Altova, creator of XMLSpy and other XML, data management, UML, and Web services tools, announced that Altova XMLSpy has been named "Most Innovative XML Application" in the 2005 SOA Web Services Journal Readers’ Choice Awards presented by SYS-CON Media. Also known as the “Oscars of the Software Industry,” more than 17,000 readers chose the winning products and tools in the SYS-CON awards program.

Altova XMLSpy is an XML development environment for modeling, editing, debugging, and transforming XML-related technologies, and automatically generating runtime code from schemas in multiple programming languages. It features advanced XML, DTD, XML Schema, XSLT 1.0/2.0, XPath 1.0/2.0, XQuery, WSDL, SOAP, and code generation capabilities.

In addition to winning the Most Innovative XML Application award, XMLSpy was also named a finalist in six other awards categories by SOA Web Services Journal readers, including:
• Best XML Parser
• Best XML Utility
• Best GUI for SOA/Web Services
• Best SOA/Web Services Testing Tool
• Best SOA/Web Services Legacy Adapter or Utility
• Best SOA/Web Services Automation Tool

Readers also named the Altova XML Suite a finalist for Best .NET Providers/Tools in the 2005 .NET Developer’s Journal Readers’ Choice Awards. The XML Suite integrates five complementary tools – XMLSpy, MapForce, StyleVision, SemanticWorks, and SchemaAgent – to meet a broad range of XML development needs such as XML editing, schema development and management, data mapping and integration, stylesheet design, Semantic Web development, Web services creation, code-generation, and debugging.

“Each year in the Readers’ Choice Awards there are just one or two companies whose range and scope is so wide and deep, and market penetration so successful, that the readers of our magazines reward it with more than one Readers’ Choice Award,” said SYS-CON Group Publisher and Editorial Director Jeremy Geelan. “SYS-CON Media warmly congratulates Altova for performing better in 2005 than anyone else in the world. It is a remarkable achievement, and we are very proud of our publications’ proactive role in helping to facilitate this community-driven recognition process.”

“It’s a tremendous honor for XMLSpy to be named the most innovative XML application in the market, particularly since the designation is coming directly from the developer community,” said Tim Hale, Director of Marketing for Altova. “There is a mutual respect between Altova and the developers that use our applications. We thank the readers of SOA Web Services Journal and .NET Developers’ Journal for affirming the advantages they have gained by using Altova tools and we look forward to providing them with even greater benefits in the future.”