Flinders cements position as digital leader

Cisco Vice-President (Australian and New Zealand) Ken Boal with Vice-Chancellor Professor Michael Barber on Wednesday.
Cisco Vice-President (Australian and New Zealand) Ken Boal with Vice-Chancellor Professor          Michael Barber on Wednesday.

In an Australian first, Flinders University and the leading networker Cisco have signed an agreement which lays the foundations for Flinders to lead Australia in the most innovative parts of the internet.

The agreement, which is the first of its kind between an Australian university and a digital networker, further enhances Flinders’ position as an emerging leader in the provision of digital health services and cyber security expertise.

It also puts Flinders at the heart of Cisco’s global ‘Internet-of-Everything’ vision to make networked connections more relevant and valuable than ever before.

Through this strategy, Cisco says it will ‘turn information into actions that create new capabilities, richer experiences and unprecedented economic opportunities for businesses, individuals and countries’.

New initiatives at Flinders will include the establishment of an academy at the university’s new Tonsley Park building in which Cisco staff will train students to work with the newest technologies and latest developments in the digital space.

Students will be able to undertake the training as part of their degree pathways.

The agreement, in which Flinders has invested $14m, has already led to the development of a Wi-Fi network at Flinders’ Bedford Park campus which Cisco says is one of the fastest in the world.

Flinders University Vice-Chancellor Professor Michael Barber, who signed the agreement with Cisco’s Vice-President (Australia and New Zealand) Ken Boal at Flinders University, Victoria Square, on Wednesday, said the University was excited to be able to offer a range of new opportunities for students, staff and researchers.

“Flinders has always prided itself on being one of the most innovative academic institutions in Australia,” Professor Barber said.

“Access to Cisco’s global network and industry experience will ensure that Flinders remains at the forefront of the technological revolution.

“This extends our longstanding relationship and further confirms Flinders’ mission to foster strong and effective collaborations with business and the community.”

Mr Boal said the initiatives set out in the agreement will enable us to explore how to create new valuable connections between people, process, data and things that has the potential to lead to job creation and enable South Australia to thrive in the Internet of Everything.

“We believe that the partnership initiatives announced today will provide a sustained innovation platform leading to significant benefits,” he said.

“These include job creation and increased support for disciplines that will be impacted by the Internet of Everything and be extremely important to meeting the future challenges of social and economic issues, such as cyber security, for Flinders University, as well as for the wider South Australian community.”

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