XpertLearning Partners with Microsoft to Provide Online Training to Imagine Cup Gulf Finalists

Dubai, UAE: June 27, 2010: In collaboration with Microsoft Gulf, XpertLearning, the leading provider of e-Learning solutions in the Middle East, will provide the Imagine Cup Gulf winners with access to online courses to sharpen their presentation skills ahead of the Imagine Cup World Finals in Warsaw, Poland.

Now in its eighth year, Imagine Cup has grown to be the premier student technology competition in Gulf and worldwide that aims to encourage young people to apply their imagination, their passion and their creativity to technology innovations that are focused on finding solutions to real world problems.

The regional winners of the Gulf Imagine Cup 2010 had an intense competition amongst university student team finalists from Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and the UAE. The three member team from the American University of Kuwait celebrated their first-place finish in the regional finals for their project ‘Multi-touch tutoring system’. The second place went to the team from Sultan Qaboos University, Oman for their project ‘Show me the traffic; the third runner-up was the team from University of Bahrain for their project ‘Cash Trash’ and the fourth place went to the team from University of Wollongong, Dubai for their project ‘Ear-It’. In addition, another team from Sultan Qaboos University, Oman, was declared winner of the mobile application development category for their project ‘Find me a taxi’ supported by du. All four winning teams will represent the region and participate at the global finals of the Imagine Cup that is being held in Warsaw, Poland from July 3-8, 2010.

“Imagine Cup empowers students to apply their creative and technical skills to make a positive impact on the local and global community. They are challenged to use technology to help solve the world’s toughest problems, and every year we see students rising to the challenge and developing tools to address these needs” said Sekna Khanafer, Academic Developer Evangelist at Microsoft Gulf.

Sekna added that Nabeel Nazeer, a previous winner of the 2008 Worldwide finals in France, is currently working as a Technical Consultant for XpertLearning in Dubai. The team at XpertLearning decided to contribute and help the teams in their quest to become winners at the worldwide finals in Poland.

“The Imagine Cup is the ultimate accolade any Computer Science or Information Systems graduate student can attain. It helps students receive the recognition and encouragement they need to pursue their career. From my personal experience, presentation skills are extremely important and truly made the difference for my team during the final competition in France. You can have an amazing project but if you cannot sell it to the judges at the World Finals, then the chances of you winning the title is slim,” said Nabeel.

“XpertLearning provides a range of accredited presentation skills courses from SkillSoft, a leading SaaS provider of e-learning and performance support solutions for global enterprises, government, education and small to medium-sized businesses. These courses can definitely help the Imagine Cup Gulf winners in sharpening their skills ahead of the World Finals. XpertLearning is glad to partner with Microsoft to contribute to the growth and development of students within this region. We wish the Imagine Cup Gulf winners the best and look forward to them winning this year’s competition in Poland,” Nabeel added.

In 2007, Nabeel’s team, TeamSmile from the University of Cape Town in South Africa, developed an innovative solution to enhance the lives of bus commuters using text mes¬saging technology. The team saw their idea as a way to lure middle- and high-income groups in South Africa onto public transport by providing them with accurate information on bus arrival times. The team went on to win the National Innovation Competition and the Imagine Cup National Competition in 2007 before travelling to the World Finals in France in 2008. As one of the six teams awarded the Imagine Cup Innovation Accelerator prize at the Imagine Cup World Finals in France, Nabeel’s team travelled to Silicon Valley, California, US, for a rigorous two-week business and technology training pro¬gram in May 2009. Following this trip, the team opened up a company in South Africa to commercialize the product.

For more information on the success of Nabeel’s team, see the links below:

http://www.uct.ac.za/dailynews/archives/?id=6706

http://www.xpertlearning.com/Extranet/IC.pdf

http://www.it-online.co.za/content/view/396669/

http://www.commerce.uct.ac.za/Commerce/News/CommerceConnectsNewsletter/2008/20080711_CommerceConnectsNewsletter_Article3.htm

http://imaginecup.com/About/InnovationAccelerator.aspx

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/jul08/07-08icwinnerspr.mspx

http://imaginecupfinalsinparis.spaces.live.com/blog/

NetDimensions Wins 2010 Technology Company of the Year Award

Hong Kong, June 10, 2010 – XpertLearning’s partner, NetDimensions (London Stock Exchange, AIM: NETD), a global provider of performance, knowledge and learning management systems, has won Computerworld Hong Kong’s coveted 2010 Hong Kong (HK) Technology Company of the Year Award.

“We are very proud to receive this award,” stated Ray Ruff, Chief Information Officer and co-founder of NetDimensions at the awards ceremony hosted by Computerworld Hong Kong on June 9th.

The HK Technology Company of the Year Award recognizes the foremost company providing IT products and/or services to organizations locally and overseas that has been integral to the advancement of the IT industry in Hong Kong.

“This award is dedicated to the hard work and perseverance of NetDimensions’ team members in driving the company’s continuous success for more than a decade,” added Ruff.

