With its current financial report, the USU Group again achieved a top result in this year's competition for the world's best annual reports. In the Software category, the League of American Communications Professionals (LACP) awarded USU's 2018 Annual Report platinum, the highest award, for its annual report. Around 1,000 entries from 25 countries were submitted to LACP and judged according to various criteria. The USU publication ranked 17th among the top 100 reports from all over the world and seventh among the TOP 50 reports from EMEA. In addition, LACP honored the creativity of the annual report as "most creative report worldwide" with gold. There was another award for the best letter to shareholders.
The jury – staffed by international communications experts - awarded the USU Annual Report 99 out of a possible 100 points. USU thus took first place worldwide in the "Software" competition category. In addition to the text and narrative style, USU also received the highest number for its first impression, report cover, creativity, accessibility of information, financial report and letter to shareholders.
"Dark Digit" are the title and concept of the USU report and shed light on the "little secrets of success" of USU customers, which usually take place in the background. The Annual Report is dedicated to USU clients and presents some of them in the narrative report. The focus is not on the technical information of the customer projects, but on the people behind them.
"Our annual report has been our company's calling card for years. This year's "freestyle section" also reflects the close relationship of trust with our customers. That makes me just as happy as the high awards in one of the world's most important communications competitions," says Bernhard Oberschmidt, CEO of USU Software AG, commenting on the good results.
The award was presented in particular for the outstanding work of the experts involved: Raimund Vollmer, a journalist from Reutlingen, Germany, acted as a provider of ideas and shaped the content of the annual report with his concise and entertaining style. And the Asperger agency freework Grafik-Design was responsible for the expressive graphic implementation.