Why have you chosen to deliver solutions to universities?

Alexandru Uglea: The personal experience of The Red Point's founders stands behind the development of this line of business. It is experience gained as students and then as graduates, when the time and effort to earn a certificate or diploma were unreasonably high. This gave birth to the idea to optimize these processes through a software solution, and it was the beginning of shaping a vision that today supports the evolution of education through innovation and information technology.

The next step was the development of market analysis and research to substantiate the decision to develop this direction of business. In the analysis, we focused on university- management solutions outside of our country, where the field was already advanced. All information resulting from the analysis and market research in conjunction with valuable insight, deeply rooted in reality, represented a strong academic starting point in developing first university-management software solutions in Romania.

What are the current main goals of The Red Point in the educational field?

Alexandru Uglea: Given the leadership of The Red Point in the academic education sector due to the Academis integrated platform, implemented in over 24 leading universities in Romania, the company's goal is to continue to keep this status. This is a major responsibility that we assume, considering the evolution of universities in Romania and abroad.

The experience gained so far in this direction indicates the contribution of extraordinary information-technology development and modernization of the educational system in our country. All the projects we have developed are tailored to the needs of an evolving knowledge-based society. To meet that objective, we are aware of the need to anticipate and meet the dynamic educational environment with the latest modern technology that brings institutions added value through integrated management activities, more effective control of operations, real-time access to a unique source of data, and improved decision making.

Thus, with the extension of the Academis platform, The Red Point decided to bring the evolution of its solutions to the next level. This has been done through the partnership with leading global IT players in education and beyond.

We are speaking here of Blackboard, Microsoft, Oracle, IBM, SAP, Siveco, and Novensys. These decisions were based on the desire to extend our audience to other key areas of the university that have not been addressed until now.

What is the next step in your recent partnership with Blackboard?

Alexandru Uglea: The Blackboard vision, one of the strongest blended-learning global players, focuses on creating a collaborative learning environment and on increasing the impact of education by transforming learning experience to include changes in the current social environment. This will contribute to evolution of the education sector, which in turn will train the students, whose performance and commitment will be significantly higher. This is because they will be part of a highly collaborative community. In the end, all of this will result in more effective institutions.

Sharing this vision, in our next step in the partnership with Blackboard, the company aims at promoting new opportunities for education and for the universities that are already The Red Point's clients. We also hope to attract other higher education institutions interested in evolution towards an advanced educational environment.

Specifically, we will offer higher education institutions the opportunity to exist in an environment where any student can view content, collaborate with teachers, evaluate the academic performance, and access any resource at any time to achieve their educational objectives.

Building such an environment will enable institutions to achieve significant benefits, such as student-centered learning, greater instructors' efficiency, instant access anytime and from anywhere, improved evaluation and outcomes management, and access to high-quality training content.

What is the best-liked solution in your portfolio?

Alexandru Uglea: As I said previously, more than 24 universities from Romania know the advantages offered by Academis, the university management platform. Depending on the needs raised by higher education institutions or identified by special tests conducted by The Red Point team together with the teams from universities, we decided to implement those parts of the Academis solution that cover the areas with problems optimally and most effectively.

Academis is based on the success of University Management System (UMS) integrated solution, dedicated to education management, but the platform includes other components. One is the economic component of the Academis platform, based on SAP's All-in-One application. Another is Blackboard, the blended-learning component. Yet another is Magnon, the organizational management process component.


There is also Quantis, the software component for the evaluation of educational quality. Next, there is Oracle Siebel CRM, the educational relationship-management component. The last component is Microsoft Live@Edu, a modern platform dedicated to the communication and collaboration between students and teachers.

Each of these components has its own specific qualities, and therefore every one is appreciated in view of the principal needs of a university and the way that The Red Point solution solves the university's problems. I guess if I had to choose one, though, the greatest appreciation overall is for the UMS, which is one of the most mature solutions developed by The Red Point, and with which we now have considerable experience.

Do you intend to expand your activity abroad?

Alexandru Uglea: Absolutely. This is one of strategic directions that we want to develop. The first steps have already been taken, and the discussions in this respect that are underway with universities in Moldova, Serbia, Montenegro, and Malta all appear very favorable.