Pimcore Awards 2026: Honoring Innovation, Growth, and Long-Term Partnership

Unveil the luminaries of the Pimcore Awards at Pimcore Inspire 2026, where innovation meets dedication.

Pimcore Inspire 2026 brought the community together in a truly memorable setting: the Amadeus Terminal at Salzburg Airport, under this year’s theme, Gateway to Tomorrow. On April 14, 2026, customers, partners, developers, and digital leaders gathered for a full day of strategy, technology, innovation, and exchange — all centered around where Pimcore is heading next and what that means for the ecosystem. The event featured keynotes, panels, masterclasses, networking, and the legendary Hangar Party, all hosted on-site at Salzburg Airport.  

As with every great Inspire, one of the most anticipated moments of the day was the Pimcore Awards 2026. The awards celebrate the people, projects, and partners moving the Pimcore ecosystem forward — from standout implementations and fast-growing partnerships to exceptional long-term commitment and innovation with the latest Pimcore technologies. We are proud to recognize this year’s winners and the remarkable achievements behind them.  

Project Of The Year: Caleffi Hydronic Solutions

This year’s Project of the Year award goes to Caleffi Hydronic Solutions, together with implementation partner GMDE. Submitted by the Pimcore community, the project stood out because of its impressive business impact and execution quality. Caleffi, a leading Italian manufacturer in the HVAC sector, operates in more than 90 countries and faced the challenge of managing and communicating highly complex, multilingual product information consistently across platforms and markets.  

By leveraging Pimcore for centralized product information and digital asset management, Caleffi significantly improved the way product data is governed, translated, and delivered. The project helped standardize communication across international markets, improve compliance with internal and external standards, and accelerate go-to-market processes by around 30 percent. It is a powerful example of how Pimcore enables global manufacturers to transform complexity into consistency and speed. Congratulations to Caleffi and GMDE on this outstanding achievement.  

Studionaut Of The Year: Dominik Pfaffenbauer

 A new category joined the awards lineup this year: Studionaut of the Year. With Pimcore Studio now finalized and generally available, it was the perfect moment to recognize the people in our ecosystem who embraced the Studio journey early and turned vision into production-ready results. We invited the Pimcore community to share what they had already achieved with Pimcore Studio, and the response was extraordinary — from business-driven reporting and dashboard solutions to modernized applications and next-generation AI-powered use cases. Pimcore Studio reached General Availability with the 2026.1 platform release, making this new category especially timely.  

The winner is Dominik Pfaffenbauer, a familiar name throughout the Pimconaut ecosystem. Dominik embraced Studio from day one and has already brought it into production at Austrian Standards, where more than 4 million products are being managed. His work exemplifies the forward-looking mindset and hands-on innovation that this award was created to celebrate. Congratulations, Dominik.

Rising Star Of The Year: Strix

The Rising Star of the Year category returned in 2026 to recognize the fastest-growing solution partner entering and building within the Pimcore ecosystem. This award is about more than growth alone — it highlights strong, high-quality delivery for clients and a clear commitment to building capabilities the right way.  

This year’s winner is Strix. Their start in the Pimcore ecosystem has been nothing short of impressive, with projects spanning multiple areas that leverage Pimcore’s strengths in data management, PaaS-based delivery, and integrations with Shopware. Combined with a steep learning curve and strong investment in certifications via the Pimcore Learning Hub, Strix quickly established itself as a partner to watch. Congratulations on a fantastic start and a well-deserved recognition.

European Partner Of The Year: elbkapitäne

 At Salzburg Airport — the symbolic Gateway to Tomorrow — it was only fitting to honor the European partner that most successfully helped clients move forward with Pimcore. The European Partner of the Year award recognizes high-quality project delivery, strong certification performance, and the ability to leverage the full Pimcore portfolio to create real business value. Pimcore’s solution partner ecosystem now includes more than 170 partners, with around 150 based in EMEA, making this recognition especially meaningful.  

This year’s winner, elbkapitäne, has been teaming up with Pimcore for eight years and has consistently delivered excellent projects using Pimcore solutions both on-premise and with PaaS. Their dedication to Pimcore, paired with qualitative project wins and continuous skills development, made them stand out in a highly competitive field. Congratulations, Elbkapitäne.

Pimcore Store Partner Of The Year: blackbit

Following its debut last year, the Pimcore Store Partner of the Year award recognizes the partners whose solutions extend Pimcore with meaningful additional capabilities. The Pimcore Store has become an important destination for innovative, ready-to-use extensions that help customers and partners move faster and unlock even more value from their Product Experience Management initiatives. As of today, 27 integrated solutions are available in the Pimcore Store, reflecting a growing ecosystem of innovation around the platform.  

The 2026 winner is blackbit — a partner that has been working with Pimcore for 12 years and is widely known for delivering impactful solutions across the world. Their long-standing contribution to extending and enriching the Pimcore ecosystem made them the clear choice for this year’s recognition. Congratulations, blackbit.

Pimcore Sound Barrier: valantic

The final recognition of the evening was the Pimcore Sound Barrier award — a special honor for a solution partner whose contribution goes far beyond project delivery alone. As Pimcore moves forward with AgenticAI, Pimcore Studio, and the new Pimcore Enterprise Platform, this award recognizes a partner that has helped shape the journey over many years through collaboration, feedback, and trust. Pimcore itself was born from a business need, and its evolution has always been driven not just by internal teams, but by strong partnerships built on openness, transparency, and teamwork.  

The numbers tell the story of that ecosystem: 26 solution partners have been with Pimcore for more than 10 years, and 68 partners have been part of the journey for 5 to 9 years — meaning more than 55 percent of partners represent long-term relationships. One partner, however, has truly broken the sound barrier. With more than 130 clients on Pimcore, over 500 certifications throughout the partnership, active support in product development, and 16 years of trust and collaboration, this year’s recognition goes to valantic. Congratulations — and thank you for being such an important part of the Pimcore journey.

We extend our sincere congratulations to all winners of the Pimcore Awards 2026. Each of them represents a different kind of excellence within the Pimcore ecosystem: innovation, delivery, growth, contribution, and long-term commitment. Together, they show what is possible when technology, expertise, and partnership come together - and they set the tone for what lies ahead as we move through the Gateway to Tomorrow.