Nominations were submitted by Computerworld Hong Kong’s readers and the winner was selected by the magazine’s editors based on criteria including product innovation, market achievements and successes, and key milestones.

Computerworld Hong Kong Publisher Simon Yeung said: “Each year the Computerworld Hong Kong Awards strives to recognize a Hong Kong-based technology firm that has demonstrated clear innovation, market success and a proven ability to compete and succeed against market-leading competition - NetDimensions with its stellar customer wins and superior technology is truly deserving of the 2010 HK Technology Company of the Year Award.”

Paul Michael Gledhill, Director and Co-Founder of XpertLearning, was full of praise for NetDimensions. “We are proud to be the regional supplier of the NetDimensons solutions and believe they fully deserve this accolade”, said Mr. Gledhill.

Janine Croft, Managing Director of XpertLearning echoed Paul’s comments. “Following our very successful NetDimensions User Day in Dubai last week, we are very happy that NetDimensions have won such a prestigious award”, declared Janine.

XpertLearning has a very successful first-ever NetDimensions User Day event

Dubai, Moevenpick Hotel, June 02, 2010. XpertLearning, the leading provider of e-Learning solutions in the Middle East, held its first-ever NetDimensions User Day event. This event was a first of its kind within the Middle East region and was held in collaboration with NetDimensions, global enterprise solutions provider of performance, knowledge and learning management systems.

The event started off with a welcome note and an overview of the day’s agenda from Paul Michael Gledhill, Director and Co-Founder of XpertLearning. John Quinn, ‘Presentologist’ and General Manager of Satellite Visual Communication, followed up and introduced the audience to the Interactive Audio Response System & Electronic Voting System, which was going to be used by the audience to respond to questions posted by the presenters during the day.

The audience was then introduced to the NetDimensions’ representatives, Steve Curtis, Channel Manager EMEA, and Rory Stewart, Consultant EMEA. Steve Curtis provided an overview of NetDimensions along with some key product updates. The focus of the event, however, was on NetDimensions’ key product offering, namely the Enterprise Knowledge Platform (EKP). Steve was also involved in some other key presentations during the day, including a session with Clayton Marshall D’Souza, Technical Manager and Riham Khoury, Head of Academia at XpertLearning, on how clients can move from EKP Bronze to EKP Gold and the benefits that such an upgrade will bring to them.

Rory Stewart introduced the audience to NetDimensions’ latest product, the Mobile EKP (mEKP), which is an end-user version of the Enterprise Knowledge Platform (EKP) and which runs independently from a USB flash drive without any required installation or Internet connection. Rory also demonstrated how mEKP enables users to review course materials, run courses, take exams and review documents, as well as review exam and training history information from any computer with a USB port at their convenience anywhere, anytime.

Case studies were presented by representatives of XpertLearning’s key clients. Robert Saint-Jacques, Human Resource Director at twofour54, kicked off the case study series. He was followed by Rachel Devereux-Douglas, Learning & Development Manager at Supreme Group, Ali Zaheer, Training Officer and Haitham Kamal Abdulkarim, Contact Centre Team Leader, both from Emaar. The case study series was wrapped up with a presentation from Maggie Williams, Management Trainer and Tariq Manzoor, Learning and Development Administrator, both from ENOC. The case studies focused on the core product offering of NetDimensions, the EKP, and how it helped these organizations (twofour54, Supreme Group, Emaar and ENOC) in managing their entire training and development process from delivering and tracking to testing and reporting.

Nabeel Nazeer, Technical Consultant at XpertLearning, wrapped up the presentation series with a session outlining the different marketing initiatives taken by the company. The company’s social media marketing initiative was introduced to the audience. Nabeel also explained how XpertLearning works hard to provide excellent customer service and support its customers on EKP from pre-sales to implementation and after-sales technical support.

The event concluded with a prize ceremony, chaired by Riham Khoury, in a truly classic Hollywood-Oscars-event-like fashion. Prizes were awarded for 3 categories, namely Best Dressed LMS, Best Overall EKP Implementation and Biggest Usage of EKP Functionality.

Through the use of the Interactive Audio Response System & Electronic Voting System and with background music taken straight from the ‘Pirates of the Carribean’ to set the Hollywood Oscars atmosphere, the audience voted for the Best Dressed LMS. Vodafone Qatar knocked everyone out and landed itself the most-coveted prize. The prize was collected by Asim Mirza, Operations Delivery Manager, and Alexandra Pascu, Lead Trainer, both from Vodafone Qatar.

Emaar, represented by Ali Zaheer, bagged the prize for Best Overall EKP Implementation. DEPA won the prize for Biggest Usage of EKP Functionality. Stefanie Heidester, in charge of Internal Communication and Knowledge Management at DEPA, collected the prize from Janine Croft, Managing Director at XpertLearning.

All in all, it was a great first XpertLearning – NetDimensions User Day event. The XpertLearning team thanks everyone for attending and participating in this event. We look forward to welcoming you next year!