Best Federal Government Project

• Winner: Best Federal Government Project
  Best Federal Government Project
• Winner: Services Australia - Online claiming and delivery of Australian Government Disaster Recovery Payment (AGDRP)
• Finalist: ATO - Project Leap - Improving ATO IT Systems
• Finalist: Department of Home Affairs - Australian Government National Joint Common Operating Picture

---

Best State Government Project

• Winner: Best State Government Project
  Best State Government Project
• Winner: NSW Department of Customer Service, Better Regulation Division - Strata Hub
• Finalist: SA Water - Single view of customer and contact information
• Finalist: Transport for NSW - Park&Ride with Transport Connect

---

Best Local Government Project

• Winner: Local Government Association of Queensland - AI Road Condition Assessment
• Finalist: Best Local Government Project
  Best Local Government Project
• Finalist: City of Melbourne - Digital Permits Regulatory Reform Project

---

Best Industrial Project

• Winner: Endeavour Energy - Digital Substation Transformation
• Finalist: Best Industrial Project
  Best Industrial Project
• Finalist: Monson- Escapes Legacy Debt To Delight Customers
• Finalist: SA Water - Diagnostic and Prognostic Maintenance Project (DPM)

---

Best Agricultural Project

---

Best Not-For-Profit Project

• Winner: Camp Quality - Kids’ Guide to Cancer
• Finalist: Best Not-For-Profit Project
  Best Not-For-Profit Project
• Finalist: Lifeline Australia - CRM and fundraising systems integration for Lifeline Australia
• Finalist: The Gidarjil Development Corporation (GDC) - 5G ‘Connecting to Country' Drone Program

---

Best Education Project

• Winner: RMIT University - Enhancing Cyber Security Across Australia’s University Sector Project
• Finalist: Best Education Project
  Best Education Project
• Finalist: RMIT University - RACE - RMIT AWS Cloud Supercomputing Facility
• Winner: Victoria University - BYOD Implementation

---

Best Health Project

• Winner: NSW Health - NSW Statewide Telestroke Service
• Finalist: Best Health Project
  Best Health Project
• Finalist: ACT Health - ACT Digital Health Record Program
• Finalist: eHealth NSW – Cloud Transformation Journey

---

Best Finance Project

• Winner: Commonwealth Bank of Australia - Using AI to stop abuse in financial transaction descriptions.
• Finalist: Best Finance Project
  Best Finance Project
• Finalist: Suncorp Group - Geospatial Question Removal in Home Insurance
• Finalist: NAB - NAB CONX – Deconstructing our NAB Connect Monolith

---

Best Consumer Project

• Winner: Woolworths Group - Woolworths Group Contact Center Cloud Migration
• Finalist: Best Consumer Project
  Best Consumer Project
• Finalist: Lovisa - Global Retail Expansion
• Finalist: Aussie Broadband - Fault Detector Project

---

Best Sustainability Project

• Finalist: Best Sustainability Project
  Best Sustainability Project
• Finalist: Golden Grove Nursery: Enabling Sustainable Agriculture with Data Driven Technology
• Finalist: Transit Care - fleet utilisation
• Finalist: ADCO Constructions - National Digital Procurement

---

Best Talent Management Project

• Winner: ANZ - Engineering Career Pathways
• Finalist: Best Talent Management Project
  Best Talent Management Project
• Finalist: Service NSW: Digital Services Digital Boot Camp Program
• Finalist: University of Newcastle StandOut Program - Enabling Life-Ready Graduates at the University of Newcastle+

Best Federal Government Project

• Winner: Best Federal Government Project Documentary
  Best Federal Government Project Documentary
• Winner: Australian Post – Telecommunications Transformation Program
• Finalist: Clean Energy Regulator – Digital Transformation
• Finalist: Service Australia – Providing proof of COVID-19 vaccination for everyday people in Aus

---

Best State Government Project

• Winner: Best State Government Project documentary
  Best State Government Project documentary
• Winner: SA Water – Energy Management for a Zero Cost Energy Future
• Finalist: Victorian Department of Health – Common Data Layer
• Finalist: eHealth NSW – Vaccination Administration Management Solution (Covax)

---

Best Local Government Project

• Winner: Best Local Government Project Documentary
  Best Local Government Project Documentary
• Winner: City Unley – Measuring Tree canopy change with a Digital Twin
• Finalist: Western Parklands Council – Sensor Network Project
• Finalist: LGAQ – Transforming Queensland Council’s Digital Experience

---

Best Industrial Project

• Winner: Best Industrial Project Documentary
  Best Industrial Project Documentary
• Winner: Sydney Water – Largescale IoT Wastewater Blockage Detection Deployment
• Finalist: SA Water – Energy Management for a zero-cost energy future
• Finalist: Essential Energy – Digital Safety Tools for Energy Distributions

---

Best Agricultural Project

• Winner: Best Agricultural Project Documentary
  Best Agricultural Project Documentary
• Winner: AgBioEn – Deployment for renewable energy
• Finalist: Bartle Frere Bananas – Data-Driven Sustainable Smart Farming
• Finalist: Visualising Australasia’s Soils – Sharing agricultural data to maximize value

---

Best Education Project

• Winner: Best Education Project Documentary
  Best Education Project Documentary
• Winner: Queensland University of Technology – Prospective Student Digital Assistant
• Finalist: Department of Customer Service – Rural access Gap Program
• Finalist: Victoria University – VU Explore

---

Best Health Project

• Winner: Best Health Project Documentary
  Best Health Project Documentary
• Finalist: eHealth NSW - Patient Reported Measures: Delivering healthcare that matters to people
• Winner: Barwon Health – COVAX South West Victoria eVaccine Management System
• Finalist: The University Of Sydney – COVID_!( Smart IoT Screening System Pilot at Sydney Children’s Hospital Network

---

Best Finance Industry Project

• Winner: Best Finance Industry Project Documentary
  Best Finance Industry Project Documentary
• Winner: Westpac Digital Bank – Banking-as-a-Service
• Finalist: Commonwealth Bank of Australia – Execution Health Score
• Finalist: Bendigo and Adelaide Bank – 30 for 30: a rapid developer led cloud transformation

---

Best Consumer Project

• Winner: Best Consumer Project Documentary
  Best Consumer Project Documentary
• Winner: Woolworths Group – eReceipts
• Finalist: Koala Sleep – Digital Transformation project
• Finalist: Aussie Broadband – Fault Detector Project

---

Innovation Group Award

• Winner: Innovation Group Award Documentary
  Innovation Group Award Documentary
• Winner: Lendlease
• Finalist: Commonwealth Bank of Australia – The Emerging Technology Team

---

Talent Management Award

• Winner: Talent Management Award Documentary
  Talent Management Award Documentary
• Winner: NSW Telco Authority – Training and Development program
• Finalist: Step it Up Australia – UST’s program, run with Macquarie Bank

Local Government

• Winner: Local Government Award
  Local Government Award
• Finalist: Randwick City Council
  Randwick City Council
• Finalist: City of Greater Geelong
  City of Greater Geelong
• Finalist: Parkes Shire Council
  Parkes Shire Council

---

State Government

• Winner: State Government Award
  State Government Award
• Finalist: ACT Health
  ACT Health
• Finalist: Department of Customer Service, Spatial Services
  Department of Customer Service, Spatial Services
• Finalist: Service NSW
  Service NSW

---

Education

• Winner: Education Award
  Education Award
• Finalist: La Trobe University
  La Trobe University
• Finalist: Swinburne Online
  Swinburne Online
• Finalist: Victoria University
  Victoria University

---

Industrial & Primary Production

• Winner: Industrial & Primary Production Award
  Industrial & Primary Production Award
• Finalist: Coates Hire / Coates Hire
  Coates Hire
• Finalist: SA Water / SA Water
  SA Water
• Finalist: Beach Energy / Beach Energy
  Beach Energy

---

Finance Industry

• Winner: Finance Award
  Finance Award
• Finalist: Regional Australia Bank
  Regional Australia Bank
• Finalist: AMP Services
  AMP Services
• Finalist: Commonwealth Bank of Australia
  Commonwealth Bank of Australia

---

Mass-Market

• Winner: Mass-Market Award
  Mass-Market Award
• Finalist: Transdev Australasia
  Transdev Australasia
• Finalist: Super Retail Group
  Super Retail Group
• Finalist: Aussie Broadband
  Aussie Broadband

---

Health

• Winner: Health Award
  Health Award
• Finalist: HCF
  HCF
• Finalist: eHealth NSW
  eHealth NSW
• Finalist: Ambulance Victoria
  Ambulance Victoria

---

Federal Government

• Winner: Federal Government Award
  Federal Government Award
• Finalist: Legal Services Commission of South Australia
  Legal Services Commission of South Australia
• Finalist: Digital Transformation Agency
  Digital Transformation Agency
• Finalist: Services Australia
  Services Australia

---

Australian Technology Project of the Year

• Winner: Project of the Year Award
  Project of the Year Award

Project of the Year

• Winner: Transport for NSW / Opal Connect
  

  Transport for NSW

  Opal Connect

  With the arrival of digital driver’s licences last year, NSW citizens took another step toward ditching their wallets.

  But for public transport users yet to make the jump to contactless payments via digital wallets, the physical Opal smartcard is still standing in the way.

  That could soon change, with Transport for NSW planning to trial a virtual equivalent of the Opal card backed by a new account-based digital ticketing and payments platform, dubbed Opal Connect.

  Launched last October, the Opal Connect platform provides a new way for customers to keep track of all their public transport payments, whether this is via Opal card or credit or debit cards.

---

Paul Shetler Award

• Winner: Reserve Bank of Australia / Banking Technology Modernisation
  

  Reserve Bank of Australia

  Banking Technology Modernisation

  In the rough and tumble that is daily life in Australia’s retail banking and financial services sector, the performance of institutions in the eyes of customers and shareholders alike is today, more than ever, linked to solid technology strategy and execution.

  Core systems renewals, better customer software, apps and bots are now all the currency of progress for commercial banks, yet few Australians realise that one of the biggest transactional players in the ecosystem is actually the government, namely the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA).

  Ask almost any Australian what the letters ‘RBA’ mean to them and the chances are your answer will be ‘interest rates’ – it is after all a central bank.

  But what most Australians don’t immediately realise is that much of the digital progress made by the sector here over the last decade has been spurred on by the RBA, ranging from better online resilience to making real-time payments a reality.

---

Finance

• Winner: Westpac / Customer Service Hub
  

  Westpac

  Customer Service Hub

  Westpac’s internal technology shop has always been in it for the long haul.

  Come the rain, shine and the occasional hail of management changes, Australia’s oldest bank has not wavered from materially improving customer service.

  Not just online and in branches but for the technology its staff use day to day  to make things happen.

  As a multi-brand bank, a core challenge of Westpac has been standardising and unifying systems that have served their time well, but need to move with the times.

• Finalist: CUA / Health Insurance Online Application
  

  CUA

  Health Insurance Online Application

  Credit Union Australia’s health insurance arm has overhauled its online application processes in the face of looming government health reforms, suboptimal workflows and mounting consumer dissatisfaction with the broader health insurance sector.

  CUA Health partnered with Squiz to redesign the user experience and functionality of their health insurance quote, application process and ‘product picker’ to deliver a smoother experience for customers enabled by a better back end at the insurer.

  The project set out to improve on the previous “clunky, disjointed” application process that relied on a combination of online, phone and paper workflows that were cumbersome and slow for CUA Health to process with “significant” manual operational requirements.

  Built on Squiz DXP, the new application process is wholly online and streamlines the end-to-end front and back end journey for both the applicant and CUA employee, creating instant memberships that are ready for customer use immediately.

• Finalist: AFG / AFG Assess
  

  AFG

  AFG Assess

  With interest rates at record lows, secured lending broker and aggregator AFG has moved to carve out a point of difference from the majors by making it easier for loan applicants to demonstrate serviceability through better document versioning history and accessibility.

  The new cloud-based Home Loan application system was custom developed in collaboration with IT services provider, Rubicon Red, combining Oracle Cloud Services with cloud-native open-source developer tooling for enterprise-grade performance and scalability.

  The new AFG Assess system, which debuted in July last year, was designed to support the long-running approval process that typically spans weeks or months, with clients providing new information and meeting new milestones as the application progresses.

