In-Depth

ADT's 2000 Software Innovator Awards

What do a moving company, a financial services organization, a marrow donor program, an Internet media publisher, a bank and a health insurer all have in common? They are all winners in Application Development Trends' sixth annual Innovator Awards competition.

The ADT Innovator Awards honor IT managers, team leaders and team members directly involved in important development projects that use as-yet unproven products, technologies and/or methods to develop and deliver mission-critical software for solving a crucial business problem.

We received numerous entries in each of the six contest categories — E-business Application Development, Middleware/Application Integration, Application Engineering, Component-based Development, Data Warehousing and Extending Existing Systems. Each entry was judged by our editors and a team of consultants from Keane Inc., a Boston consulting firm. After much deliberation, we selected a winner and an honorable mention in each category.

On the following pages, we profile each of these projects and detail how the development teams approached and worked to build software to solve the problem. The experiences of these companies can help other organizations face pressing development problems. We at ADT would like to thank all of the readers who took part in this year's competition. And we welcome those now in the midst of innovative projects to take part in our seventh annual competition, the 2001 Innovator Awards.

E-business Application Development

Winner: Bekins Van Lines motors online
Honorable Mention: Zurich U.S. Insurance

Middleware/Application Integration

Winner: Citigroup Inc.
Honorable Mention: Virginia Community College System (VCCS)

Application Engineering

Winner: National Marrow Donor Program
Honorable Mention: Gerber Products Company

Component-Based Development

Winner: Associated New Media (ANM)
Honorable Mention: Silocaf

Data Warehousing

Winner: Bank of Montreal
Honorable Mention: Orlando Sentinel Communications (OSC)

Extending Existing Systems

Winner: Blue Cross & Blue Shield
Honorable Mention: Fireman's Fund Insurance