The Straits Times scored eight awards at the Asian Digital Media Awards yesterday, including for Best News Mobile Service, Best Online Video and Best Innovation New Product.

Singapore Press Holdings' (SPH) flagship paper won four silvers and four bronzes at the event held at Orchard Hotel.

Citizen journalism site Stomp won two awards: a gold for Best in Social Media Engagement, and a bronze for Best News Website.

Lianhe Zaobao also won a silver award for Best in Social Media Engagement.

There were 185 entries from 29 media companies in nine countries vying for the annual awards, which was in its eighth edition. This year's awards was jointly presented by the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (Wan-Ifra) and Google.

A Straits Times online feature on Singapore swimmer Joseph Schooling's Olympic gold win in Rio last year won the silver award in the Best in Lifestyle, Sports or Entertainment Website category. It includes an interactive graphic that analyses his winning feat.

Another project that features Olympic medal hopefuls from South-east Asia also won silver in another category.

The Anatomy of Cancer, an interactive guide on common cancer types affecting Singaporeans, won a silver award in Best Digital Advertising Campaign. The pro-ject, which features three-dimensional (3D) models, was part of a content marketing campaign for Parkway Cancer Centre.

The Straits Times' mobile app also won silver for Best News Mobile Service.

To help users visualise a futuristic version of Singapore where technology makes life easier, the digital team created a virtual reality game, Are You Future Ready? This bagged The Straits Times a bronze for Best Use of Online Video. It was done in collaboration with GovTech, the agency behind technology transformation in the public sector.

"We are continuing on our transformation journey, striving to produce more digital content as well as more compelling content," said Mr Warren Fernandez, Straits Times editor and editor-in-chief of SPH's English, Malay and Tamil Media Group.

"These awards are a recognition of those efforts made by all on our team. We still have room to improve if we are to meet the ever rising expectations of our readers and serve them well."

Award winners, which were announced on the second day of the three-day Digital Media Asia 2017 conference, were selected by a panel of 14 judges. Other winners include Hong Kong's South China Morning Post and The Star Media Group from Malaysia.

Topics discussed at the conference yesterday included global trends in media use, and the monetisation of digital news content.