EIBTM, the Global Meetings & Incentives Exhibition, awarded its 2008 Meeting and Incentive Industry Awards in early December, when the show convened at Barcelona's Fira Gran Via. A total of 58 events were up for awards in six categories. And the winners are:

BEST SPECIAL EVENT: Extraordinary Events, Tom Bercu Presents and George P. Johnson Company for “VM Ware.” The networking event for 11,000 executives, sales teams, and users of VM Ware was modeled after “‘The Streets of San Francisco” and held in a 132,000-square-foot hanger.

BEST CONFERENCE (MORE THAN 250 PARTICIPANTS): FacetoFace GmbH, Cologne, Germany, for “The Takeda House.” The three-day conference for the Takeda Pharmaceutical Company included a virtual house with rooms where representatives held interactive communications sessions regarding plans for the company.

BEST CONFERENCE (FEWER THAN 250 ATTENDEES): Business & Nature GmbH, Munich, Germany, for “For the Champs of Tomorrow.” This business workshop for 45 managers of German IT distributors for a printer manufacturer included a project to turn an outdoor area of a Potsdam, Germany, kindergarten into a playground.

BEST PRODUCT LAUNCH: OPTS Ideas, Boise, Idaho, for “Microsoft Windows Server 2008, Visual Studio 2008, and SQL Server 2008 Launch.” For this software launch, organizers found stories from IT developers around the world and captured them on film and in a book.

BEST INCENTIVE PROGRAM: Harith Productions, Willow Grove, Pa., for “An Evening of Carioca Pride.” This trip for Endo Pharmaceuticals to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, included an evening themed around the Amazonian rainforest, for which all the décor and art was purchased from the local community.

BEST EVENT EVALUATION: Innevento Comunicacion en Vivo, Bilbao, Spain, for “Convencion SDP 2007.” Organizers took a three-pronged approach to measuring the return on investment of Procter & Gamble's annual sales convention, including surveys and interviews with delegates before, during, and after the event.