  As a multi-stage process involving mulitple staff members, the system had to be built with a contract-based locking and versioning mechanism between the process automation layer and the Angular-based user interface.

---

Federal government

• Winner: Digital Transformation Agency / Govpass Digital Identity Ecosystem
  

  Digital Transformation Agency

  Govpass Digital Identity Ecosystem

  When former Communication Minister and later Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull established the Digital Transformation Agency’s upstart predecessor five years ago, solving Australia's digital identity problem was front and centre.

  “One of the Digital Transformation Office’s first tasks will be to ensure people no longer have to complete separate log on processes for each government service,” he said in January 2015.

  “Instead, people should have a ‘digital identity’, which they can use to log in to each of their services across the government.”

  A year earlier, the government’s landmark financial system inquiry led by David Murray had declared Australia’s identity environment fragmented and uncoordinated.

  The report recommended that a national federated digital identity, supported by a trusted digital identity framework, be developed to let citizens easily and securely access digital services.

• Finalist: Australian Taxation Office / Online Services for Agents
  

  Australian Taxation Office

  Online Services for Agents

  When the Australian Taxation Office first flagged its online tax agent portal overhaul more than four years ago, it had one key goal: fixing stability.

  In the years prior, the agency’s legacy tax and BAS agent portals had struggled with serious problems around reliability, resulting in a flood of complaints from tax agents.

  The portals, which were first introduced in 2002, were the sole way for agents to access ATO systems and client records, as well as to communicate with the agency on behalf of clients.

  The stability issues came to a head in 2015, when an inquiry by the parliamentary tax and revenue committee urged the ATO to address concerns with a series of targeted improvements.

• Finalist: Reserve Bank of Australia / Banking Technology Modernisation
  

  Reserve Bank of Australia

  Banking Technology Modernisation

  In the rough and tumble that is daily life in Australia’s retail banking and financial services sector, the performance of institutions in the eyes of customers and shareholders alike is today, more than ever, linked to solid technology strategy and execution.

  Core systems renewals, better customer software, apps and bots are now all the currency of progress for commercial banks, yet few Australians realise that one of the biggest transactional players in the ecosystem is actually the government, namely the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA).

  Ask almost any Australian what the letters ‘RBA’ mean to them and the chances are your answer will be ‘interest rates’ – it is after all a central bank.

  But what most Australians don’t immediately realise is that much of the digital progress made by the sector here over the last decade has been spurred on by the RBA, ranging from better online resilience to making real-time payments a reality.

---

Young Leader

• Winner: Michelle Dobson / Head of Cloud Business Office
  

  Michelle Dobson

  ANZ - Head of Cloud Business Office

  When Michelle Dobson worked as a bank teller, she found herself serving the victim of a break-in whose bank cards and ID documents had been stolen from her home in a brazen overnight heist.

  Now head of technology at ANZ Banking Group's cloud business office, Dobson still recalls that experience of helping a customer at a moment of crisis and being able to offer comfort and make a difference.

  Dobson became a teller after initially studying nursing, deciding it was not for her, before finding herself as a manager of a Strathfield Car Radios store. Still in her early twenties, progression deeper into management was blocked by her youth and lack of qualifications.

  So Dobson returned to University to study business and information systems, and applied for part-time work as a bank teller.

---

Mass-market

• Winner: Transport for NSW / Opal Connect
  

  Transport for NSW

  Opal Connect

  With the arrival of digital driver’s licences last year, NSW citizens took another step toward ditching their wallets.

  But for public transport users yet to make the jump to contactless payments via digital wallets, the physical Opal smartcard is still standing in the way.

  That could soon change, with Transport for NSW planning to trial a virtual equivalent of the Opal card backed by a new account-based digital ticketing and payments platform, dubbed Opal Connect.

  Launched last October, the Opal Connect platform provides a new way for customers to keep track of all their public transport payments, whether this is via Opal card or credit or debit cards.

• Finalist: Aussie Broadband / MyAussie app
  

  Aussie Broadband

  MyAussie app

  When most telco customers need more than a router reset to fix a connection problem, they usually have to ring up a call centre and go through the standard IT Crowd questionnaire before a technician reboots things on their end - Aussie Broadband’s app lets you do it yourself.

  The MyAussie app, launched in March last year, is a major project for the internet provider flowing from its customer service strategy of delivering an “easy as possible,” “no bullsh*t” service.

  One of the features that Aussie believes sets it apart from a typical telco app is the ability for customers to “kick” their own connection, restarting a service all the way through the network ran than just at a modem level on premises.

  “It’s a much more thorough version of ‘turn it off and then on again,’” Aussie Broadband said.

• Finalist: Nine Entertainment / 9Voyager
  

  Nine Entertainment

  9Voyager

  When Ryan McCartney was asked to integrate Nine Entertainment’s Voyager self-service advertising service with Qantas’ Frequent Flyer program, he treated the task as just another job.

  “I didn’t see it as a huge deal,” he told iTnews. “I kind of treated it like it was just another ticket

  Yet the task was of considerable business importance, required significant technical skills and was given to the then-21-year old despite his inexperience and the fact he got the task during his first year of full time work.

  McCartney came to Nine’s attention while studying for his Bachelor of Information Technology at the University of Technology, Sydney. That course sees students participate in an internship in their first and third years. McCartney’s third year placement was at Nine and saw him asked to work on Voyager, an initiative aimed at winning revenue from the thousands of small businesses that don’t see television advertising as accessible. Voyager aims to change that by offering self-service booking and ad creation.

---

State government

• Winner: Legal Services Commission of South Australia / PhotoLegal
  

  Legal Services Commission of South Australia

  PhotoLegal

  Faced with a 17 percent ‘no show’ rate for legal advice appointments last year, the Legal Services Commission of South Australia built a secure file transfer portal to help its client’s access legal aid.

  The portal, dubbed PhotoLegal, has been developed to allow SA residents to confidentially share information with the commission’s legal advisers without needing to attend appointments in person.

  It also eliminates the risk of sending copies of sensitive documents using non-secure methods such as email.

  Using end-to-end encryption, the portal can be used to upload and transmit images, PDF files and Word documents from any device.

---

Industrial and primary production

• Winner: GrainCorp / CropConnect Settlements Engine
  

  GrainCorp

  CropConnect Settlements Engine

  GrainCorp is reducing the risk for Australian growers being left out-of-pocket when brokering the sale of their grain by introducing a Secured Payment process to its CropConnect digital marketplace.

  The Secured Payments option was launched in May last year for farmers warehousing grain at GrainCorp sites.

  Before it existed, grain suppliers and buyers congregated via CropConnect but it was simply a “match-making service” connecting the two parties.

  The actual transaction needed to be settled outside of the platform, saddling growers with risk if and when a buyer didn’t pay within the advertised terms.

---

Education

• Winner: University of Adelaide / International Eligibility Assessment Digital Assistant
  

  University of Adelaide

  International Eligibility Assessment Digital Assistant

  International students have long been big business for Australian universities, but checking their eligibility, qualifications and English language proficiency is a complex and time consuming task.

  The University of Adelaide decided to automate much of the process with a chatbot that pops up automatically on the international students’ page on its website.

  The bot offers a series of simple questions tailored to each student’s home country to pre-assess suitability for entry, powered by data on each country’s academic qualifications system and language analysis to gauge English language skills.

  Aside from offering more assistance to international students than has ever been available, the chatbot has lowered the university’s cost to serve each potential student, increased the volume of pre-qualified leads and delivered a scalable solution to augment the Prospect Management team’s limited resources.

---

Local Government

• Winner: Local Government Association Queensland / Energy Detective
  

  Local Government Association Queensland

  Energy Detective

  Queensland’s 77 local councils combined spend $250 million on energy every year, but until now have had little insight into what they could be doing to reduce their costs or how they compare to other councils.

  After a survey of members highlighted a growing desire for stronger data and analytics capability, the Local Government Association Queensland has been working to develop a tool to delve into councils’ energy spend.

  Analytics and Special Projects principal at LGAQ, Brodie Ruttan, told iTnews the Energy Detective leverages existing data tools including AWS, Snowflake, Alteryx and Tableau, with council assets benchmarked by kilowatt consumption per square metre per day.

  He said the association was able to secure buy-in from councils, who are understandably wary about sharing data, because it was never envisioned as an ‘open data’ project for the whole world to see.

---

Diversity

• Winner: DXC / Dandelion Program
  

  DXC

  Dandelion Program

  NAB is using DXC Technology’s Dandelion program to train people on the autism spectrum for cybersecurity careers.

  Dandelion is DXC Technology’s flagship social impact program, resulting in the employment of 100-plus people on the autism spectrum directly.

  In addition, the program has seen over 20 people employed as technical and support leads at other organisations, including ‘Big 4’ banks NAB and ANZ, as well as the Department of Human Services (DHS) and Department of Social Services (DSS).

  NAB has its own Neurodiversity at Work program, which it has worked closely with DXC to create and run.

---

Healthcare

• Winner: Feros Care / MyFeros Portal and Voice Command Technology
  

  Feros Care

  MyFeros Portal and Voice Command Technology

  Aged services provider Feros Care has introduced the Google Assistant to its in-home care clients to increase their access to information and services and reduce their reliance on the call centre.

  Using Google Actions and the DialogFlow natural language processor along with custom APIs, Feros Care was able to create a voice activated system that connected with its MyFeros portal, used for everything from checking appointments to requesting assistance.

  Every Feros interaction with clients is captured on the portal, including medical interventions and advice, all of which helps seniors self-manage their experience to retain independence.

  Even though the system was designed to be as user-friendly as possible, some seniors still struggled with the interface, especially if they had mobility issues.

---

Resilience

• Winner: SA Water / SCADA System
  

  SA Water

  SCADA System

  SA Water has refreshed critical control systems attached to drinking water and sewerage infrastructure that services 1.7 million people.

  The utility sought to improve resilience and lower the risk of service interruptions through an upgrade and centralisation of the critical Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) environment that supports its distributed operations.

  The new system allows SA Water to “monitor, control, upgrade and support our critical infrastructure on demand, with minimal service interruptions, and in any situation, from isolated issues to a state-wide power interruption or targeted cyber attack.”

  It also makes use of a new type of programmable logic controller (PLC) designed specifically for water treatment plants. 

---

Emerging technologies

• Winner: IRT Group / Autonomous Vehicle Shuttle Service
  

  IRT Group

  Autonomous Vehicle Shuttle Service

  Autonomous vehicles have long been touted as an opportunity to increase mobility and accessibility among the elderly, but so far IRT Group is the only aged care provider to make it a reality.

  The project kicked off at its Kangara Waters lifestyle village in Canberra where IRT essentially had to build everything - including the government approval processes - from scratch.

  Executive general manager of IT, John Vohradsky, said the opportunity to deploy a driverless shuttle was identified through the organisation’s “push-pull” IT strategy of meeting the pull of IRT’s needs across its business streams while continuously identifying opportunities to push new technologies.

  “We were looking to push the new driverless technology to see how we could meet three main challenges pulling on the organisation, like the isolation the elderly can feel when their family and friends move away or people they know pass away,” he told iTnews.

---

Sustainability

• Winner: ITP Renewables, ThoughtWorks / openCEM
  

  ITP Renewables, ThoughtWorks

  openCEM

  The future of Australia’s energy mix has spawned innumerable heated arguments over how to balance secure electricity supply with economic and environmental needs, prompting energy consultants ITP to launch an open source modelling tool to settle arguments and provide clarity.

  Inspired by similar open source models in Europe and North America, ITP launched the openCEM model as a free, transparent tool to cut through the complexity of Australia’s energy mix and how it can securely transition away from carbon.

  “ITP felt, as many have felt, that public discussions around renewables were fraught with many assumptions and made with few facts and little expertise,” ITP strategy group manager Oliver Woldring said.

  Woldring told iTnews that existing models privately held by companies weren’t freely available and the data and methodology underpinning them can be opaque - making it harder to answer the question about how we move from today’s energy grid to tomorrow’s.

---

IoT

• Winner: WaterNSW / DamGUARD
  

  WaterNSW

  DamGUARD

  WaterNSW has created a sophisticated data integration and analytics solution to safeguard the state’s dams and the people and buildings near them.

  The solution, DamGuard, has enabled WaterNSW to make better use of "massive" data sets generated by the Internet of Things (IoT) and other data sources to improve dam safety.

