Five Reader Picks for Tech's Next Big Thing

Universal Display is a so-far unprofitable Ewing, N.J., company with 2005 sales of $10 million. The stock has a market capitalization of $430 million. Cambridge Display Technology is headquartered in the other Cambridge, the one in England. The company recorded $18 million in sales in 2005, and the stock has a market capitalization of $180 million.

Two Private Companies to Watch

A couple of other potentially disruptive technology companies didn't make this list of five because they are still private. Financed at this stage in their growth by private pools of venture capital or by corporate partners, these companies are intriguing, but there isn't any way at this point for individual investors to put a single dollar into them.

In a former life, I covered the world of venture capital investments and venture-capital-funded companies, and two of the companies that readers nominated stand out to me for the quality of the investor groups backing them at this stage. That's no guarantee that these companies will succeed in bringing a single product to market, but it is enough for me to note and file away the names for the future. These two private companies to watch are:

• inPhase Technologies, a holographic data storage company with an investment group that includes New Venture Partners, Hitachi(HIT), Bayer MaterialScience and Nanotech Partners, an investment pool founded by Mitsubishi.
• A123 Systems, a battery technology spinout from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology backed by Motorola(MOT), Qualcomm(QCOM) and venture capitalist Sequoia Capital.

Thanks to Keith and Dave, respectively, for nominating these still-private companies that bear watching.

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