Austrian APA and Portuguese Lusa to share European Award for News Agency Quality

Austrian news agency APA and Portuguese news agency LUSA are sharing the 2010 European Alliance of News Agencies' Award for Excellence in News Agency Quality. Austria Presse Agentur gets the prize for a strategy project called "Focus Media" performed by a project group within the agency. LUSA Agencia De Noticias De Portugal's Technical Director, Paulo Nogueira dos Santos, is awarded for a technical transformation of the news agency aiming towards multimedia and convergence.

The prize, Euro 1 000 to share, diploma etc, will be handed over to the winners by the President of the European Alliance of News Agencies (EANA), M'ty's Vince, CEO of Hungarian news agency MTI, in connection with the organisation's Annual General Assembly and a conference in Geneva on September 22 - 24, 2010.

The Board/Bureau of EANA, that is also the Jury for the Award, said that the APA project "includes aspects on editorial, technological and commercial strategies for a news agency".

"Within a short time, all media, including news agencies, must change dramatically to come to terms with new technological, social and economic influences that include both opportunities and threats", the EANA Jury said. "The APA "Focus Media" project claims no more and no less than to rethink the concept of APA as a news agency considering the radically changing world of media".

"Mr dos Santos' technical project stresses the need for forward aiming developments of multimedia and convergence in a time of booming information technology and combines this with cutting IT costs by using an efficient mix of in-house IT and outsourcing", the EANA Jury said.

Mr dos Santos joined LUSA in 2005 as Technical Director. Earlier he has had managerial IT positions in companies of several industries like semiconductors and ceramics & crystal. He has also been an invited lecturer at several public and private universities in Lisbon and Porto. He is a graduate from the Faculty of Sciences, Porto University, APGEI - Porto and IEP/ESADE - Porto with degrees in Applied Mathematics, Industrial Management and Business Management.

The APA team for the "Focus Media" project comprises:

Peter Kropsch, CEO,

Konrad Tretter, Managing Director,

Michael Lang, Editor-in-Chief (Editorial Department),

Johannes Bruckenberger, Deputy Editor-in-Chief (Editorial Department),

Alexander Falchetto, Head of Planning & Operations (APA-IT),

Claudia Haider, Key Account Manager, Head of Sales Department "Media"(Marketing & Sales)

Marcus Hebein, Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Head of APA-MultiMedia (Editorial Department) Jochen Hofer, Head of the Vorarlberg Bureau (Editorial Office)

Gerald Innerwinkler, Head of Multimedia Solutions (APA-IT)

Roman Oslansky, Project Manager, Multimedia Solutions (APA-IT)

Clemens Pig, Head of Marketing & Sales

Katharina Schell, Head of Editorial Department Domestic Affairs (Editorial Department)

Paul Schneidhofer, Sales Manager, Key Account Manager, Head of Sales Department "Business"(Marketing & Sales)

Robert Schweinzer, Head of Product Management for the APA Editorial Departments (Editorial Department)

For more information, please contact EANA secretary Erik Nylen +46 739 865272