  Utilities are swamped by data. For example, WaterNSW uses data about everything from leakage and movement to pressure, seismic activity, weather and other factors, some of which is recorded using telemetry.

  Multiple external organisations collect the data, and in the past they didn’t store it in the same system. Another problem was that some data needed for safety analysis was recorded on paper during manual inspections.

Consumer

• Winner: Boost Juice / Real-time feedback app.
  

  Boost Juice

  Real-time feedback app.

  Getting into the minds of customers is the first part of any sale, but when it comes to generating loyalty and satisfaction it pays to know what your clients are really thinking and saying.

  But if you can do that on the spot at the point of sale literally as soon as people are being served, both the customer and the business are onto a winner.  

  At a time when sentiment is divided over what propels a standout digital customer experience into one that delivers the real world, Boost Juice has carefully blended the physical experience of buying with real-time customer feedback.

• Finalist: Credit Union Australia / "Sam" Chatbot
  

  Credit Union Australia

  "Sam" Chatbot

  Credit Union Australia (CUA)’s new artificial intelligence chatbot, Sam, has been developed to combine the best elements of digital and call centre sales by continually learning from its interactions with customers.

  Originally named Rosie, Sam was launched as part of a pilot program in August last year to augment the human sales team’s capabilities by assisting self-service sales of health insurance on the company's website.

  Whereas most chatbots identify key elements of questions and then reply with stock standard responses, Sam has been developed in conjunction with ASX-listed Flamingo AI’s Cognitive Virtual Assistant technology to listen to and learn from each interaction.

• Finalist: MyChemist / Scalable data centre architecture
  

  MyChemist

  Scalable data centre architecture

  Online retailer mychemist.com.au has taken a very modern journey to ensure its data centre utilisation rates are as high as possible.

  The pharmacy also wants to avoid new spending while also making its applications portable so they can run anywhere, anytime, without degrading performance or interrupting business.

  The focus of the Data Centre 2017 project was to provide a scalable data centre architecture that could allow active applications to be transported between physical data centres and the cloud without the business being aware of its location.

---

Education

• Winner: Canberra University / Student CRM consolidation
  

  Canberra University

  Student CRM consolidation

  The University of Canberra has taken out the top spot for education IT projects at the 2018 iTnews Benchmark Awards for its UC Student 360 customer relationship management project.

  This ambitious project leveraged Microsoft Dynamics 365 Online to combine a vast array of digital tools and systems to automate more than 200 workflows, channelling enquiries around the uni to the proper department and providing a clearer path for communication.

  Current and prospective students alike benefit from the new platform, which brings together data and course information in a more streamlined, accessible manner.

• Finalist: Curtin University / Remote exam invigilation
  

  Curtin University

  Remote exam invigilation

  One of the biggest challenges posed to the education sector as it increasingly moves online is how to make sure students are submitting their own work and actually sitting internet-based tests themselves.

  Instead of hiring a fleet of invigilators to deploy into students’ homes to peer over their shoulders, Curtin University developed the Intelligent Remote Invigilation System (IRIS) to tap into students’ devices and automatically detect instances of cheating.

  Building on an earlier pilot from the Engineering Institue of Technology, IRIS is a cloud-based platform that uses machine learning and data analytics to harness the webcam and microphone on a student’s computer to monitor for coaching and check the test taker is the correct person.

• Finalist: LaTrobe University / "Matilda" social engagement robot
  

  LaTrobe University

  "Matilda" social engagement robot

  Teachers are often wary about letting more distracting tech fads into the classroom, but a trial of a social engagement robot in special needs classrooms in Melbourne has proved an early hit with both educators and students.

  ‘Matilda’ has been deployed in four classrooms at the Waratah Special Development School, where students range in age from 5-years old to 18-years old, and can assist teachers in creating positive social engagement through entertaining learning activities.

  Research project manager Dr Seyed Mohammed Sadegh Khaksar, from the university’s Research Centre for Computers, Communication and Social Innovation, said the personalised robot is designed to be personalised and complement teachers’ work, rather than replace teachers.

---

Finance

• Winner: Commonwealth Bank / OneCloud
  

  Commonwealth Bank

  OneCloud

  The Commonwealth Bank of Australia has never been shy about wearing its infrastructure heart on its sleeve.

  Nor has it backed away from making tough calls on vendors when it comes to creating the solutions it needs and wants rather than bending to supplier requirements. 

  So after literally decades of working the 'big iron' of computing, Australia's largest retail institution has set about redefining how it manages the heavy stuff with much greater efficiency and effect to keep it on the front foot.

• Finalist: ING / Identity management
  

  ING

  Identity management

  Identity management is the foundation of any enterprise computing effort and in 2018 ING made an effort to improve its authentication engines.

  Motivated by a desire to ensure staff could access the applications and data they need as soon as possible after joining the Bank, ING implemented a new system that matches hew hires' roles to its application estate.

  The result? Access on day one of a new worker's tenure, rather than days of manual requests. And as a side benefit, a far better ability to prove just who accesses what and when, to help with compliance issues raised by a certain Royal Commission ... 

• Finalist: CUA Australia / Personal banking portal
  

  CUA Australia

  Personal banking portal

  Australians have taken to internet and mobile banking in their millions, but CUA decided that it could enhance the experience for its ~500,000 users by making their experience more personal.

  The result is a new smartphone app that links members to personal bankers.

  Delivered in just four months, the results have already been impressive: user numbers blew away targets and those who adopt the service are younger, more engaged and feel better about doing business with CUA.

---

Healthcare

• Winner: Liverpool Hospital / Project ECHO
  

  Liverpool Hospital

  Project ECHO

  Liverpool Hospital has won the 2019 iTnews Benchmark Award for best health IT project for its implementation of the US-based Project ECHO, bringing health expertise to rural and remote communities.

  More than 350 de-identified cases from regional areas have been connected with hepatitis experts at the hospital using Zoom’s off-the-shelf cloud video conferencing platform, saving patients from the time and cost of travelling to Sydney to receive a diagnosis.

  It's believed Project ECHO has saved lives by significantly reducing the cost of treatment, as many of the patients wouldn't have been able to afford the time off work, travel, and accommodation while they went to Sydney for diagnosis and treatment.

• Finalist: UnitingCare Queensland / Transform Program
  

  UnitingCare Queensland

  Transform Program

  UnitingCare Queensland has undergone a broad transformation of its IT ecosystem and management, consolidating four distinct functions into one group and eschewing legacy systems in favour of managed services.

  The overhaul was driven by a need to reduce overhead costs while also improving the service delivery model of back-office functions in an incredibly competitive marketplace with limited funding streams.

  Amalgamating IT functions was the first step of the Transform Program, resulting in the creation of the Digital and Technology (D&T) organisation.

• Finalist: Melanoma Institute / Secure workspace
  

  Melanoma Institute

  Secure workspace

  When Ernie White took the CIO's seat at Melanoma Institute Australia a little over a year ago, his mind soon turned to security.

  The Institute’s (MIA’s) researchers work across Macquarie and Sydney universities, while some of its own team at the Poche Centre collaborates with researchers in Norway, the Netherlands and Canada.

  Some of the Institute’s researchers also work in hospitals across Sydney.

  The data they work with can include patient records and the Institute’s colossal database of melanoma-related research and records, which is used to research therapies for melanoma.

---

Industrial

• Winner: Melbourne Water / Artificial intelligence and automation
  

  Melbourne Water

  Melbourne Water - Artificial intelligence and automation

  Melbourne Water has taken out this year’s top prize in the iTnews Benchmark Awards for work in artificial intelligence and automation that has achieved important outcomes and displayed impressive operational maturity.

• Finalist: Queensland Airports / Video analytics
  

  Queensland Airports

  Video analytics

  As a general rule, airports are very well monitored places.

  Closed-circuit television cameras track the movements of travellers, staff and assets in and around airports, compiling a massive amount of potentially useful data in the meantime.

  Most of the time, that footage is used to make sure nothing untoward is happening.

  Queensland Airports Limited, however, has signed on 28 partners as part of a video analytics project to better understand physical movement patterns to provide a better experience for travellers, retailers and other stakeholders.

• Finalist: Aurecon Jacobs / Automated construction drawings workflow
  

  Aurecon Jacobs

  Automated construction drawings workflow

  Construction of a city-shaping project to deliver a vital alternative to the West Gate Bridge, providing a much needed major second river crossing, was never going to be easy.

  With such a massive project, it’s imperative engineers have quick access to accurate and highly detailed plans - a task that would have required hiring a fleet of drafters to hand-draw around 3,000 individual, yet highly similar, plans.

  Aurecon Jacobs Joint Venture (AJJV) decided in 2017 to look into automating the process in a bid to speed up production, reduce communication barriers between engineers and the outsourced drafters, and improve coordination between the many project disciplines working on the tunnel.

---

Federal Government

• Winner: Airservices Australia / Iaas overhaul
  

  Airservices Australia

  Airservices Australia - Iaas overhaul

  Airservices Australia has taken out the award for best federal government IT project of the year at iTnews’ 2019 Benchmark Awards for its huge IaaS overhaul.

  The government-owned corporation recently emerged from a seven-month migration of its entire enterprise compute estate to a secure government cloud provided by Vault Systems.

  It comes after the agency was force to give up two ageing in-house data centres at its Alan Woods office in Canberra at reasonably short notice.

• Finalist: Fair Work Ombudsman / Foreign language anonymous reporting portal
  

  Fair Work Ombudsman

  Foreign language anonymous reporting portal

  The Fair Work Ombudsman, in its capacity to address the exploitation of vulnerable workers, is exploring every avenue available to provide workers with information about their rights and give them opportunities to report their employers’ dirty dealings.

  In mid-2016 the FWO launched its online Anonymous Report tool for workers to alert the ombudsman to potential workplace breaches, and already more than 33,000 tip-offs have been lodged through the portal.

  Migrant workers, despite being one of the most vulnerable groups of workers in Australia due to they’re usually young and have difficulty with language and cultural barriers, were a lot less likely to contact the FWO.

• Finalist: National Blood Authority / BloodNet 5
  

  National Blood Authority

  BloodNet 5

  The National Blood Authority, who coordinates the management and delivery of Australia’s blood supply, has overhauled the BloodNet platform underpinning its lifesaving work.

  Work to modernise BloodNet4 began in late 2016, with an aim to reduce millions of dollars of wasted blood and making it easier, more efficient and cost-effective for healthcare professionals to order blood and blood products.

  The logistics behind BloodNet are complex - different blood components like platelets, plasma and red blood cells have differing shelf lives, and it can take donations from four separate people to provide one transfusion of platelets that must be used within five days.

---

State Government

• Winner: Victorian Department of Health and Human Services / Client incident management system
  

  Victorian Department of Health and Human Services

  Client incident management system

  The Victorian Department of Health and Human Services has won the state government award in the iTnews Benchmark Awards for the overhaul of its client incident management system (CIMS).

  The mission-critical system is used to manage incident reports in a centralised manner when clients are harmed due to incidents arising from accidents, staff mistakes or misconduct.

  It was borne from the need to support the department’s revised incident management policy and replaces what were previously manual, cumbersome processes that lacked transparency.

• Finalist: ACT Government / ACT Digital
  

  ACT Government

  ACT Digital

  Creating a shared ecosystem across the whole of the ACT government, ACT Digital connects existing business systems from the territory’s directorates.

  The platform functions as an opt-in, consent-focused digital service channel for citizens to streamline their dealings with the government.

  After proving their ID once, users will be able to access government services, from fines and vehicle registrations through to the booking of public amenities.

• Finalist: NSW Department of Finance, Services and Innovation / DNA Lab
  

  NSW Department of Finance, Services and Innovation

  DNA Lab

  The Digital NSW Acceleration (DNA) Lab grew out of a small project team within the Commonwealth Bank Innovation Lab.

  Now the fully functioning team of 28 staff within DFSI work with agencies across the NSW government to digitally transform public service operating models using agile methodology.

  Stakeholders are taken through an intensive eight-week overhaul, which includes testing with actual end-users, and has so far generated overwhelmingly positive feedback from participants and the broader department of innovation.

---

Local Government

• Winner: City of Greater Bendigo / Bendigo Things Network
  

  City of Greater Bendigo

  City of Greater Bendigo - Bendigo Things Network

  The City of Greater Bendigo's new IoT network has earned the top prize in the local government category of the iTnews Benchmark Awards 2019.

