SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nineteen individual awards were presented at the 4th Annual International User Experience Awards (UXies), the premier awards for digital experience. This year’s Grand Prize Winner went to Work & Co. for its fully-responsive website redesign of Virgin America. Others included Google, Deutsch for Volkswagen, SAP, Interaxon, Method for LUSH Cosmetics, Cantina for the Newport Folk Festival, Cogapp, Cantina for Qatar Museums, UberConference, Virginia Tech students, UX Vision for Maveze, and American Express.
Panelists and judges, which included senior design leads from GE, Facebook, Frog, Amazon, WIRED, Etsy and a keynote by UBER’s Andrew Crow, discussed how UX has finally become recognized as a critical part of a product’s success to an audience of over 350 technology executives and practitioners. Each winner also presented their projects and approach at the afternoon portion of the 2014 event, which was held at the Merchants Exchange Club in San Francisco, CA.
“The importance of exceptional UX is changing the way products and services are brought to life, presented to customers and upgraded to better serve customer needs. Without great UX, none of these products would be nearly as successful,” said Beverly May, Executive Director of the UXies. “These companies understand the role of exceptional UX and are helping the industry evolve with outstanding, impactful and innovative products. This year saw over 50% more submissions than 2013 as ever more organizations realize the importance of UX." Submissions came from 15 countries.
This year’s UXies honored exceptional UX design, products, services, process, and concepts across a range of industries and technologies, from “Best Everyday Activity” with UberConference, to “Best Enterprise Experience” for SAP Consumer Insight 365, to “Best Next-Generation Experience” for MUSE, a brain-sensing headband, to “Best Brand Experience” for Volkswagen’s new website (vw.com). The People’s Choice public crowdvoting award went to UXVision for its redesign of Maveze, a Tel-Aviv blog, based on 5,000 votes on the 200 global entries. All entries are available at: http://uxawards.org/entries/.
“The UXies are a great opportunity to recognize those companies that are putting customers first and taking the extra step forward to guarantee that they are engaged and satisfied with each and every touch point with their product or service,” said Turi McKinley, a 2014 judge.
2014 User Experience Award Winners
All winners received crystal trophies; the Grand Prize recipient also received $1000 and each Gold, $250. All winners can be found here: http://uxawards.org/ux-awards-2014-winners/
- GRAND PRIZE for Most Impressive Industry Evolution: Virgin America's Responsive Redesign by Work & Co. for Virgin America
- GOLD for Best Brand Experience: The new vw.com by Deutsch LA for Volkswagen of America
- GOLD for Best Contribution to UX: Material Design by Google, Inc.
- GOLD for Best Enterprise Experience: SAP Consumer Insight 365 by SAP Labs LLC
- SILVER for Best Next-Generation Experience: Muse: the brain sensing headband by Interaxon Inc.
- SILVER for Best Multichannel Experience: LUSH Handmade Cosmetics: Redefining the brand experience by Method for Lush Cosmetics
- SILVER for Best Cultural Experience: Qatar Museums' Website by Cogapp for Qatar Museums
- BRONZE for Best Theoretical Exploration: Method Money: Translating exploratory research into future scenarios by Method
- BRONZE for Most Authentic Experience: The Newport Folk Festival® App by Cantina for Newport Folk Festival
- BRONZE for Best Everyday Activity: Everything You Love About Conference Calls by UberConference
- HONORABLE MENTION: 10,000ft by 10,000ft
- HONORABLE MENTION: SwiftKey Keyboard: fast, easy and fun typing by SwiftKey
- HONORABLE MENTION: QardioArm by Qardio Inc.
- HONORABLE MENTION: Kennedy and Oswald by Mullen/ Mark Boroyan for National Geographic
- STUDENT for Best Student UX: Zone by Virginia Tech Industrial Design Students
- PEOPLE’S CHOICE: MaVeZe - UX Redesign of Leading Tel-Avivian Blog by UXVision for MaVeZe
- HONORABLE MENTION (PEOPLE’S CHOICE): Project Drive.SAP by SAP Ireland Ltd.
- SECRET ADMIRER: UX Framework: Serve Responsive Web by American Express Serve
- HONORABLE MENTION (SECRET ADMIRER): The Eventbrite Reserved Seating - Seat Designer Application by Eventbrite
2014 UX Awards Jury
The UXies are chosen by a rotating panel of expert judges using a 5-point voting system and consensus. Awards are given based on merit, outcome, impact, methodology, and innovation, rather than in fixed categories. The 2014 Jurors included:
- Cliff Kuang, WIRED
- Alex Wright, Research Head, Etsy
- Brian Kralyevich, VP UX, Amazon
- Greg Petroff, CXO & GM UX, GE
- Janice Fraser, CEO, LUXr at Pivotal Software
- Margaret Stewart, Director Product Design, Facebook
- Michal Pasternak, Former CXO, HUGE
- Turi McKinley, Participatory Design Director, Frog
Full biographies are available at http://userexperienceawards.com/judges/
About the International UX Awards
The UXies (UXAwards.org) were the first awards dedicated exclusively to showcasing the best in UX: practitioners, outcomes, processes and impact. The UX Awards evangelize the essential value of UX, inspire and educate the broader technology community, celebrate and reward exceptional UX practitioners and companies, and advance the craft of UX as a discipline. The UX Awards are produced by Oxford Tech + UX in partnership with dozens of major local and national UX, technology and design organizations.
The 2014 UX Awards were sponsored by HUGE, SAP, Infor, Fjord, Modus Associates, VerbFactory, Wunderland, Conjure, The Design Team, Flying Pancakes Productions, Interaction Design Foundation, Loop 11, Neo, Pivotal Labs, Pow Interactive, Proto.io, Rosenfeld Media and Sachs Insights.