrate them into the value chain,” said Joan Kerr, executive director of supplier diversity programs for AT&T and co-chair of DiversityNXT.

“Outdated stereotypes about diverse suppliers, bias toward marquee names, pressure to consolidate the supply chain and fears about liability and manageability are stifling innovation,” said Denise Coley, DiversityNXT co-chair and director of supplier diversity business development for Cisco Systems.

“But outsourcing services to diverse suppliers that can make swift and smart decisions is an obvious solution for innovating, controlling costs and conquering the labor shortage crisis. It’s been proven that deviating from the buying blueprint can pay off in a market that moves at the pace of Wall Street.”