  In partnership with La Trobe University, the council has spent the last year building the free, open-source Bendigo Thinks Network by establishing network infrastructure across the city.

• Finalist: Wyndham City Council / WynLens augmented reality tool
  

  Wyndham City Council

  WynLens augmented reality tool

  Wyndham City Council in Melbourne’s outer west is expanding an augmented reality urban planning tool to cover cities across Australia.

  The expansion was enabled by a $300,000 grant from the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.

  Initially, the council’s smart city team developed 'WynLens' as a tool for developers and residents to visualise the $250 million redevelopment of the Werribee city centre.

• Finalist: Lake Macquarie Council / Road maintenance app
  

  Lake Macquarie Council

  Road maintenance app

  Lake Macquarie City Council has built a custom iPad app to allow its road crews to better capture and manage the condition of its $1.7 billion of local road infrastructure.

  The app allows council to improve the efficiency of road maintenance and upgrade works by letting field crews inspect, photograph and - if needed - assign repair work from the site of a defect.

  “Once the job is assigned to a crew, it is prioritised by severity and location, ensuring that the crews complete the jobs in an efficient sequence," council's asset management manager Helen Plummer said in a statement.

---

Emerging Technology

• Winner: University of Newcastle / Virtual reality dental anesthetic training
  

  University of Newcastle

  Virtual reality dental anesthetic training

  Newcastle University’s virtual reality play for oral health students has seen it take the inaugural emerging technology award at the iTnews Benchmark Awards.

  The VR application is used to simulate the delicate procedure of administering anaesthetic-filled needles for second and third-year students.

  Using an Oculus headset, the simulation allows students to practice in a controlled, standardised environment before moving onto their peers and eventually real-world patients.

• Finalist: Reece / Adopting Docker
  

  Reece

  Adopting Docker

  Bathroom and plumbing goods supplier Reece has made the shift to Kubernetes to manage around 1500 Docker containers that, together, make up some of its enterprise applications.

  The nine-month project, performed over three phases, has led to enormous improvements in the time taken to deploy software assets into production.

  "Previously our application deployment averaged 20-30 minutes a with very high ratio of failures," DevOps manager and lead architect Larry Fang said.

• Finalist: Port Macquarie-Hastings Council / Virtual reality for staff training
  

  Port Macquarie-Hastings Council

  Virtual reality for staff training

  Building on its workforce engagement strategy and values-based culture, Port Macquarie-Hastings Council on the NSW mid-north coast has adopted virtual reality technologies to enhance the effectiveness of staff training.

  Staff engagement was the primary focus of the VR Immersive Learning project, with plans to deliver a raft of professional development modules in a way that will help the information and ethos stick.

  Council is particularly interested in delivering empathy-based training through virtual reality, billing the technology as the most realistic way for staff to walk in another person’s shoes.

---

Rising Star

• Winner: Fiona Sparks and Eric Jiang / Service response at DHHS Victoria/Monplan student planning app.
  

  Fiona Sparks and Eric Jiang

  Service response at DHHS Victoria/Monplan student planning app.

  Two incredible feats of IT project leadership have made it impossible to decide on a single winner for the iTnews Benchmark Awards’ Rising Star category.

  For its second year as a category, it was decided that Fiona Sparks from the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services, and Eric Jiang from Monash University would share in the award

  Sparks leadership of the department’s IT strategy, planning and budgeting put her in charge of 100 projects with a combined $130 million budget each year.

  Jiang showed remarkable leadership in developing the MonPlan student planning website for Monash University, despite still being an undergraduate student himself.

Federal Government

• Winner: Australia Post / Digital ID
  

  Australia Post

  Digital ID

  Australia Post has been busily working to reinvent itself in recent years in the face of a rapidly declining letters business.

  This existential crisis has forced it to take a long, hard look at its core proposition and how best to serve its customers.

  With one of the largest retail networks in the country and a status as a trusted organisation, Australia Post is repositioning itself as a provider of many services to the community - with a clear focus on online.

  Its early strategic manoeuvres with its Digital ID identity verification solution have seen organisations across verticals flock to the fledgling service, and will likely cement Australia Post as the first identity provider on the DTA's whole-of-government Govpass digital identity framework.

  This, plus the opportunity to convert the six-and-a-half million identity verifications it performs in its retail centres each year, puts the Digital ID platform on the path to success.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Department of Veterans Affairs / MyService
  

  Department of Veterans Affairs

  MyService

  A major digital transformation of the way the Department of Veterans Affairs processes applications for military benefits has taken months and many headaches out of the process.

  In an effort that spanned several government agencies, DVA led the development of a bespoke platform that replaces a 16-page paper form with just three to five questions, delivered online.

  It has slashed the average processing time from 107 days to 30 days.

  And back-end links to legal information provider GovLawTech ensures any changes to legislation are automatically reflected in the system.

  It has made eligibility a lot clearer for veterans and removed the confusion that had charaterised the previous process, while dramatically increasing the chances that the application is processed correctly the first time.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: National Library / Digital library infrastructure replacement (DLIR)
  

  National Library

  Digital library infrastructure replacement (DLIR)

  Surging volumes of digital content were creating major logistical issues for the National Library of Australia, and it quickly became clear that its existing systems weren’t going to keep up with long-term demand.

  The digital library infrastructure replacement (DLIR) project saw the introduction of numerous digital archiving, OCR, image conversion and collection management tools, backed by an open source framework that has sped digitisation processes by up to 80 percent.

  Additionally, a new digital deposit service has boosted efficiency by allowing external parties to submit digital materials directly to the NLA – validating the library’s largest-ever software development and putting it in good stead to meet demand for the next decade.

  Learn more about the project here.

---

Finance and Legal

• Winner: Suncorp / Fast-tracking claims processing
  

  Suncorp

  Fast-tracking claims processing

  Waiting for an outcome on your insurance claim, generally just after you've been through a stressful situation, is not an experience anybody enjoys.

  Suncorp already offered an online self service portal to make the lodgement of claims easier, but customers were still reliant on a human operator to review their claim.

  The insurer wanted to reduce the amount of time it took for most of its users to lodge and have their claims assessed.

  An initial test of IBM's Watson natural language classifier quickly turned into a full deployment that has since extended to the group's GIO, APIA, and Bingle brands.

  After feeding Watson 15,000 de-personalised claims and their resulting liability determinations, Suncorp's creative application of the technology means it is now able to automatically correctly assess a claim in 90 percent of cases.

  For motor insurance customers, it has meant five minutes after their claim has been lodged online they can be out booking repairs for their vehicle.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Minter Ellison / Client data management solution
  

  Minter Ellison

  Client data management solution

  Law firm Minter Ellison wanted to move from state-based silos of e-discovery to a national capability underpinned by a single cloud-based platform.

  It also wanted to find a way to better transfer encrypted data to and from third parties involved in the e-discovery process, like data forensics specialists.

  The result is improved service and reduced costs for its clients - and the first success in a broader push to migrate business apps into the public cloud.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: ING / Everyday round up
  

  ING

  Everyday round up

  A big investment into ING's IT architecture in recent years has set the online bank up perfectly to move quickly on financial services innovation.

  Its rebuild to an architecture based on Google's Polymer application toolkit and the API Blueprint platform has allowed it to deploy features like its new 'every round up' digital money saver tool at rapid speed.

  While the idea isn't original - smaller players like Acorns and Moneybox offer similar products - ING's technology smarts have allowed it to react fast in a market where smaller, more nimble players are threatening to snap up the established players' market share.

  Learn more about ING's everyday round up project here.

---

Industrial

• Winner: Sydney Water / Customer hub
  

  Sydney Water

  Customer hub

  Like many organisations, Sydney Water is doubling down on efforts to understand its customers, but with a difference.

  It has created a ‘customer hub’ that uses data drawn from across the company to predict issues before they turn into customer-facing problems and to send proactive notifications about them.

  It’s early days so the full scale of the ambition is yet to be realised, but the hub is active for over one million customers in Sydney’s west - and this is very much a project to watch.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Momentum Energy / Alchemy
  

  Momentum Energy

  Alchemy

  Momentum Energy's billing system had grown over many years to become its primary customer relationship management tool, but with competition increasing and customer expectations surging, the platform could no longer keep up.

  A massive overhaul of the core environment saw Momentum shift to the cloud-based Salesforce CRM platform, with a massive data consolidation project providing the long-elusive single view of the customer.

  The new Alchemy system has delivered portal-based self service and a host of back-end integrations that streamline processes like credit checks, bad debt management, product ordering, and mobile access.

  Extensive involvement from staff and executives ensured the platform met both internal and external needs. Within a month of go-live, Momentum had set a monthly sales record – signalling a reinvention of customer service that will help it meet the ever-changing expectations of digital-savvy customers.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Newcrest Mining / Lihir O3b satellite project
  

  Newcrest Mining

  Lihir O3b satellite project

  Mines are often in remote, relatively inaccessible locations, but Newcrest’s Lihir Island takes that to another level.

  It’s 200 km from the nearest provincial city and 800 km from Port Moresby - and that became a growing problem as connectivity to the site stalled its digital mining ambitions.

  When conventional connectivity options were exhausted, Newcrest found a way to boost bandwidth to the site by 600 percent, bringing two telcos together for the first time.

  Learn more about the project here.

---

Consumer

• Winner: Carsales / Cyclops
  

  Carsales

  Cyclops

  Carsales is one of the few organisations to reap long-lasting success from the hackathon model.

  An idea one year ago to use machine learning and artificial intelligence to take significant pain out of sorting images of cars is already proving its worth.

  Not only has it cut out 55 hours of handling time per day for the 20,000 daily images Carsales workers were manually categorising, the firm's private and dealer customers are using the technology to do the same in their own operations.

  Learn more about the Cyclops project here.

• Finalist: EB Games / Ecommerce platform migration
  

  EB Games

  Ecommerce platform migration

  Building an online presence around a legacy of physical retail locations has challenged every retailer, but EB Games Australia has set the global pace for parent company GameStop after overhauling its online presence to run completely in the cloud.

  Rather than a lift-and-shift infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) migration, the development team went back to the foundations, integrating a range of commercial and open source tools to develop a lean, flexible and scalable framework that runs on AWS platform-as-a-service (PaaS) infrastructure.

  The new platform not only streamlines the online sale of products, but has integrated online and retail operations by enabling omni-channel marketing and customer loyalty outreach.

  Scalability and availability have proven good enough to support demand surges around high volume, limited edition releases – which has driven a sales uplift that pushed return on investment to nearly 144 percent.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Rugby Australia / High performance unit (HPU) analytics platform
  

  Rugby Australia

  High performance unit (HPU) analytics platform

  Trainers and coaches at Rugby Australia had invested heavily in systems to collect biometric and performance data on their athletes, but lack of integration between these systems meant data analysis relied on piecemeal manual processes.

  Development of the high performance unit analytics platform integrated a number of data management and visualisation tools to consolidate player data and make it available to stakeholders through a variety of methods.

  This integration and elimination of manual reporting has paved the way for rapid analytics that lets teams adjust players and match strategies on the fly.

  Learn more about the project here.

---

Healthcare

• Winner: ACT Health / Clinical systems incorporating positive patient identification
  

  ACT Health

  Clinical systems incorporating positive patient identification

  A radical transformation at ACT Health has banished the paper records at the point of care that are responsible for wrongly labelled blood samples and medication in hospitals.

  Now, when a blood sample is taken, a clinician is required to scan the GS1-standard barcodes on both their own ID card and the patient's wristband before a label can be scanned and printed onto a blood tube by a computer-on-wheels at the bedside.

  It means a label can only be printed in the patient's presence, reducing the risk that the label will be incorrect or misapplied.

  The effort required modifications to eight separate IT systems provided by different vendors.

  Not only has the health directorate already recorded a 40 percent reduction in wrong blood in tube incidents, it has also wiped eight hours of nursing time off per day per ward.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Catholic Healthcare / MyCH tablet and client portal
  

  Catholic Healthcare

  MyCH tablet and client portal

  A single application on a mobile tablet has significantly reduced the volume of calls to Catholic Healthcare's call centre and given its elderly clients more control over their lives.

  Samsung tablets with the aged care Breezie interface network with the not-for-profit's line-of-business system to give its home care customers the ability to access and control their schedule of care visits.

  Queries about which carer was coming and when formed a large part of the load of Catholic Healthcare's call centre - the app is now freeing these workers up to deal with more complex enquiries.

