Johannesburg, 17 Jan 2019
SIS Global announces that STADIO Holdings (STADIO), a JSE-listed company invested in private higher education institutions, has appointed SIS Global (South Africa) to undertake a strategic transformation project to replace legacy finance, HR, and student systems with UNIT4's cloud, next-generation education management solutions, hosted on Microsoft Azure.
The contract calls for SIS Global to deliver the solution and provide required services to modernise and transform STADIO's technology environment, while supporting the transformation of its core applications.
STADIO Holdings CEO, Dr Chris van der Merwe, comments: "As our plan to widen access to higher education in our country gathers momentum, digital transformation is a key driver. SIS Global understands our desire to build a digital platform that puts the student experience at the centre of all we do."
STADIO currently owns six registered higher education institutions that are aimed at providing programmes, both undergraduate, including bachelors' degrees, higher certificates and diplomas and post-graduate, including honours' and masters' degrees and doctorates, through distance, online and traditional contact learning to over 30 000 students. Brands within the STADIO group include AFDA, Embury, LISOF, Milpark Education, Prestige Academy and Southern Business School.
STADIO will be replacing legacy finance and student management systems across all six of its registered higher education institutions and will roll-out the Unit4 Suite as a standard across all its brands. The transformation project will be led and implemented by Unit4 partner, SIS Global, selected for its ERP, education industry expertise and technology background, along with its ability to demonstrate a clear understanding of STADIO's requirements and the intricacies of the South African higher education sector.
Robert Hawley, CEO, SIS Global, says: "This comes at a hugely exciting time for the student information systems market, as more universities and colleges seek to expand beyond legacy solutions and embrace cloud functionality. SIS Global is a cloud-first business that does not have the baggage of having to support legacy systems, which offers a huge opportunity to help customers transform their business. The cloud allows us to deliver our industry solutions worldwide. We're bringing our key philosophy, which is delivering specialist projects with a strong service orientation and high quality. We can do this because we're privately owned and can focus on quality with staff that believe and can take ownership of their projects."
The power and effectiveness of next-generation UNIT4 Education Management solutions, combined with the agility, security and strength of Microsoft Azure, will support STADIO's expansion plans and provide it with a secure, single SaaS platform.
"Our cloud-based nature allows us to be much more agile in how we deliver our solutions to customers. This model enables us to drive innovation, not just in software, but in the delivery as well."
The transformational journey begins: In 2019, the deployment of Unit4 Business World will be completed, providing a unified finance, HR and procurement system for all STADIO brands; and in 2020, the Unit4 Student Management solution will be implemented to effectively manage the student life cycle from enquiry to graduation, along with Prevero, Unit4's corporate performance management solution, providing in-depth information, analyses and trends, enabling even more informed business decisions to be made.
Ian Bayley, Executive Head of Education, SIS Global, said: "Our knowledge and experience of higher education institutions, combined with Unit4's industry-leading technology, will ensure STADIO can work smarter and more efficiently, creating disruption in the higher education space with the latest intelligent technologies and enabling the delivery of an exceptional student experience."
"Our commitment to ensuring that we truly meet the needs of our students will be a key differentiator for the STADIO group. We want to ensure the students experience solid service delivery, and SIS Global's experience and Unit4's cutting-edge technology will enable us to make that a reality," comments Dr Chris van der Merwe.
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