Independent Industry Experts Named to Judge 2027 FICO Decision Awards

Top executives, journalists and analysts will evaluate how FICO customers are using AI and decisioning technology to drive measurable business outcomes

Highlights:

• FICO announces panel of independent industry judges for 2027 FICO® Decision Awards
• Winners of the FICO® Decision Awards are to be announced in February 2027
• The 8 award categories are AI & Analytics; Digital Transformation; Customer Lifecycle; Decision Management Innovation; Fraud & Scam Defense; Financial Inclusion & Empowerment; Pioneer Award; Industry Vanguard Award
• More information at www.fico.com/decisionawards

BOZEMAN, MT--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Global analytics software leader FICO has announced its panel of independent judges for the 2027 FICO® Decision Awards, which honor businesses achieving outstanding results using analytics and decision management technology to grow their business, manage risk and reduce costs.

“Our customers are adapting fast, using data, analytics, and technology to create better outcomes, and some of what they're building is remarkable,” said Nikhil Behl, president, Software at FICO. “The FICO Decision Awards, now in their 15th year, celebrate that progress, and I'm grateful to our eight independent judges for the expertise they bring.”

Deadline has been extended to October 21, 2026. Winners will be announced in February 2027. For more information, visit www.fico.com/decisionawards

This year, our judges, in alphabetical order, are:

• Vitor Cavalcanti, founder and CEO, Coletivo.tech
  A journalist with more than 20 years of experience in content and communications, Vitor Cavalcanti leads Coletivo.tech, a Brazilian content and strategy platform focused on technology, business and society. He previously held senior leadership roles at IT Forum and as executive director of Movimento Brasil Digital, where initiatives he led, including free digital-skills courses and national research on 5G's economic potential and Brazil's digital competitiveness, reached millions of Brazilians. Vitor is a PhD candidate in business administration at Fundação Getulio Vargas and a member of the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council.
  
  
• Emilia David, associate editor, Enterprise AI and Technology, ISMG
  Emilia David has spent close to 20 years in journalism, much of it reporting on how financial institutions manage risk and adopt new technology. She covered banking operational risk and capital markets for four years at WatersTechnology, then moved into venture capital reporting at Venture Capital Journal and Insider before joining The Verge and then VentureBeat as AI reporter, where she wrote the weekly AI orchestration newsletter. She joined ISMG in mid-2026, continuing to cover enterprise AI across the application layer, infrastructure, policy and productivity, with a focus on how banks and enterprises separate real AI value from hype.
  
  
• Amy Lamb, head of development & industry relations, National Foundation for Credit Counseling (Previous Winner)
  With nearly two decades of experience across the nonprofit and technology sectors, Amy Lamb specializes in strategic partnerships, philanthropy, program strategy and consumer financial wellness. She now heads development and industry relations at NFCC, the United States' largest and longest-serving nonprofit financial counseling organization, working with industry partners and NFCC Member Agencies to fund and implement solutions that improve consumers' financial health. Her portfolio includes Life Beyond Debt, an initiative pairing fintech tools with trusted human financial guidance to give consumers in debt a personalized path toward financial stability.
  
  
• Adam Mills, AI editor, Newsweek
  Adam Mills leads AI Impact, a weekly Newsweek newsletter focused on how artificial intelligence is changing the way businesses operate, compete and create value. His reporting covers enterprise AI adoption, governance, financial crime compliance and the changing economics of technology, with recent work examining AI agents, software and services business models, workforce adoption and decision-making inside large organizations. With more than 15 years of experience as an editor, consultant and writer, Adam brings a practical lens to where AI is delivering measurable business value, where companies are struggling to scale it and what those lessons mean for business leaders. He is a graduate of San Diego State University and is based in Long Beach, California.
  
  
• Jim Mortensen, strategic advisor, Fraud & AML, Datos Insights
  Jim Mortensen is a strategic advisor in Datos Insights’ Fraud & AML practice, covering identity, fraud and data security. With more than 30 years of financial services experience, he has worked extensively in fraud prevention, identity verification, credit underwriting, analytics and risk management for leading financial institutions around the world.
  Prior to Datos Insights, Jim held senior roles at Equifax, Early Warning Services and American Express. At Early Warning Services, he led the Identity Solutions product line and its risk advisory committee of fraud and security executives from major banks. Earlier at American Express, he helped develop underwriting and fraud strategies supporting the company’s international card businesses across Asia, Europe and Latin America.
  
