A provincial government initiative dedicated to the sharing of geographical data was recognized with the “Best of Show” award at the recent ITX Awards hosted by IT World Canada, publishers of CIO Canada. The awards were presented at a gala at Toronto’s Roy Thomson Hall, in conjunction with CIO Canada’s tenth anniversary celebration (see pgs. 12 and 13).
Land Information Ontario (LIO) is responsible for coordinating the collection of the province’s land data and sharing it among the various levels of government and other stakeholders. Its infrastructure is composed of a Web-accessible physical data warehouse and a metadata collection query tool to support exchanges.
“I think we underestimated how much efort it would take, but we’re finally starting to reach the point where we’re making a difference to the taxpayers of Ontario,” said Brian Maloney of the Ministry of Natural Resources after receiving the honour, along with an award in the “Collaboration” category.
Category Award Winners
In addition to receiving accolades for LIO, the Ontario government’s Justice Cluster also won the ITX award in the “Business Leadership” category for its Justice Technology Services’ Major Case Management initiative. Developed in part as a response to recommendations following a review of the Paul Bernardo investigation and trial, the system assists investigators in collecting, managing, retrieving and analyzing large volumes of investigative data in major cases.
Scotiabank took home the “Business Value” award for its Automotive Finance Flooring Portal and PocketPC. Flooring is the industry term for the financing of
(back row – left to right) Derek Landry, Manager Geosmart; Raphael Sussman, Manager Land Information Ontario; Moira Watson Turner, Data Architect Consultant; Des McKee, Assistant Deputy Minister, Science Information Resource Division, CIO – Land & Resources Cluster
(front row – left to right) Jim Hamilton, Director IRMB; Rob Parry, Manager Land and Resource Data Administration; Brian Maloney, Manager Geographic Information; John deLagran, Manager Information Infrastructure; Anne Halverson, Manager Information Access
new vehicles for automotive dealerships. This initiative provides online and wireless solutions to eliminate cumbersome and error-prone manual processes. The implementation reduces workload from bank branches and dealerships by enabling dealers to interact directly with the system. It also improves credit administration and management of the financed inventory.
Sun Life Financial received top honours in the “IT Leadership” category for its Group Retirement Services and Group Benefits Integrated Services initiative. The initiative is a response to the need to transform business and focus on the customer at the centre of a self-service model. This was achieved by completely redesigning processes so plan members can conduct business in an intuitive manner.
Benefits from the changes include increased new sales, a high customer loyalty rating and reduction in costs per member.
Launched by IT World Canada in 1997, the ITX Awards recognize IT initiatives that demonstrate best practices and enable the enterprise to move in new directions, changing its scope, nature and economics.
The ITX Awards form part of a broader ‘Leadership’ program produced by CIO Canada in collaboration with IBM.