  It also gives users the ability to enter a video call with their care advisor without having to remember any authentication credentials, thanks to the inclusion of the OAuth protocol.

  Catholic Health is now looking at augmenting the platform to potentially support health monitoring through IoT devices, and whether the portal can facilitate financial transactions.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Thomas Holt / LiveCare360
  

  Thomas Holt

  LiveCare360

  Thomas Holt's aged care residents were becoming increasingly more technologically-savvy than the provider that was responsible for their living services.

  The not-for-profit saw the writing on the wall and took the opportunity of the greenfields build of its new Seymour Shaw residential care home to change things.

  Now, residents at the facility are surrounded by robots, sensors, circadian rhythmic lighting and wearable devices, all interacting with Thomas Holt's centrepiece LiveCare360 platform to provide a single, holistic view of the individual.

  Importantly, the system is reaping benefits not only in terms of healthcare and illness prevention, but is also giving its baby boomer customers the same lifestyle they'd had outside of the care facility.

  Learn more about the LiveCare360 project here.

   

---

Telco and Media

• Winner: Nine / 9Galaxy
  

  Nine

  9Galaxy

  Marketing of advertising time on commercial TV networks had long followed heavily manual processes, with rates set based on audience projections that were often best-guesses based on marginally related figures.

  Nine set about reinventing the audience projection process by integrating a number of big data analytics tools into a platform called 9Predict – which applies data science to massive datasets to deliver audience projections that quickly proved to be 20 percent more accurate than previous manual methods.

  Better numbers mean Nine is less likely to have to refund advertisers if real viewership doesn’t meet predictions – potentially saving millions of dollars per year.

  It has also improved modelling of projected audiences for video-on-demand (VOD) content, enabling Nine to better commercialise that fast-growing arm of its business and give the network a competitive advantage in a cutthroat industry that is still adapting to the challenges of the online era.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Aussie Broadband / Churn interface (faster than a pizza)
  

  Aussie Broadband

  Churn interface (faster than a pizza)

  Rapid growth is the goal of every small company, but for customer-facing businesses like national broadband network (NBN) retail service provider Aussie Broadband, it can also pose new challenges.

  Recognising that automation would help it grow without having to add more customer support staff, the firm built a bespoke system that integrated its customer environment with NBN Co’s service provisioning system.

  The new system automatically commissions services for customers from other RSPs within minutes. Order processing time has dropped from 13 minutes to 2.6 minutes – saving over $100,000 per year.

  The system will also support Aussie Broadband’s Wideband Networks corporate arm, delivering even more benefits as its customer base grows into the future.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: REA Group / Realestate.com.au home loans
  

  REA Group

  Realestate.com.au home loans

  REA and NAB had nine months to deliver a “world-first experience” to people in the market for property.

  A single portal through which potential homeowners could search for property, receive conditional online approval for a home loan, and then see how that loan could help them buy the property of their dreams.

  The two companies had very different ways of working and a mid-project crisis, but kept their composure to deliver on-time and budget.

  The result is a world-first where customers browsing property can properly understand their ability to purchase it.

  Learn more about the project here.

---

Education

• Winner: Deakin University / Genie
  

  Deakin University

  Genie

  A homegrown virtual assistant for students looks likely to be the catalyst for the formation of an AI and IoT start-up spun out of Deakin University next year.

  Deakin's Genie assistant is a suite of chatbots, artificial intelligence, voice recognition, and a predictive analytics engine that is intended to help students keep track of their campus lives.

  It does everything from nudge students if they haven't been studying enough to helping them keep on top of upcoming assignments and exams.

  The platform was built by Deakin’s internal IT team, and just months after officially going live, the university is already fielding requests from other organisations for the technology - so much so that Deakin CIO William Confalonieri has been given permission to start the engines on commercialisation.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: Griffith University / The biodiversity and climate change virtual laboratory (BCCVL)
  

  Griffith University

  The biodiversity and climate change virtual laboratory (BCCVL)

  Recognising that limited access to climate change datasets can compromise advancements in the field, Griffith University embarked on a major big data project to significantly improve climate change education and research around the world.

  Its biodiversity and climate change virtual laboratory (BCCVL) was built from the ground up using open source tools as well as the computing resources of the nationwide NeCTAR research cloud.

  The platform, which lets users develop and run complex modelling experiments across hundreds of layers of spatial data, in its short time has already become a significant global resource.

  More than 2200 students and researchers at 300 institutions in 18 countries are leveraging the BCCVL to conduct real-time modelling and experiments that support their own work on climate change.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: University of Newcastle / Neonatal resuscitation VR
  

  University of Newcastle

  Neonatal resuscitation VR

  A virtual reality application developed by the University of Newcastle is giving midwifery students hands-on experience resuscitating a newborn baby, without the real-world risks.

  Students previously had access to just a single lab session each semester to learn the procedure and test their skills.

  The new VR application gives them the opportunity to test and learn as many times as they like in a realistic setting, with or without the assistance of a virtual helper.

  Early results show midwifery students are using the app six times each on average, and choosing to do so most of the time off their own bat.

  Learn more about the project here.

---

State and Local Government

• Winner: NSW Department of Planning and Environment / SEED
  

  NSW Department of Planning and Environment

  SEED

  The sharing and enabling environmental data (SEED) platform is a public-facing portal that brings together over 1200 scientific datasets on land, air and water from nine state agencies and bodies in a single place.

  The site is deceptively simple to navigate; taking out the complexity required seven IT systems integrated for the first time.

  The result is an example of what can be achieved by government when they commit to open data.

  Learn more about the project here.

• Finalist: City of Melbourne / Digital services platform (DSP)
  

  City of Melbourne

  Digital services platform (DSP)

  Over the next 15 years, the City of Melbourne will take on another 70,000 residents, placing increasing pressure on how public services are delivered.

  This challenge led the IT team to look for a way to deliver services without the high-cost, manual and often inconvenient process of the past.

  It has resulted in a complete overhaul of the predominantly paper-based way Melburnians previously interacted with the city, with a SaaS-based digital services platform that puts the needs of users first.

  The platform has allowed the council to unshackle itself from a few large IT vendors and vastly speed up its development cycle, shipping products months faster than it previously could.

  The digital services platform has been built in a way that allows the city to respond to changing user needs quickly and scale up as required. It will serve as the foundation for future digital transformation efforts at the council.

  Learn more about the digital services project here.

• Finalist: Department of Health and Human Services / L17 family violence portal
  

  Department of Health and Human Services

  L17 family violence portal

  For over a decade, Victoria Police had been faxing an average of 71,000 paper forms to the Department of Health and Human Services for referral to family violence and protection agencies.

  All parties involved knew the process was inefficient and hampered response co-ordination across agencies, but the number of agencies involved along with the sensitive nature of the data and the constraints of traditional IT delivery models made the challenge seem too great.

  The problem was further exacerbated as volumes of referrals grew, but a 2016 royal commission into family violence proved the impetus to get the project kickstarted.

  With $1.7 million in funding, the DHHS IT team put their heads down, and six months later, the new Siebel L17 family violence web application was in operation.

  Doing development in-house and leveraging existing platforms avoided procurement headaches, while establishing a close, agile working relationship with police ensured user requirements were properly met.

  Now, family violence cases for the first time can be referred, tracked, reviewed and responded to by multiple agencies through a single online interface.

  Learn more about the project here

---

Rising Star

• Winner: Gaurav Singh / Energy Australia
  

  Gaurav Singh

  Energy Australia

  Gaurav Singh was named Oracle's top database admin of the year for the JAPAC region last month - but 18 months ago he'd had little experience with big data.

  Singh started at Energy Australia as a support resource, but used the energy retailer's massive information systems overhaul as an opportunity to skill himself up.

  His ability to self-learn a new and complex technology stack shone through when he designed a parallel footprint to Energy Australia's main Oracle information management platform.

  The new environment made a huge difference to the company's ability to ship out new products at speed while ensuring business continuity. Singh is the now go-to for Energy Australia on all things data warehouse.

  Learn more about Singh's journey here.

• Finalist: Josh Simmons / Metro South Hospital & Health Service
  

  Josh Simmons

  Metro South Hospital & Health Service

  Turning up to work one day as a physiotherapist, and the next as an IT advocate helping your former colleagues navigate technological transformation.

  It's not a traditional pathway to IT leadership, but it's how Josh Simmons became the Queensland Metro South Hospital & Health Service's head of adoption services, and the organisation's port of call for all things IT.

  Simmons' ability to communicate effectively with clinicians, coupled with a keen desire to learn and understand complex technical components and concepts, has seen him achieve big things in a short space of time.

  Learn more about Simmons' journey here.

   

   

• Finalist: Ross Stuart / SuperChoice
  

  Ross Stuart

  SuperChoice

  Ross Stuart started life at SuperChoice as a Java developer.

  Fast forward five years, and he's now the superannuation firm's go-to expert on DevOps and automation.

  After dipping his toes in the water with the company's 2016 IT infrastructure overhaul, Stuart has taken the initiative and skilled himself up to the point that is he now presenting on the topic at industry conferences while leading SuperChoice's internal team of DevOps engineers.

  Learn more about Stuart's journey here.

Federal Government

• Winner: Lesley Seebeck / Bureau of Meteorology
  

  Lesley Seebeck

  Bureau of Meteorology - Replacement of BoM's Supercomputer

  CIO Lesley Seebeck has achieved the not-inconsiderable task of delivering a world-class government supercomputer on time and on budget in just two years.

  The Bureau of Meteorology, which relies on high performance computing to crunch through its complex climatic modelling, saw the writing on the wall in 2014, knowing it would need to move to a new HPC deal by 2016 when its existing hardware would no longer cater to system enhancements.

  In September it seamlessly switched over to a new Cray XC40 facility 16 times faster than its old supercomputer, which will underpin and enhance the critical services the BoM delivers to a range of meteorology consumers, from emergency services to Defence and climate researchers and scientists. Shorter intervals between model runs means the BoM can deliver better, faster intelligence in situations when the smallest delay could be the difference between a home being saved or a home being lost in one of Australia’s notorious summer bushfires.

  Its new-found computational power places it amongst the top ten meteorological agencies in the world.

• Finalist: Ramez Katf / Australian Taxation Office
  

  Ramez Katf

  Australian Taxation Office - myTax

  Love it or hate it, there is no denying that the ATO has revolutionised the process of lodging a tax return, taking the sting out of arguably one of the most painful government transactions Australians are expected to carry out each year.

  Its digital lodgement solution has put the revenue collector within striking distance of its vision for no-touch simple tax returns, where automated, pre-filled forms only need a click of approval from a desktop, tablet or even mobile phone.

  In its third year, myTax became available to all individual taxpayers for the first time in 2016 and was used by 3 million Australians.

  A long way from the pages of paper forms of the past, ATO clients can now login to myTax on their smartphone using voice authentication, and the agency brags that returns can be completed in five minutes, thanks to the ability to pull and pre-fill user information from other government sources.

• Finalist: John Sheridan / Department of Finance
  

  John Sheridan

  Department of Finance - govCMS

  In many ways, the Department of Finance’s govCMS program is the antithesis of government IT projects in the usual mould.

  Since 2014, CTO John Sheridan and his team have stood up the collective, open source web content management system and hosting service with no big-bang upfront funding, and no whole-of-government adoption mandate.

  Instead, Finance has steadily iterated on an effort to address a widely felt public sector pain point.

  Based on the Drupal open-source CMS, Sheridan and the team has leveraged the scale of government in Australia not only to provide a cheap web hosting solution, but to bring a powerful community of developers together to share new functionality.

  By all accounts, govCMS has eclipsed expectations. In its second year it has already doubled its predicted adoption rate and currently supports 104 live government websites, with 29 more in the works. Despite the low initial outlay, it is tracking beyond targets to deliver millions of dollars back to government coffers by avoiding unnecessary expenditure on websites and supporting software.

---

Finance

• Winner: Mark Gay / ME Bank
  

  Mark Gay

  ME Bank - Project Transformation

  Five years ago ME Bank identified that the only way to get near its strategic goal of tripling its customer base by 2020 was to be able to offer a compelling experience for end users - something its existing IT environment would not allow.

  It opted to completely rebuild rather than renovate its existing system architecture to give itself the ability to plug into new technologies quickly and easily, without the worry of maintaining old systems.

