Datamation Announces Product of the Year Winners

Datamation’s Product of the Year 2005 Awards showcase a healthy mix of familiar players and ambitious upstarts, reflecting the diversity and adaptability of enterprise technology.

Winners ranged from giants, such as SAS — our only double winner — and Microsoft, to an organization distributing free software.

Recognizing the rapidly evolving needs of enterprise professionals, this year’s awards feature several new categories, including Compliance Software, Enterprise Linux Application and Malware Removal Tool.

Grabbing the top spot in the Anti-Spam category was SpamAssassin, an extensible email filter that identifies spam. SpamAssassin is under the umbrella of the Apache Software Foundation, which supports a range of open source software projects. The popular spam filter had twice the votes of runner-up Webroot Software’s Spy Sweeper Enterprise. Finishing third was Cloudmark Inc.’s Immunity. Other finalists included NetIQ’s Mail Marshal SMTP, MessageLabs Anti-Spam and PureMessage from Sophos Inc.

SAS, a familiar name from previous Datamation awards, was the runaway winner in one of our new categories — Compliance Software. SAS Credit Risk Management software easily outdistanced second-place finisher Cognos’ Controller, while Consul risk management Inc.’s InSight Security Manager Compliance Management Modules and Configuresoft’s Enterprise Configuration Manager finished in a virtual tie for third.

Another new awards category, Enterprise Instant Messaging, was won by Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005, an enterprise-level software designed to extend IM and other real-time communication to partners, customers and suppliers. IBM’s Lotus Instant Messaging finished a respectable second, followed closely by IMLogic Inc.’s IM Manager 6.5.

Mozilla’s Firefox 1.0, the increasingly popular open-source alternative to Microsoft’s embattled Internet Explorer browser, dominated the voting for Datamation’s first Enterprise Linux Application award, earning nearly twice the number of votes as the other three finalists combined. Second place went to VMware Inc.’s VMWare Workstation 4.5, with AdaCore’s GNAT Pro Toolset and Novell’s SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 deadlocked for third place.

In a competitive contest, NFR Security’s Sentivist IPS, a network intrusion prevention system, won this year’s Enterprise Security award, topping runner-up Digital Defense Inc.’s Frontline 3.0, a subscription-based vulnerability assessment service. The bronze went to Britestream Network’s BN1010 network interface card. Also receiving respectable support were SecureWave’s Sanctuary Device Control and PivX Inc.’s Qwik-Fix Pro Enterprise.

StorageTek’s Streamline SL500 Modular Library System was the big winner in the Enterprise Server category, gaining more than twice the votes of runner-up IBM’s p5 Series. JBoss Inc.’s JBoss Application Server finished third, with NetManage Inc.’s RUMBA and HP’s OpenVMS OS for Alpha, VAX and Integrity Servers close behind.

Continue on to the next page to check out the rest of the winners and finalists.

In the Handheld Device category, there was Blackberry and then there was everybody else. Research in Motion’s Blackberry 7100 crushed the other finalists, getting 85 percent of the total votes. The leftovers were split between Palm’s Treo 650, PalmOne’s Tungsten T5, HP’s iPaq 6315 and ASUSTeK Computer Inc.’s MyPal A730W.

Another one of our new categories, Malware Removal, saw a spirited two-horse dash that was finally won by Lavasoft’s Ad-Aware SE Professional Edition spyware removal software. Ad-Aware pulled away from second-place finisher Safer Networking’s Spybot Search and Destroy. Other finalists were Webroot’s Spy Sweeper Enterprise, PC Tools’ Spyware Doctor and Computer Associates’ eTrust PestPatrol Anti-Spyware.

SAS made another trip to the winner’s circle, this time in Datamation’s venerable Network & Systems Management Software category. The SAS IT Service Level Management software outpolled eIQnetworks Inc.’s SystemAnalyzer in a tight race. Coradiant Inc.’s TrueSight Real Transaction Monitor finished third, followed by Autoprof’s Policy Maker and Network Instruments LLC’s Observer.

Newbury Networks’ Wi-Fi Watchdog 3.0 was an easy winner in the Wireless Software category, topping runner-up Wireless Security Corp.’s WSC Guard 3.4. In a photo-finish for third place, Colligo Networks Inc.’s Colligo Workgroup Edition 3.3 edged Sendia Corp.’s Sendia Wireless SFA and InterLink Network Inc.’s LucidLink.

Over the next two weeks, Datamation will run stories about the winners in each of our 10 categories.