  
• Melisa Osores, managing editor for Latin America, Informa TechTarget
  With nearly 30 years of experience writing and editing specialist technology media in Mexico and Peru, Melisa Osores now leads Latin American coverage for Informa TechTarget, overseeing ComputerWeekly en Español's reporting on IT strategy, cybersecurity and enterprise AI adoption across the region. Earlier in her career, she led corporate communications for organizations in IT, tourism, security, health and services, and spent nine years as deputy editor of PCWorld Perú and Computerworld Perú, contributing regularly to outlets including InformationWeek México and b:Secure. She holds a degree in communication sciences from Universidad de Piura.
  
  
• Rob Strechay, lead analyst, VentureBeat Intelligence
  Rob Strechay advises technology providers and enterprise leaders on AI, cloud-native infrastructure, data, observability and cyber resilience, most recently as VentureBeat's first Lead Analyst and a founding analyst of VentureBeat Intelligence. Rob joined VentureBeat after nearly three decades spanning startups and Fortune 500 companies, including executive and analyst roles at Amazon Web Services, HPE, NetApp, Zerto, TechTarget's Enterprise Strategy Group, Manulife Financial and most recently as managing director and principal analyst at theCUBE Research and SiliconANGLE. His commentary on AI and enterprise infrastructure has appeared in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, CRN and CIO, alongside his own coverage for VentureBeat.
  
  
• Jaime Vargas, senior director, credit risk strategy, T-Mobile (Previous Winner)
  At T-Mobile, Jaime Vargas was part of the team that cut deployment cycles by more than 50% while processing over a million monthly credit applications with zero downtime, work that won a 2026 FICO Decision Award. He now leads credit risk strategy there, bringing deep FICO® Platform expertise to the judging panel from twelve years at FICO in analytic consulting and practice leadership across the Americas and Asia Pacific, plus senior credit risk roles at Santander Bank. Jaime holds an MBA from Indiana University of Pennsylvania and a BSc in industrial engineering from Universidad de Los Andes.

The 2027 Awards will be presented across a refreshed line-up of eight categories: AI & Analytics; Digital Transformation; Customer Lifecycle; Decision Management Innovation; Fraud & Scam Defense; Financial Inclusion & Empowerment; Pioneer Award; Industry Vanguard Award.

Winners will receive recognition at FICO® World, which will be held April 19–22, 2027 at the Marriott Marquis San Diego Marina hotel in San Diego, California. Winning implementations will be featured in conference activities, and two representatives of each winning company will receive complimentary conference passes.

Last year's winning firms represented multiple industries and countries worldwide, all with outstanding results: Erste Group & Inditex (AI, Machine Learning & Optimization); Banco Santa Cruz (Cloud Deployment); T-Mobile & Banco Atlántida (Customer Onboarding & Management); Absa (Debt Management); Bradesco (Decision Management Innovation); AFRY (ESG Champion); Grab Finance & NFCC (Financial Inclusion); Santander Brazil & Barclays (Fraud Management); BNZ (Pioneer Award); and TSYS, Compeer Financial & SentiLink (FICO Industry Vanguard Award).

About FICO

FICO (NYSE: FICO) powers decisions that help people and businesses around the world prosper. Founded in 1956, the company is a pioneer in the use of predictive analytics and data science to improve operational decisions. FICO holds more than 200 US and foreign patents on technologies that increase profitability, customer satisfaction and growth for businesses in financial services, insurance, telecommunications, health care, retail and many other industries. Using FICO solutions, businesses in more than 80 countries do everything from protecting 4 billion payment cards from fraud, to improving financial inclusion, to increasing supply chain resiliency. The FICO® Score, used by 90% of top US lenders, is the standard measure of consumer credit risk in the US and has been made available in over 40 other countries, improving risk management, credit access and transparency.

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