  ME implemented seven new software systems and one million lines of code over the past four years in a complete redesign of its IT architecture intended to future-proof the bank.

  Despite an initial series of short outages immediately following the core banking overhaul aspect of the project, the transformation effort is already paying dividends through a huge reduction in time-to-market for new products, faster home loan settlements resulting in more revenue, and growth in customer numbers.

• Finalist: Dave Chapman / Teachers Mutual Bank
  

  Dave Chapman

  Teachers Mutual Bank - Dell Boomi integration

  TMB’s many years of effort to prepare its IT environment for the digital age is paying off after the implementation of the last piece of the puzzle, its Dell Boomi-based integration platform.

  After upgrading its core banking platform, introducing a new data warehouse, and implementing a single-customer view, TMB has now threaded all the pieces together via the on-demand cloud integration tool.

  Importantly, the integration is allowing TMB to quickly and easily capitalise on the innovative third-party mobile apps TMB anticipated its customers would be seduced by.

  The bank’s IT team managed to sell a technical capability to its board, and convince its core banking system provider to publish APIs and extensible services, to get the program up and running.

  It is reaping rewards through a reduction in IT operating costs and the millions TMB saved through using the platform to avoid a core banking system replacement.

• Finalist: Ian Gibson / SuperChoice
  

  Ian Gibson

  SuperChoice - Infrastructure strategy

  The hard June 30 deadline for compliance with the government’s new SuperStream superannuation system gave SuperChoice no choice but to address its constrained IT environment - which it freely admits was near breaking point.

  But instead of simply meeting its obligations, the company decided to go the whole hog and entirely rewrite its core legacy platform into a microservices architecture and deploy it into a multi-public cloud environment, alongside a complete overhaul of its development practices.

  It turned from minimal dev and test environments and expensive and slow provisioning (taking ten or more weeks) into spinning up new virtual environments in under an hour, thanks to a cultural overhaul to agile and DevOps practices, and by growing the IT team by almost 400 percent.

  It is now paying far less operational costs annually and has drastically reduced deployment errors, while bringing in new revenue from moving away from a single user acceptance testing environment for all clients to dedicated environments for individual firms.

---

Industrial

• Winner: Shaun Gregory / Woodside Energy
  

  Shaun Gregory

  Woodside Energy - Cognitive computing program

  If the enterprise world makes good on its potential to harness artificial intelligence (AI), Woodside will be where many look for clues on how to succeed.

  The liquefied natural gas producer started its journey by building a cognitive system that allows staff to search 30 years of collective knowledge for answers to questions.

  They have since gone on to build 12 cognitive instances, tackling everything from geotechnical data to HR, and recently revealed Willow, a virtual avatar that will let staff speak to a system that can search for answers across all their enterprise systems.

  It’s a program where payback could run into the billions, and one that is setting a benchmark for how we might all interact with IT systems and data in the not-too-distant future.

• Finalist: Rob Downing / Hanson Australia
  

  Rob Downing

  Hanson Australia - Dynamic mix control of ready-mixed concrete

  There are tens of thousands of combinations of raw materials that form recipes for different types of concrete.

  These recipes need to be maintained and tweaked according to statistical analysis. There is no room for error – any miscalculations can be catastrophic.

  Hanson Australia decided to take this complex materials science problem and turn it into an algorithm capable of calculating the bill of materials for every truck delivery in under one second. Customers can now get quotes in under an hour.

  The project was the most highly visible initiative in the company for its life of three years, and handles almost all concrete mix calculations across 220 plants nationwide.

• Finalist: Chris Taylor / Qantas
  

  Chris Taylor

  Qantas - Migration to the cloud

  Qantas has spent several years setting up an enterprise-grade hosting platform utilising public cloud, automating many aspects of infrastructure delivery and management.

  It has re-architected Qantas.com for the cloud using microservices, with goals to enable IT to provision new web-based services through the site at the ‘click of a button’.

  It’s a journey that many IT shops find themselves on and at varying stages of completion.

  But get it right and the rewards are there: not just in cost savings, but increased agility from faster release cycles and greater resiliency against service interruptions that can play havoc with revenue.

---

Consumer

• Winner: Goran Stefkovski / Kogan
  

  Goran Stefkovski

  Kogan - Dick Smith

  The opportunistic purchase of the Dick Smith online business, sans any of its infrastructure, in April this year saw Kogan’s tech team given just two months to launch a full ecommerce operation for the brand from scratch.

  By leveraging existing in-house expertise to remodel the proprietary Kogan platforms and microservices for a new brand, and utilising the auto-scale properties of Kogan’s cloud infrastructure, the team was able to relaunch Dick Smith as a pure-play online store without any additional resources within just one month.

  Launching a month ahead of schedule earned the business an unanticipated extra $3 million in revenue from a brand that is now generating around that figure each month in sales for the Kogan group.

• Finalist: Christian McGilloway / Retail Zoo
  

  Christian McGilloway

  Retail Zoo - Free the Fruit

  Faced with a slow decline in repeat customers and participation in marketing competitions, Boost Juice parent Retail Zoo was forced to rethink how it connected with its core customers.

  It took a gamble and created its first-ever cross-platform mobile app game, integrated with its PoS systems for in-game vouchers offering free drinks.

  Taking its cues from Candy Crush, interspersed with a bit of combat, the success of the game saw the firm end up doubling its intended four-week campaign time after the game soared past download forecasts and to the top of the free app charts for a brief stint.

  Despite some initial performance hiccups, the team has managed to create a well-designed, fun and compelling marketing tool that has made its mark on bottom-line sales as well as foot traffic in stores.

• Finalist: Alan Perkins / Inchcape
  

  Alan Perkins

  Inchcape - V360

  Inchcape’s back-end, plagued by manual processes and old, fragmented systems, was nowhere near ready to support the automotive services firm’s vision of being a customer-centric organisation.

  In an industry rife with such technological headaches, Inchcape’s IT team stands out for its efforts to push through traditional and steadfast ways of doing things with a proposition to try something new and unknown.

  Its V360 project unified data from closed proprietary and fragmented systems into one SQL data warehouse to provide a holistic view of the customer.

  The effort has significantly cut down the cost and many hours of effort involved in accessing information, such as for daily functions like determining what cars to order from overseas: this process previously took 40 people a combined 60-80 hours per week to produce 80 spreadsheets, where V360 produces this output in 5 seconds.

---

Healthcare

• Winner: John Sutherland / Ramsay Health
  

  John Sutherland

  Ramsay Health - MyPatient+

  Working hand-in-hand with clinicians, Ramsay Health has built a mobile application that promises to deliver advanced time-management capabilities to its doctors.

  CIO John Sutherland and his team have built a fully mobile tool that eliminates impediments that can slow a busy doctor down.

  Hospitals are complex places where events are unpredictable and rarely run to schedule: the MyPatient+ app keeps the whole surgical team up to date on any changes or delays to rosters in real-time, so they can better organise the rest of their patient care.

  It delivers clinicians a full list of their patients, locations, and discharge summaries, and is the first mobile tool to tap directly into a patient’s My Health Record if they have authorised doctor access.

  Sutherland and the team have committed to a program of constant improvement that is scheduled to see pathology results, outpatient schedules and clinical telemetry added in the future.

• Finalist: Nasa Walton / West Moreton Hospital and Health Service
  

  Nasa Walton

  West Moreton Hospital and Health Service - MeCare

  In the West Moreton health district of southern Queensland, patients suffering from chronic diseases make up only five percent of hospital numbers, but their care consumes almost 50 percent of hospital budgets.

  Walton and team realised that if they could do something to empower even just a fraction of this group to manage their own care from home, it could make a huge difference to the sustainability of hospital operations, and hand precious time back to sufferers.

  The HHS has become just the second health service in the world to implement the MeCare telehealth solution, offering customers tailored disease management plans enabled by connected scales, blood pressure and glucose monitors, and video conferencing tools, constantly feeding health data back to a clinical hub where algorithms have been devised to flag any issues in a patient’s status.

  West Moreton expects to recruit 200 patients to the scheme by January 2017, and is aiming to reduce preventable hospital admissions for its chronic disease sufferers up to 32 percent.

• Finalist: Mark Hindle / Relationships Australia NSW
  

  Mark Hindle

  Relationships Australia NSW - Complete Technology Refresh

  Relationships Australia NSW has managed to cut an astonishing 25 percent out of the not-for-profit’s IT costs by completely overhauling what was a neglected legacy environment.

  The organisation can now direct funds once wasted on high maintenance legacy technology to delivering relationship support services to the community, and can prioritise the IT team’s time towards making services better for its clients.

  Hindle inherited 23 RANSW sites running on siloed, dated infrastructure and decided the organisation needed to take drastic action to get ahead of the upgrade cycle.

  The IT team centralised all sites onto a new WAN, a new call centre solution, and a new Tier III data centre. New video conferencing facilities have been installed to allow RANSW to deliver safe, anonymous counselling to clients remotely through a private and discreet browser based session.

  While it is anticipating financial savings from the effort, the organisation is more confident that it is able to justify the trust its sponsors and champions place in it to improve mental health outcomes and relationships in NSW.

---

Utilities/Media

• Winner: Alisa Bowen / News Corporation
  

  Alisa Bowen

  News Corporation - Digital site production platform

  The online news business is extremely competitive – we should know – and the ability for a site to reach the biggest possible audience requires engaging content.

  News Corp has over 500 editors and journalists creating that content worldwide, but it wanted a backend system to support agile and speedy content creation and delivery, and increase the mobile responsiveness of over 30 websites.

  The result is a new content management platform based on WordPress, with content APIs and a Node.js system for bespoke requirements.

  It is one of the largest Wordpress deployments anywhere in the world, and one that is enabling News Corp to improve site performance and bring innovations to its audience much faster.

• Finalist: Kim Wenn / Tabcorp
  

  Kim Wenn

  Tabcorp - Sun Bets

  When a company the size of Tabcorp embarks on the largest global venture in its 22-year history, you know it’s going to be big in both complexity and potential payoff.

  The UK market that Tabcorp is after is three times the size of Australia, and in just 173 working days Tabcorp created an end-to-end cloud-based wagering platform to address it.

  The new platform also underpins Tabcorp’s Australian operations, so any innovation made on either side of the world can be immediately applied in the other market.

  This is a strong case study on architecting for the cloud that puts Tabcorp at the forefront of a highly-competitive sector.

• Finalist: Gurinder Sidhu / Energy Australia
  

  Gurinder Sidhu

  Energy Australia - Big data augmented data warehouse platform

  EnergyAustralia isn’t alone in wanting to bring its data to life – but it is significantly advanced in its journey.

  The company sought insight to fuel innovation and improve the customer experience, overhauling its vast, siloed analytics systems in favour of a single information management architecture.

  The financial savings from the program already run into the millions. The data is also powering business revenue streams in the tens of millions of dollars, and this is just the beginning.

---

Education

• Winner: Fiona Rankin / University of Wollongong
  

  Fiona Rankin

  University of Wollongong - Early Start Program

  The University of Wollongong has embarked on an ambitious and laudable campaign to use technology to break down the barriers of distance and ensure all children and educators have equal access to learning and teaching tools.

  Its Early Start program partnered with 41 early childhood centres in rural and remote areas to bring technologies like video conferencing, iPads, and smart whiteboards and tables for improved local learning as well as interaction with other facilities.

  The early childhood centres use video conferencing to connect into the Early Start Facility back at UOW, which offers research and discovery spaces that students and teachers can tap into despite the tyranny of distance, providing them teaching and learning tools that would otherwise have been unavailable.

  The project required a significant amount of integration work as well as training for educators. It also had the added challenge of ensuring its chosen technology solutions were robust enough to withstand both the challenges of remote locations and the less-than-delicate hands of students.

  The payoff for the effort is less in hard dollar return on investment - although the program has generated commercial research income and grant funding - and more on opening up previously unattainable opportunities for rural and remote students, as well as for research and collaboration on early childhood.

• Finalist: William Confalonieri / Deakin University
  

  William Confalonieri

  Deakin University - cARdiac ECG

  Deakin University has cemented itself as one of the more digitally-mature universities in Australia, and its latest focus on virtual and augmented reality for new ways of learning shows great promise.

  Its cARdiac ECG iOS app uses augmented reality to immerse students in the fundamentals of the heart and electrocardiography (ECG), allowing them to perform a digital ECG and test their understanding of critical cardiac events.

