LONDON: The first judging panel for the WARC Media Awards has been finalised – in the Best Use of Data category – and includes senior marketers from McDonald's and Mars.

The WARC Media Awards are a comprehensive set of awards with a $40,000 Prize fund that rewards pioneering communications planning which has made a positive impact on business results for brands around the world.

The judging panel for the Best Use of Data of data category – there are four in all, the other three being Effective Use of Tech, Effective Channel Integration and Effective Use of Partnerships and Sponsorships – will be chaired by Nicole Kane, Director, Global Media at McDonald's Corporation, where she oversees global partnerships, accountability, and agency relationships.

Joining her from the client-side is Sorin Patilinet, who leads the Global Center of Expertise for Advertising and Media at Mars Incorporated.

From the agency-side, judges include Morag Blazey – Chief Executive Officer - UK, Ebiquity, Youmna Borghol – Head of Data, Choueiri Group, Luke Brown – CEO, co-owner, Affinity, Paula Fernandez – Global Head of Data Tools & Analytics, Kinetic Worldwide, Arun Kumar – Chief Data & Marketing Technology Officer, IPG Mediabrands and Global President of Cadreon, Nancy Rowe – Digital Strategy and Insight Lead, SapientRazorfish, Mike Solomon – Managing Director, OMD Chicago and Rick Watrall – Chief Analytics Officer, Horizon Media.

Also on the panel is Shubu Mitra , the Founder and CEO of Agile Measurement and until recently Director of Connection Effectiveness & Productivity at The Coca-Cola Company.

Entry to the Awards is free and papers submitted as effectiveness case studies are welcomed from any territory or discipline. Further details, including entry kit and entry form, can be found on the Warc Media Awards website. The deadline for entries is 19 September.

Potential entrants can also learn from WARC's Media Casebook 2017: Insights from the WARC Media Awards, which distils the views of judges from last year's Awards. Last year's Best Use of Data judges were critical of papers featuring impressive looking dashboards that, in fact, failed to generate insight from data in a meaningful way.

Data sourced from WARC