Huawei Partners with Southern Cross University of Australia to Build 'Better Connected Education'

Education summit addresses trends and challenges shaping the future of education

Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, September 4, 2015 Huawei, in partnership with Southern Cross University (SCU), hosted the 2015 Education Summit in Gold Coast, Australia. The two-day event, which commenced on September 3, was themed "Building a Better Connected Education" and served as a key discussion forum for addressing the trends and challenges shaping the future of education in the digital age.

Over hundred and fifty people were in attendance, including governors of the Department of Education and Training in Queensland, representatives from senior industry analysts from IDC, senior representatives of Huawei's partners and customers from the education industry such as Peking University and Blackboard, and experts and academia specialized in digital education from across the world. Among the key highlights of the summit was an announcement by Huawei concerning a series of joint efforts it is undertaking with Australian universities to cultivate a new generation of IT professionals to lead the country's digital transformation in education.

"Information technology is transforming the way we teach, learn and administer in the education world. It plays an indispensable role in facilitating high-tech research projects, enabling the efficient sharing of education resources and allowing for connectivity and collaboration between campuses," said Dong Wu, Vice President of Enterprise Network Solution Sales Department, Enterprise Business Group, Huawei. "At Huawei, we are committed to collaborating with customers and partners in the industry to develop the intelligent, agile and innovative ICT architecture needed to create better connected education," Wu added. Commenting on the topic, Massimiliano Claps, Head of Government, Healthcare and Education Research, IDC EMEA, said: "Traditional teaching and learning approaches are being replaced by hybrid and diverse learning methods where students are at the center of the learning process, teachers are no longer just lecturers and learning is no longer confined to classrooms. With digital transformation, personalized online learning is gaining greater momentum."

When referring to a new network built in collaboration with Huawei at SCU, Vice Chancellor Professor Peter Lee said, "SCU is a multi-campus institution. We had a need to update our network facilities to meet the expectations of students, including the use mobile devices on campus, as well as the capacity to video-conference across our campuses. With Huawei, SCU will build an agile and reliable network to provide teachers and students with network access anytime and anywhere. High-speed internet connectivity and data transmission will also enhance daily operations and management. The advanced network infrastructure will be an essential part of driving the future development of SCU."

Professor Peter Lee, Vice Chancellor of SCU, presented at the summit.

Sue Bryant, Director of ICT Solutions Marketing, Huawei South Pacific, said: "Huawei's smart campus solution is designed to integrate a variety of education resources on campuses through an agile network that can be easily customized to cater for different needs. The solution allows customers to improve the reliability and stability of their information systems and mitigate network operation and maintenance pressure – and by extension costs – by leveraging virtualization management. We expect these ICT technologies to drastically improve learning efficiency and to help drive the transformation of the whole industry."

During the summit, attendees also visited SCU to learn about its campus network and anytime-anywhere access to education resources. The operation and maintenance interface of the on-demand campus network, which can greatly improve network efficiency, was also showcased during the visit.

In line with its continued focus on ICT infrastructure innovations, Huawei is committed to working with partners and customers to provide primary education institutions, universities and vocational schools with innovative ICT solutions, including agile campus, education cloud and smart classroom products and services. Huawei has assisted hundreds of schools, in building smart information systems and agile service channels. Key institutions using Huawei ICT solutions include Imperial College London, Newcastle University, Peking University, Tsinghua University, Southern Cross University and Northern Michigan University.