  The app is the first deliverable from the university’s three-year DeakinAR program, which will see the introduction of an enterprise-scale solution for creating and managing AR experiences.

  While the business value of the full three-year project, launched this year, is yet to be realised, the university has successfully delivered on the cultural and technical competency journey needed to jumpstart the program.

• Finalist: Professor David Abramson / University of Queensland
  

  Professor David Abramson

  University of Queensland - Infrastructure for Data Intensive Science

  Can infrastructure be cool? If so, the University of Queensland’s FlashLite computer and MeDiCI fabric take the cake.

  Faced with the challenge of a data tsunami, David Abramson - who took out this category last year - and team needed to find a way to provide infrastructure that could support data-intensive research while simultaneously being easy to use and not too expensive.

  The FlashLite parallel computer boasts high-speed SSD and main memory for the ability to store and manipulate large amounts of data, while the MeDiCI fabric moves data around systems, devices, and storage using local data caches - making data appear locally even though it is distributed - to allow for anytime, anywhere access by end users.

  The team leveraged off-the-shelf technologies and a commercial data centre for the effort, which originated as an ARC grant. It grew into a multi-university project that brought on six partners, who alongside the federal government have contributed funding to the initiative.

---

State and Local Government

• Winner: Dr Steve Hodgkinson / Department of Health and Human Services Victoria
  

  Dr Steve Hodgkinson

  Department of Health and Human Services Victoria - Victorian Housing Register Application Online

  Victoria’s Housing Register Application Online is unique not only because it is the first end-to-end digital social housing form on offer in Australia, but because it is the first state government service to be integrated into the Commonwealth’s MyGov authentication platform.

  CIO Hodgkinson and his team kept the customer experience at heart when they designed the service, which replaces irrelevant parts of what was a 200-page paper form with a dynamically presented questionnaire tailored to the user’s circumstances.

  DHHS called in usability testers, UX experts and Vision Australia to help optimise the solution for the its customer base, as part of its first fully-agile project implementation.

  By leveraging the existing MyGov platform, the department has avoided huge upfront and ongoing costs.

  It has also laid the foundation for a more joined-up user experience when it comes to government transactions, which hopefully will one day be structured around the customer rather than levels of government.

• Finalist: David Carroll / Adelaide City Council
  

  David Carroll

  Adelaide City Council - Cloud Migration

  Carroll's team realised early on that their move to the cloud represented not only an opportunity to save money and replace legacy applications, but to completely future-proof the organisation for the waves of technological advances to come.

  Adelaide City Council has eschewed the “lift and shift” option to completely rearchitect its IT environment so it is tailor made for an as-a-service future, doing a complete sweep of its application set to identify those that needed reconfiguration, those that should be left on-premise, and those that should be dumped altogether.

  Already, the council’s payroll, HR services, staff directory, email, data management platform, and terminal services have been successfully migrated to the new infrastructure.

  Carroll exploited the opportunity to secure portability between different cloud providers using Equinix’s cloud connect, so the council will be ready to make the switch whenever a new, cost-effective solution emerges in dynamic cloud market. 

  The team has also paid careful attention to documenting the whole process so it can share what it has learned with other councils who might benefit from its journey.

• Finalist: Trevor Hill / Department of Education Tasmania
  

  Trevor Hill

  Department of Education Tasmania - Edi (EDucation Information System)

  Since 2011, Tasmania’s Department of Education has been working to build a central, system-wide data warehouse and user portal that will put data from 24 previously disparate systems at teachers’ and administrators' fingertips.

  Edi is a self-service data interface designed to make it as easy as possible for teachers to keep track of every facet of their student’s progress in near-real time.

  It currently holds more than 150 million records on the 195 schools and 64,000 students in the state - information that previously would have taken busy teachers hours to find.

  While access to student data is now easily available from a PC, tablet or phone, the team has made sure to protect sensitive data through an identity management matrix that ensures only relevant staff can access the information they need.

  The department is already fielding interest from other schools systems in the tool.

Federal Government

• Winner: Andrew Walduck / Australia Post
  

  Andrew Walduck

  Australia Post - Building Future Ready IT

  Australia Post is the first to acknowledge it desperately needed a change in direction. The speed of decline in its traditional mail business meant the country's postal body needed to adapt or die.

  Enter Building Future Ready IT, a project defined by ambition and risk, and which formed a key pillar of the organisation's restructure into a digital business. This massive project touched every facet of AusPost's IT landscape over five years and required 63 individual elements across five streams to come together to deliver its goals.

  Walduck has taken AusPost to where its customers are through initiatives like the Digital Mailbox and an internal digital delivery centre offering online and mobile-based services. The organisation has reaped an impressive return on investment as a result, and digital channels now contribute a weighty portion of the organisation's overall revenue.

  The project is a great example of IT-driven innovation changing the business as a whole.

• Finalist: Graham Gathercole / Department of Agriculture
  

  Graham Gathercole

  Department of Agriculture - Service delivery modernisation

  Until this year, Agriculture staff were forced to operate with pen and paper when out in the field, and return to their desk to enter in their assessment data.

  Equipping 2500 field staff with a HP Windows 8 tablet has meant paperwork that used to be processed in 24 hours can now take less than 15 minutes, and imported goods that would take up to 48 hours to be cleared can now be processed on the spot.

  Cutting down these lengthy business processes is estimated to result in big annual savings for both the department and its clients, who can now transact online (instead of through fax and email). The relative simplicity of the project doesn't detract from the huge benefits it is set to deliver to the organisation.

• Finalist: Nicole Rose / CrimTrac
  

  Nicole Rose

  CrimTrac - ACORN

  The Australian Cybercrime Online Reporting Network (ACORN) launched as a multi-departmental effort aimed at triaging reports of cybercrime and crowdsourcing cybercrime data.

  It represents the first time state and federal police have been able to access a national view of the online crime affecting Australians, data which can be used to inform the most suitable response to the threats.

  Despite some early hiccups, the project deserves kudos for attempting to paint a whole-of-country view of cybercrime - with both public and private sector data - rather than focussing on isolated incidents.

  The success of the project will ultimately be determined by ACORN's visibilty amongst the citizens and businesses inputting data.

---

Finance

• Winner: Colin Turner / ANZ Bank
  

  Colin Turner

  ANZ Bank - Common decision platform

  The introduction of comprehensive credit reporting obligations last year forced ANZ to take a long hard look at its existing systems. It found seven disparate applications aligned with individual products which made accessing information on existing customers very difficult.

  With the knowledge that positive credit reporting wouldn't be too far away, ANZ took a chance on the then-unknown PowerCurve technology, consolidating its seven existing systems into one platform that would provide a single credit decision capability across its retail portfolio, and also prepare the bank for positive credit reporting.

  The bank can now also offer much faster - and more automated - credit card system approvals, without the need for as much human intervention.

• Finalist: Richard Holmes / Westpac
  

  Richard Holmes

  Westpac - Westpac data centre migration

  To achieve its goal of becoming a customer service leader, Westpac needed the back end to support its vision for the front end.

  Four years ago it set itself the challenge of getting out of 12 data centres and 6000 servers of varying quality, and consolidating to just two Fujitsu facilities while shifting into a private cloud. 

  The massive simplification has reduced its server costs by half, dramatically reduced its physical infrastructure footprint, and significantly slimmed the amount of time taken to provision new servers. And the bank managed to deliver the project within the dedicated timeframe and budget.

• Finalist: Darren Oliver / Herron Todd White
  

  Darren Oliver

  Herron Todd White - Project HAWK

  Property firms aren't generally lauded for their technological innovation, but Darren Oliver's team has demonstrated an admirable case of thinking outside the box.

  Lumped with an ageing Lotus Notes workflow management solution, they decided that rather than opt for another off-the-shelf solution, HTW would build its own, in what the firm says is its biggest project in a 45-year history.

  Using a mix of Linux, Ember, Ruby on Rails, OpenStack and Google technologies, Oliver and his team built a web-based business application that has delivered a huge reduction in the time needed for valuation processing, while allowing staff to work from anywhere, anytime.

---

Industrial

• Winner: Luc Hennekens / Qantas
  

  Luc Hennekens

  Qantas - Real-time all-weather load sheets

  No-one wants to be stuck on a stationary plane waiting for baggage and freight to be loaded, or shunted to a later take-off time because tardy loading made the plane miss its runway slot.

  So Qantas decided to ditch its existing paper-based process and build a mobile app that interacted with its flight management system to allow ground staff to input baggage and freight numbers in real-time via iPad minis.

  The new approach also reduced flight turnaround times by enabling greater communication between ground crew, pilots and planners.

  The project has now been picked up by New Zealand and Noumea operations, and has also enabled Qantas to better manage third-party providers at regional airports by equipping them with the tablets.

• Finalist: Kelvin McGrath / Asciano
  

  Kelvin McGrath

  Asciano - IT transformation program

  Years of underinvestment in infrastructure had resulted in unloved kit that wasn't performing for Asciano.

  McGrath had an undisputed need to fix the situation, and decided to leapfrog the inevitable hardware replacement by moving to an environment dominated by cloud solutions, taking the opportunity to rationalise his applications by half at the same time.

  Asciano's core IT environment is now consumed as a service, meaning its geographically-dispersed staff can for the first time work anywhere, any time and on any device.

  The transformation project also included the automation of systems at Asciano's Port Botany site, which took workers out of harm's way and resulted in a big decrease in injury rates.

  Judges were impressed by the project's amibition, cultural change and outcomes for worker safety.

• Finalist: Sandeep Dharni / Norske Skog
  

  Sandeep Dharni

  Norske Skog - ERP replacement

  Organisations in struggling industries tend to sweat IT investments to avoid the costs associated with change.

  But newsprint and magazine paper producer Norse Skorg decided that investing upfront could in fact turn out to be a competitive differentiator, and looked outside the box for a replacement to its heavy legacy enterprise environment.

  In just eight months it switched on its new Ramco public cloud-based ERP platform, allowing staff mobile access to core systems and delivering executives real-time visibilty of asset costs and operational performance.

  Importantly, the platform has cut down IT capex and allowed capital to be redeployed to growing the business in a declining market. The company's European headquarters is now looking at replicating the project overseas.

---

Consumer

• Winner: Wayne McMahon / Domino's
  

  Wayne McMahon

  Domino's - GPS Driver Tracker

  Dominos CIO Wayne McMahon introduced a seemingly simple yet incredibly effective piece of technology that has made a big difference to the consumers of the company's pizzas nationally.

  The Driver Tracker app allows customers to track their delivery from store to door.

  Equipping GPS to delivery vehicles not only lets consumers know exactly when their order will arrive, but has also significantly reduced driver incidents and boosted sales for the company.

  Others in the global Dominos group are now preparing to introduce McMahon's solution into their own markets.

• Finalist: Paul Keen / Dick Smith
  

  Paul Keen

  Dick Smith - Online retail standard

  Keen's third appearance as a finalist in the Benchmark Awards is driven by his most ambitious effort yet - getting Australia's online retailers using the same standard for the exchange of data.

  His frustration at being asked for data in different formats for each channel Dick Smith deals with boiled over into a proposal that immediately got the backing of some of the biggest retailers in the country.

  The initiative has now gone global, with the likes of eBay, Walmart and Amazon working together to create an international online retail standard. The ATO is also keeping tabs to see if it can utilise the resulting standard for Australian e-invoices.

• Finalist: Bill Robertson / De Bortoli Wines
  

  Bill Robertson

  De Bortoli Wines - Just-in-time fruit receival scheduling

  No company wants wastage, and spoiled grapes that could have been wine is arguably bad for humanity. Robertson has used technology to cut down on grape waste through two interlinked initiatives.

  The web-based 'Facebook for grape growers' allows growers to enter their own grape testing results rather than rely on oversubscribed De Bortoli staff, removing the risk of harvests lost to disease and over- or under-maturity. 

  Synchronisation of the data with the company's delivery scheduling systems has replaced end-of-day, hours-long grape delivery queues with tailored 15 minute timeslots, based on optimum grape harvest time.

  It has allowed De Bortoli to reduce the risk of spoilage that once occured when grapes degraded on the vine or in the back of a truck stuck in a delivery queue.

