The Queensland Police Service, ANZ Bank and University of South Australia have all been shortlisted for the inaugural IT Service Management industry awards which will be held at Melbourne's Grand Hyatt Hotel on October 19, 2006.

The awards, which showcase itSM best practice and standards, have two major categories and are sponsored by Hewlett-Packard.

The first category is best ITIL implementation of the year, and the six finalists are: Queensland Police Service; Department of Industry, Tourism & Resources (ACT); Queensland Health (Information Division); University of Southern Queensland; Gold Coast City Council and; University of South Australia

Finalists for the second category, Innovation of the Year, are: TUSC; SP AusNet; Rusher Rogers Recruiting; Infra Corporation; University of Southern Queensland and ANZ Bank.

According to Peter Cross, chairman of itSMF Australia, the awards are a clear acknowledgement of the growing level of IT service management maturity that has been achieved in Australia over the last two years.

"I am sure that over time these awards will be highly prestigious and will come to signify some of the greatest achievements and innovations of IT organizations and individual IT professionals," he said.

A third award will be presented to the Student of the Year who attained the highest mark in the ISEB/EXIN Service Managers Certificate examination in the past year.