The University of Newcastle has agreed to a three-year, site-wide contract to use the Linius Technologies-developed Whizzard product, following a successful trial of the product.

The Whizzard product delivers personalised video solutions designed to enrich teaching, learning, and research, and was first announced by the Company to ASX in late-2020.

The Whizzard Education commercialization plan is now resourced and getting results In the March 2021 quarter, Linius executed a plan targeting mass adoption of its Whizzard product in the Australian Higher Education sector. This included the appointment of consultant Kerrie Campbell, ex CIO of Flinders University and key influencer in the Australian EduTech marketplace, to bring the expertise and connections needed to fast track the sales of Linius Whizzard in the education sector.

The University of Newcastle contract along with Whizzard trials now occurring at other Australian universities provide tangible evidence Linius is executing against its commercialisation strategy for this unique product.

Kerrie Campbell commented:

“Linius Whizzard has been very well received by key players in the university sector. They are coming to realise the uniqueness of this product and what it can offer both their educators and students.

“What is equally exciting is the new use cases for Whizzard being provided by the universities we have met. I truly believe Whizzard will facilitate a period of transformation in our tertiary education sector.”

What the Whizzard learning solution achieves?

Whizzard uses the power of Linius’ Video Virtualization Engine™, the world’s first data-driven video technology. The clear-cut competitive advantage it offers is an ability to search within the video files, instantly assembling relevant segments of video, simultaneously across all Video Conferencing platforms.

Using Linius Whizzard, universities’ students and teaching staff can extend the capabilities of their existing online tools. It connects to a university’s learning management system, video content management platform, and web conferencing/collaboration system, building a single searchable personalised library of recorded meeting content.

Kerrie Campbell commented:

“University archives and digital libraries are under-utilized due to the inherent difficulty in searching within and across video. Linius’ strategy of virtualizing video is presenting a myriad of use cases for the sector, which can be integrated within these existing learning management systems (LMSs)”.

The broader addressable market for the Linius Whizzard product in Education is immense. The Australian Higher Education market has over 1.1 million students enrolled in 43 universities (including the TAFE sector), with over 49,000 full-time equivalents (FTE) teaching staff.

Globally, there are over 19,800 Higher Education Institutions across 196 countries, with student numbers expected to double to 262 million by 2025. The Company is focused on achieving significant revenues in the Australian market, prior to launching into international markets.

The University of Newcastle has 39,137 students currently enrolled across 121 countries, supported by 2,859 staff. The contract with the University comprises an initial purchase of 10,000 subscriptions with incremental additional purchases over the term of the agreement until site-wide deployment is achieved, at agreed subscription pricing plus implementation.

Additional data packs will be charged separately at Whizzard standard pricing. The agreement is otherwise on terms that are customary for a SAAS-based service. Overall revenue is not determinable at this time and is subject to the take-up of the service and add-ons.

Whilst the revenue is important, the significance of this contract for Linius is that it demonstrates a demand for the Whizzard product exists and it validates the Company’s ability to serve its target market. The Company believes this will stimulate momentum in the market.

Linius CEO, Chris Richardson, commented:

“We are delighted that our investment in the development of an education sector-targeted Whizzard product over the March 2021 quarter is already bearing fruit. The University of Newcastle trial and the agreement flowing from it has demonstrated the Whizzard product is market-ready and paves the way for its mass adoption in the Higher Education market, making it a repeatable product ready for scale. We expect the Whizzard product to gain further market traction over coming months, with a number of other Australian universities now committed to trial it.”

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