The three leaders of the Joint Video Team, Thomas Wiegand from the Heinrich Hertz Institute (Berlin), Gary Sullivan from Microsoft and Ajay Luthra from Motorola received the award known as 'Technology Emmy' on August 23 in Hollywood. The team was completed by Malcolm Johnson, Secretary General of the ITU-T telecommunications standardization organization as well as Scott Jameson, chair of the ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee on Information Technology (ISO/IEC JTC 1).

In his acceptances speech on behalf of the three organizations, Malcolm Johnson said "The versatility of the H.264/MPEG-4 standard has been recognized and applauded across an amazing spectrum of industry. Its widespread versatility is testament to the flexibility and efficiency that has been engineered by a group of dedicated people."

The Engineering Emmy awards are presented for developments in engineering that are "either so extensive an improvement on existing methods or so innovative in nature that they materially affect the transmission, recording or reception of television."

H.264 aka MPEG 4 AVC is being deployed in numerous products and services from many international vendors to deliver high-definition video images over broadcast television, cable TV and direct-broadcast satellite-based TV services as well as Blu-Ray disc formats, mobile phones, and Internet-based TV (IPTV).