The Business Continuity Awards, the industry's most anticipated event, gets ready once again to recognise the very best in your sector. This year's Awards Gala Dinner, which will be hosted by Ruby Wax, takes place on 12 May 2010 at the Park Lane Hilton. Find out who this year's finalists are...

The Business Continuity Awards 2010 are to be hosted by Ruby Wax. Now in its twelfth year, the Business Continuity Awards present the best opportunity for organisations and individuals to gain the prestige of public acknowledgement as being the leader in their field.

SunGard has acquired 365 Hosting Limited, a Dublin, Ireland-based cloud computing and data centre services company. Privately-owned Hosting 365 has built a strong presence in Ireland delivering both data centre managed IT services and on-demand computing services within its cloud computing environment.

UK Ministry of Defence and the National Policing Improvement Agency have both appointed VEGA Consulting to advise on their business continuity management. Under the first contract, VEGA is supporting the MOD's secure Public Key Infrastructure service, which is responsible for managing the encryption keys required for ensuring secure communications across the MOD in the UK.

COOP Systems has announced an agreement with MIR3 to integrate its inEnterprise Intelligent Notification and Response platform into COOP Systems' myCOOP Business Continuity system, allowing users access to MIR3's notification and response software and initiate any necessary communication without leaving the myCOOP Business Continuity system.

ICM Business Continuity Services, part of the Phoenix group of companies, has acquired the UK arm of Office Shadow. The cash consideration payable amounts to £447,000 for the business and assets with a further £250,000 payable to a third party software developer, EPAM, for the completion of an updated version of the main software suite, due for delivery in Q2 2010.

Martin Caddick has left Marsh to head up business continuity management at PricewaterhouseCoopers

PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP has gained certification to BS 25999, the UK standard for business continuity management

Almost two thirds of staff don't know their company business continuity strategy, according to data resilience firm Adam Continuity

SunGard announces imminent launch of a new risk assessment software module

Emergency notifications services provider, Send Word Now to launch new service modules

Broker Aon is now offering cover for costs incurred in the event that buildings or surrounding areas are officially closed due to a pandemic

A new 200-seat recovery centre will open next month in Edinburgh

BT Global Services has launched a series of new business continuity offerings

Insurer initiative launches free business continuity planning toolkit for SMEs