First Brill Awards winners showcase innovative reliability designs and techniques

In the judgment of more than 90 industry professionals who evaluated project submissions from leading enterprises around the world, these projects best exhibited efficiency in data center and IT operations in the broadest sense of the word -- efficiency of capital deployment, technology, design, operations and overall management. The Brill Awards seeks to showcase companies and technologies that improve the industry's ability to sustainably deliver IT services to the end user.
Kevin Heslin, Brill Awards program director, said, "Our work at the UptimeInstitute brings us around theworld. We have foundthat borders do not limitinnovation or the desire tolower costs and to increasereliability. The Brill Awardsattracted worthy entrants from 19countries, and we believe thathonoring the best of these projectswill provide incentive for continuousimprovement in IT, wherever datacenters are found."

“It is incredibly encouraging that the industry is starting to break the barriers between IT and M&E. Blending both worlds, as shown by many of these entries, drives efficiency, lowers cost, greatly reduces risk, and integrates processes that I feel should have long ago been intertwined. Great job by all of those who submitted,” said Steve Manos, a Brill Awards judge and General Manager-North America at Norland Managed Services.

Uptime Institute will host a Brill Awards VIP dinner at Symposium 2014 (May 20-22 in Santa Clara, CA), where the winning projects will be presented. Many of the entrants will be available to discuss their winning projects:
· CenturyLink
· Chemical Abstracts Service
· Compass Datacenters
· Digital Realty
· Depository Trust Clearing Corporation (DTCC)
· eBay
· Entel
· Fidelity
· Itau Unibanco
· Kaiser Permanente IT
· LG CNS
· Morgan Stanley
· New South Wales, Australia, Department of Finance and Services
· Petroleum Geo-Services
· Portugal Telecom
· Sonda
· Taiwan Mobile
· Telefonica

Brill Awards entrants submitted applications in five categories, and these were further divided into regions for judging. This simplified the task of judging entries and enabled the program to take into account geographic, commercial, and regulatory drivers around the world. The five categories are:
· Design - Data center capital projects that demonstrate the ability to deliver significant energy and resource efficiency.
· Facility Management - Projects or processes that demonstrate significant resource efficiency through application of best practices and new ideas.
· Operational Upgrade - Data center renovations or upgrades that deliver significant resource efficiency.
· IT Systems Efficiency - IT projects or processes that demonstrate significant resource efficiency through application of best practices and new ideas.
• Product Solutions - Facility infrastructure or IT products that significantly improve data center energy and/or resource efficiency, as demonstrated in a user deployment.

In addition, 93 industry professionals contributed their time and expertise to the program. Many did so because of past affiliation with Uptime Institute or with its late founder Ken Bill, after whom the program is named. Others, however, participated because of their deep commitment to industry.
The Brill Awards replaced the Green Enterprise IT Awards, an Uptime Institute program that recognized accomplishment in data center design and operations from 2008-2013.