---

Healthcare

• Winner: Peter O'Halloran / National Blood Authority
  

  Peter O'Halloran

  National Blood Authority - BloodNet

  Since being crowned Healthcare CIO of the year in 2015, Peter O’Halloran has been busy working on a mammoth effort to link up all of Australia’s hospital pathology labs with the National Blood Authority’s central database to create a single, real-time view of the nation’s critical blood stores.

  His team has now completed what it claims is a world first: a proof of concept proving the viability of linking hospital-based lab systems into the NBA’s central BloodNet database, using real-time APIs.

  Already, 170 hospital laboratories have been linked up to BloodNet successfully, meaning the authority now has unprecedented visibility of stock levels and the status of perishable blood products across close to a quarter of the national blood supply, and is onboarding new labs at pace.

  Ultimately, O’Halloran and the team want to minimise wastage of critical and expensive blood products, which is currently estimated to cost the country $30 million a year.

  The new system will also give the health system much greater resilience to respond to disasters and other crises, like the 2008 blood shortage that put elective surgery on hold in Australia for a week.

• Finalist: Judith Day / Cabrini Health
  

  Judith Day

  Cabrini Health - Mobile clinicals and electronic medication management

  Nearly all Australian health organisations are somewhere on the journey towards electronic patient management. Cabrini Health in Victoria, however, is pushing ahead of the pack.

  Cabrini has been digitising patient records for a number of years and under Day has added electronic medication management and a mobile interface for clinical staff that gives doctors web-based access to patient records wherever and whenever they need it.

  The Cabrini team’s vision has been to go beyond electronic health records to fully web-accessible health records that can be securely accessed from a mobile device. The system has made checking up on patients as easy as possible, cutting down on the time doctors spend on the phone or in the car. It is reporting high rates of voluntary take-up of the mobile solution via an organic, incentive-based rollout.

  Additionally, Cabrini believes its rate of missed medications have been cut down to zero thanks to the new associated eMM system, and it is expecting significant savings from its pharmacy operations.

• Finalist: Tahir Tanveer / Australian Unity
  

  Tahir Tanveer

  Australian Unity - Omni-channel sales strategy

  Australian Unity has seen its customer engagement transform as the result of an end-to-end platform overhaul under which it replaced its 20-year-old bespoke CRM systems with a responsive suite of solutions and an online sales portal.

  The new platform means a customer who calls in to ask about a policy can pick up where they left off at any time, switching between online or over the phone.

  The health insurer has automated a customer needs analysis, taking contact centre staff through the best options for each caller so they can focus on providing consistent advice and an empathetic ear to new and returning customers.

  The new system is already registering significant business dividends and Tanveer says contact centre staff report it as being “as easy as using Facebook”.

---

Utilities/Media

• Winner: Nina Du Thaler / Queensland Urban Utilities
  

  Nina Du Thaler

  Queensland Urban Utilities - Q-Hubs

  Queensland Urban Utilities has created the Q-Hubs portal to visualise geospatial data drawn out of many different systems, giving staff a holistic picture of the water authority’s operations at any given moment.

  Q-Hubs delivers layer-by-layer visual details on where maintenance vehicles are located, where work orders are being carried out, where there are planned network shut-offs and where incidents have been reported.

  The platform goes beyond static ‘snapshots’ of geospatial data collated from disparate systems. The Q-Hubs system draws and visualises information in real time to give workers immediate operational intelligence to deploy staff and manage the sewer network.

  It also provides staff single-view access to customer records and network status. The platform is driving added revenue from the ability to better spot business users not paying their dues in any specific area.

• Finalist: Neil Louis / Telstra
  

  Neil Louis

  Telstra - Telstra Air

  In a post-NBN world the telecommunications playing field will be levelled and telcos will have to find new ways to differentiate themselves from competitors.

  In response, Telstra is building what it claims will the Australia’s largest wi-fi network, leveraging legacy infrastructure like payphones as well as home broadband customers' own connections to reach its target of 2 million hotspots by 2020.

  The network allows Telstra home broadband customers to share a portion of their data allowance in return for the same from others.

  The $100 million program represents an ambitious customer value proposition that has yet to be matched by any other players in the market. The telco reports that take-up is already exceeding initial expectations, and the ultimate success of the project will be Telstra's ability to convince customers to share their data.

• Finalist: Chris Truscott / Melbourne Water
  

  Chris Truscott

  Melbourne Water - Asset management information system replacement

  Melbourne Water’s $20 million replacement of its core asset management system not only released the agency from the shackles of out of date technology.

  The project was also a “once in a 15 year opportunity” to enhance the way it manages $18 billion worth of water infrastructure.

  Melbourne Water seized the opportunity to modernise not only technology but bundle up an overhaul of business processes into the change process, and to make the way 460 workers do their jobs easier and more efficient.

  The replacement is expected to deliver Melbourne Water significant savings over the life of the new technology by optimising the life expectancy of its assets and enabling it to make better strategic decisions about when and where to send maintenance teams.

---

Education

• Winner: Professor David Abramsom / University of Queensland
  

  Professor David Abramsom

  University of Queensland - Genomics Virtual Laboratory

  The study of genomics is a life-saving but resource-intensive enterprise that requires bucketloads of computing resources to process and visualise complex sequences of data.

  Abramson and his team are working to make the process of spinning up compute clusters as easy as possible for researchers, by designing a tailor-made, pre-packaged cluster that can be picked up for free by Australian scientists.

  The solution, powered by either the NeCTAR research cloud or AWS public cloud, comes pre-populated with specific bioinformatics tools and visualisation products common to the majority of genomics researchers.

  It allows scientists to spend less of their time and money piecing together complex software and hardware to facilitate their research and more time on making potentially groundbreaking discoveries.

• Finalist: Professor Ken Udas / University of Southern Queensland
  

  Professor Ken Udas

  University of Southern Queensland - Making the Connection program

  The University of Southern Queensland’s entry stands out for both its technological simplicity and its complex social ambition.

  Under the leadership of Udas, the USQ has taken its tailor-made technology program into eight Australian jails to ensure prisoners don't get left behind in the digital age, despite being largely barred from internet access.

  Udas has created a version of the USQ learning management system modified with special features to work in an offline environment. The program is now looking to supply notebook computers to prisoners so they can take the learning materials back to their cell.

  The team has yet to fully measure the impact of the program but is buoyed by studies showing participation in higher education can reduce rates of recidivism by up to 40 percent, and is aiming for a national rollout.

• Finalist: Trevor MacDougall / Open Colleges
  

  Trevor MacDougall

  Open Colleges - OpenSpace 2.0

  As an online education provider, Open Colleges’ learning platform is its bread and butter.

  This means updating its underlying technology was a make or break opportunity for the business.

  Open Colleges spun up a minimum viable product leveraging the flexibility of the AWS public cloud and crowdsourced testing technologies.

  The responsive, HTML5 design can be accessed from any device and fortnightly releases are set to keep the new platform up to speed with an increasingly demanding consumer base.

  Since OpenSpace 2.0 went live, Open Colleges says it has seen positive social sentiment nearly double, and the length of time students spend engaging with content multiply several times over. The organisation is also realising big efficiency gains from the switch away from printed material.

---

State and Local Government

• Winner: Todd Crawford / Tasmania Police
  

  Todd Crawford

  Tasmania Police - TasPol computer replacement project

  Many police forces around the world have jumped on the productivity dividends reaped from handing out mobile devices to officers.

  Tasmania Police's gutsy rollout, however, while not the first has been just as much about reducing expenditure on software licences in tough budgetary conditions.

  TasPol distributed Windows 8 tablets to all 1000 frontline staff and made devices their primary machine, allowing it to strip excess machines out of its training rooms and incident rooms and end the duplication of devices amongst workers.

  Judges were impressed with the smart decisions the team made along the way like weighing up the cost of ruggedising tablets against the actual cost of replacing a small number of dropped devices, and giving officers the freedom to take the devices home (and charge them) instead of investing in charging docks

• Finalist: Colin Jones / Service NSW
  

  Colin Jones

  Service NSW - Virtualisation of SNSW contact centres

  Established as a one-stop hub to deliver customer-facing services for a range of NSW agencies, Service NSW faced the dual challenge of modernising inherited legacy contact centres and expanding and modernising at pace.

  In response, the agency completely rebuilt the state’s Genesys contact centre platform with a fully virtualised, software-as-a-service model supported through a third party. The project has expanded to 520 seats across two contact centres.

  The effort is delivering an impressive return on investment for the NSW government by removing the need for a dedicated disaster recovery site while also creating new business opportunities.

• Finalist: David Schneider / Department of Premier and Cabinet NSW
  

  David Schneider

  Department of Premier and Cabinet NSW - Activity-based working transformation

  NSW’s Department of Premier and Cabinet sees itself on the forefront of the push towards activity-based working in the public sector.

  When the NSW government decided not to renew its lease at Sydney’s Governor Macquarie Tower and move into more cost effective premises at Martin Place, CIO David Schneider seized the opportunity to overhaul the offices.

  In a novel move for a government agency, he reworked network infrastructure at the new site, introduced mobile devices, hot desks, unified communications, telephony portability and end-to-end electronic document management to enable the new collaborative environment.

  The department is confident the move will improve the IT team’s reputation amongst staff and position the organisation as a workplace of choice for the best candidates on the market.

Federal/State Government

• Winner: Gary Sterrenberg / Department of Human Services
• Finalist: Maria Milosavljevic / Australian Crime Commission
• Finalist: Pedro Harris / NSW Department of Finance

---

Finance

• Winner: Simon Andrews / ING Direct
• Finalist: Trevor Barrenger / WorkCover Queensland
• Finalist: Dave Chapman / Teachers Mutual Bank

---

Industrial

• Winner: Ben Rogers / Rio Tinto
• Finalist: Michael Salas / SITA
• Finalist: Vito Forte / Fortscue Metals Group

---

Consumer

• Winner: Ajay Bhatia / Carsales
• Finalist: Paul Keen / Dick Smith
• Finalist: Samir Mahir / Tennis Australia

---

Healthcare

• Winner: Peter O'Halloran / National Blood Authority
• Finalist: Dmitri Mirvis / Mercy Health
• Finalist: Richard Royle / UnitingCare

---

Utilities/Media

• Winner: Paul McManus / Domain
• Finalist: Vincent Dempsey / Vodafone
• Finalist: Kelly Ferguson / Mi9

---

Education

• Winner: Sendur Kathir / Melbourne University
• Finalist: William Confalonieri / Deakin University
• Finalist: Mitra Bhar / NSW Board of Studies

Federal/State Government

• Winner: David Johnson / Queensland Police
• Finalist: Chris Robson / NSW Police
• Finalist: Peter Alexander / Treasury

---

Finance

• Winner: David Gee / CUA
• Finalist: Andy Weir / Bankwest
• Finalist: Jim Burke / Westpac

---

Industrial

• Winner: Sanjay Mehta / ConocoPhillips
• Finalist: Rob Downing / Hanson
• Finalist: Brian Adams / Worley Parsons

---

Consumer

• Winner: Damon Rees / Woolworths
• Finalist: Ajay Bhatia / Carsales
• Finalist: Viren Shah / Speciality Fashion Group

---

Healthcare

• Winner: Greg Wells / NSW Health
• Finalist: Glenn Payne / Feros Care
• Finalist: David Johnston / South Australia Health

---

Utilities/Media

• Winner: Robyn Elliot / Foxtel
• Finalist: Craig Wishart / Service Stream
• Finalist: Mathew Thomas / Unitywater

---

Education

• Winner: William Confaloniere / Deakin University
• Finalist: Ian Tebbett / Monash University
• Finalist: Bret Watson / Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research

Government

• Winner: Greg Farr / Department of Defence
• Finalist: Susan Monckley / Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations
• Finalist: David Kennedy / NSW Trade and Investment

---

Finance

• Winner: Michael Harte / Commonwealth Bank
• Finalist: David Gee / CUA
• Finalist: Andrew Henderson / ING Direct

---

Industrial

• Winner: Jason Cowie / Calibre Global
• Finalist: Vito Forte / Fortescue Metals Group
• Finalist: Gavin Bills / Pacific Aluminium

---

Consumer

• Winner: Wayne McMahon / Domino's
• Finalist: Henry Shiner / McDonald's
• Finalist: Paul Keen / RedBalloon

---

Utilities/Media

• Winner: Leigh Berrell / Yarra Valley Water
• Finalist: John Lindsay / Internode
• Finalist: Cameron Dorse / Jemena