In Feb. 1993, Bow Valley Energy (BVE) shut down its mainframe and replaced all applications that ran on it with purchased packages. This massive project, which affected almost every area in the firm, was conceived and completed in less than 1 year and moved BVE from being a laggard to an innovator in the use of information technology (IT). The project was the result of recognizing that a major key to enhancing productivity was harnessing the value in information. This paper briefly describes the project’s beginnings, major activities, and results. The project has been the subject of numerous publications, and its benefits resulted in BVE’s receiving the Canadian Productivity Award, a national prize recognizing leadership in IT