On the evening of 8th May 2008, CIR magazine presented its Business Continuity Awards to this year’s winners. The black-tie event at London’s Grosvenor House hotel was well attended, with the evening’s events being successfully hosted by comedian Rob Brydon.

This year’s awards went to:

Business Continuity Manager of the year
Abdulrahman Alonaizan, Head of Business Continuity Management, Arab National Bank

10th Anniversary Award: Outstanding Excellence in Business Continuity
SunGard Availability Services

Business Continuity Strategy of the Year
Scottish Borders Council

Most Effective Recovery of the Year
BAA Glasgow Airport Ltd

Lifetime Achievement
Dennis Thomas (Former MD, NDR) ICM Computer Group

Crisis Strategy of the Year
Commerzbank

Business Continuity Consultant of the Year
Paul Robertson, Business Continuity Consultant, Marsh Ltd

Public Sector Continuity Manager of the Year
Roy Firth, Emergency Planning and Business Continuity Manager, Harrogate Borough Council

Student of the Year
Erez Herman, Graduate Trainee, Crisis Solutions Ltd

Excellence in Business Continuity in the Insurance Industry
Marsh Ltd

Business Continuity Management Planning Software of the Year
eSecurus -NonVerba Limited

Data Centre Strategy of the Year
SunGard Availability Services' London Technology Centre

Most Innovative Product of the Year
iModus - Vocal

Business Continuity Initiative of the Year
Manchester Business Continuity Forum

Industry Newcomer of the Year
David Epstein, Business Continuity Manager, Energy Retail Division Scottish Power

Industry Personality of the Year
Mike Osborne, Managing Director, ICM Computer Group

Business Continuity Team of the Year
Military Air Solutions Business Continuity Team, BAE Systems

Business Continuity Service Provider of the Year
ICM Computer Group

An additional surprise award was given to BSI British Standards for 'Industry Advancement' in connection with its work on the BS 25999 standard.

http://www.businesscontinuityawards.com/

Award winners’ press releases:

SUNGARD RECOGNISED FOR 10 YEARS’ EXCELLENCE IN BUSINESS CONTINUITY

SunGard Availability Services, the pioneer and leading provider of Information Availability and business continuity services, today announced it was awarded the Tenth Anniversary Award for Outstanding Excellence at the Business Continuity Awards last night (8th May). In the judges’ view, SunGard’s commitment to fostering innovation and good practice in a rapidly-changing industry positioned it “head and shoulders” above rival contenders.

SunGard was also recognised for the highly resilient, next-generation data facilities at its flagship London Technology Centre, which won Data Centre Strategy of the Year.

Having led the way in the business continuity discipline since the late 1970’s, SunGard now handles an average of three customer invocations every two weeks. SunGard was the first business continuity provider to be certified against BS 25999, the new British Standard for business continuity management, and in late 2007, it published From Adversity to Availability , a practical insight into risk, business continuity, and availability, with contributions from some fifty blue-chip organisations.

Keith Tilley, EVP UK and Europe, SunGard Availability Services, said: “We are delighted and proud to receive such recognition from our industry peers. We have helped our customers navigate the huge changes in our industry over the past decade - and recover from some catastrophic events - all with 100% success. This is a great testament to the expertise and commitment of our teams: together, we’re now looking forward to the opportunities and challenges of the next 10 years!”

NIGHT OF TRIUMPH FOR ICM WITH DOUBLE CIR AWARD SUCCESS

ICM Continuity Services, the leading business continuity and disaster recovery firm, triumphed last week at the CIR Magazine Business Continuity Awards, scooping two coveted awards for ‘Personality of The Year’, for MD Mike Osborne, and ‘Service Provider of The Year’ for ICM. The awards follow similar success for ICM Group in 2007, when it also won the Service Provider of The Year Award, as well as the Most Innovative Product Award, and cap a year of outstanding growth and progress, as the firm has consolidated and grown its market share across the country, confirming its market leading position in its field.

Voted for by industry peers and clients, the CIR Awards are widely recognised as the premier acknowledgment for firms within the fields of business continuity and operational risk management. In a gala dinner at London’s exclusive Grosvenor House Hotel, Park Lane, ICM beat off an impressive line up of national and international firms to clinch the awards, with many commenting this was the stiffest competition seen for some time.

Mike Osborne, Managing Director ICM Continuity Services, commented, "I am delighted that ICM has been so successful at this year’s CIR Awards, and to be recognised personally is very humbling. Many thanks to everyone who voted for us - these awards really are the pinnacle of achievement for a business in our field and to be recognised by our peers and clients in this way is an excellent commendation of the year of hard work by everyone at ICM."

"During 2007 we saw unprecedented change at ICM, not least through our merger with disaster recovery firm NDR and the development of our offices and facilities across the UK – most notably the establishment of our head office in Aston and our industry-leading business continuity centre at Farnborough. The whole team at ICM should be very proud of these awards, and the excellent effect all their hard work has had on making ICM the success it is today."

http://www.icm-continuity.co.uk/?utm_source=Continuity%2BCentral&utm_medium=banner&utm_content=icm

BSI BRITISH STANDARDS RECEIVES CIR AWARD FOR BS 25999

BSI British Standards last night received CIR’s Award for Industry Advancement for its work in developing BS 25999. The special award was presented at CIR’s annual awards ceremony last night, in recognition of the outstanding contribution made by BSI to the world of Business Continuity Management.

