Eight enterprising suppliers to Australia’s wine industry have been acknowledged in the 2018 Wine Industry IMPACT Awards held in Adelaide last Thursday (18 October).

An initiative of Wine Industry Suppliers Australia (WISA), the awards, which were attended by more than 400 members of the industry from around the nation, celebrate the achievements of businesses that have made major contributions to the capability and competitiveness of Australia’s wine sector.

Awards were presented across seven categories for grapegrowing, winemaking, engineering, packaging, distribution and logistics, marketing and communications and tourism. A start-up award was also presented.

Teams of independent industry representatives selected the finalists for the awards and judged the winners.

The winners were:

Grape Growing – TracMap
Supplier of sophisticated GPS guidance systems and cloud-based applications for precision management of vineyards.

Winemaking – IMCD Group
Supplier of the Proteotest kit from Vason, which allows winemakers to quickly, accurately and reliably determine protein stability in wine for greater preservation of its integrity and reduction of over fining that impacts sensory qualities.

Packaging – Amorim Australasia
Supplier of cork closures with a multi-million dollar research and development focus.

Engineering – Best Bottlers
Provider of innovative automation solutions that increase speed, reduce costs and provide greater flexibility in small format packaging options.

Distribution and Logistics – WineWorks Australia
Provider of best-fit transport, warehousing, reworking and export solutions along the supply chain. The company won this award in 2016.

Marketing and Communication – BrandPrint
Provider of off-the-shelf business intelligence software implemented by Australian Vintage Ltd that analyses sales data resulting in enhanced efficiency and profitability across the supply chain.

Tourism – Studio S2 Architects
Studio S2 Architects specialises in providing architectural and interior design and education with a focus on wine tourism.

Start-Up – Rapid Phenotyping
A platform for instantly measuring chemicals throughout the entire winemaking cycle from nutrients in the soil, the uptake of nutrients to the vine and then sugar, tannin and acid levels in fruit.