Continuity Insurance & Risk (CIR) is the UK's leading bi-monthly risk management and insurance journal. The 2008 ceremony marked the 10th anniversary of the awards that recognise excellence within the field of business continuity and operational risk management.

Mike Low, Director of BSI British Standards, who received the award, said, “I am delighted that CIR has decided to honour BSI with this award for its work on Business Continuity Management. BSI recognized the importance of BCM to the operation of all organizations and brought together a high level of expertise to produce the necessary tools. Both parts of BS 25999 were developed through a rigorous process, working with business, and as a result are robust and extremely valuable to industry at large. The possibilities for developing further standards in the areas of risk, quality and security are great and we are now working with industry to create ‘value-add’ solutions.”

BS 25999-1, published in November 2006, was developed by a broad based group of world class experts to establish the process, principles and terminology of Business Continuity Management. It provides a basis for understanding, developing and implementing business continuity within an organization to offer confidence in business-to-business and business-to-customer dealings.

Part 2 of the standard was published in November 2007 and specifies the requirements for establishing, implementing, operating and improving a documented Business Continuity Management System. The requirements of BS 25999-2 are generic and intended to be applicable to all organizations, regardless of type, size and nature of business.

For further information on BSI’s work on Business Continuity Management please visit www.bsigroup.com/bs25999

NONVERBA WINS BEST BUSINESS CONTINUITY PLANNING SOFTWARE OF THE YEAR CIR AWARDS 2008

NonVerba Limited, the London, Hertfordshire and Chennai (India) based Business Continuity Planning software solutions provider, has collected the coveted award for Business Continuity Management Planning Software of the Year 2008, for its eSecurus software solution, at this year's CIR Business Continuity Awards.

NonVerba's What If? Analysis tool was also a finalist in the Most Innovative Software of the Year category.

Commenting on the Award, Peter Joyce, managing director of NonVerba Limited, said: "This really is a great honour for NonVerba. It's a fantastic endorsement for our product, eSecurus, Resilience on a Page, and rewards us for the time and effort that we have all put into developing the product over the last 5 years. I would like to thank all NonVerba staff based in the UK, and also in our Corporate Support Centre in Chennai, India, especially for their professionalism, dedication and sheer hard work. eSecurus is our baby and we are very proud of it. I think that the Award reflects on three key aspects of the product. First, the ability to allow any company in any industry to easily map its structure graphically in accordance with the new British Standard for Business Continuity - BS25999, and then link this to all aspects of the companies emergency planning base. Secondly, the flexibility of the product, through an open architecture which allows it to meet the needs of any Business Continuity Programme. Finally, the added value that the product provides in terms of access to features like SMS alerting, TV News bulletins, workflow and our online operational support services, delivered from our Corporate Support Centre. We believe in relationships. The support and commitment of our clients who share our vision of developing world class business continuity tools in the UK is recognised with this Award, and we thank each and every one of them for enabling eSecurus, Resilience on a Page, to become a truly global product."

This particular award recognises the software developer that has done the most for companies of all sizes to improve their continuity management whether servicing the public or private sector. The judges were also looking to award the company that has incorporated into the product, best practices within the field of business continuity management, such as BS25999, the ten principles of the BCI, NFPA1600 and other recognised guidelines.

Dipankar Ghosh, director of operations at NonVerba’s Corporate Support Centre in Chennai, commented: "NonVerba has continued to improve and evolve eSecurus over the last twelve months specifically focussing on the augmentation of its original design to ensure ease of use to all involved in the planning and management process, and to provide greater depth of reporting and statistical analysis. I’m very proud of our product development team and the reporting team, who along with the in-house graphics team, have developed solutions which are visually attractive and engaging. We have taken feedback from a large pool of clients, and have introduced a number of features this year. We adhered to the practice directions laid down in BS25999, to ensure that our clients would align themselves to these, and could take comfort from the fact that recognised industry-wide thinking has been incorporated into the product. However, we didn’t focus on large enterprises alone, but wanted to make the product and methodology approach available and applicable to all.”

http://www.continuityshop.com/courses/Summer.htm/

IMODUS ‘ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT TOOLS FOR COMMUNICATION THAT THE INDUSTRY HAS AT ITS FINGERTIPS’ 

Vocal Ltd’s dedicated business communication and management suite, iModus, has been named the Most Innovative Product of the Year at the prestigious Business Continuity Awards, run by CIR magazine, which recognise excellence within the field of business continuity and operational risk management.

The award, sponsored by London First and presented by Baroness Jo Valentine was given to the company which “demonstrated the most innovation in product development". iModus was chosen over five other finalists by a panel of independent judges who announced that iModus has “become one of the most important tools for communication that the industry has at its fingertips”

"Receiving the Most Innovative Product of the Year Award was a proud moment for the company" said Vocal Director, Trevor Wheatley-Perry, "there were a number of very good products shortlisted and for the system to be summarised as one of the most important tools in the industry was tremendous recognition for the work that’s been carried out by the team. Furthermore thanks must be given to our customers, for their continued support and their ideas".

www.vocal.uk.com

•Date: 9th May 2008• Region: UK •Type: Article •Topic: BC general
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UPDATED 28th MAY 2008