WALEE-NUST LAUNCHES PAKISTAN’S FIRST CENTER OF EXCELLENCE FOR SOCIAL AND DIGITAL MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES™

Islamabad, 30 June 2022 – Walee Technologies Pvt. Ltd. Walee, Pakistan’s leading influencer marketing technology company, and the NUST School of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science (SEECS), the country’s top academic institution, have joined forces to establish Pakistan’s first industry-academia Center of Excellence.

Walee-NUST SEECS partnership

Their goal is to pioneer innovative social and digital AI-driven solutions, helping to support USD 100 billion global creator economy. The initiatives will initially target the Middle East, North Africa, and Pakistan (MENAP) market. This region is expected to surpass USD 60 billion in digital advertising and e-commerce by 2022, and double by 2030.

The Walee-NUST Center of Excellence (WNCE) for social and digital media technologies represents a long-term, mutually beneficial collaboration. This partnership encompasses research and development activities and continuous improvement of academic course content. It also includes knowledge sharing between faculty, students, and Walee’s engineering teams.

WNCE can also enhance their professional visibility by way of contributing to publications, leading to higher global rankings. Walee’s adoption of web 3.0 is a significant step. It aligns with their vision to reshape the media-advertising space in the next five years through innovative solutions and techstacks. The physical, co-branded and fully functional tech facility on NUST’s premises will boost participants’ team dynamics when working on deliverables.

Industry-Academia Venture

From a media industry perspective, Walee is the only martech that has collaborated with academia to invest in the country’s future talent. Muhammad Ahsan Tahir, CEO of Walee and a 2014 SEECS engineering graduate, stated, ‘As an alumnus, I am privileged to contribute to SEECS’ 2,500 students and faculty members.

We will help them contribute to design and development projects, and to deliver globally scalable, AI-driven system serving largest B2B and B2C brands in MENAP and Turkey market” He added, “Walee Technologies helps leading brands and agencies across these areas to serve more than 500 million in population, to impactfully collaborate with creators and others to market, sell and service products to consumers using AI-driven solutions.”

The partnership supports NUST’s SEECS program strategy in ensuring it ranks as Pakistan’s top engineering program for the sixth consecutive year (QS Programs). Dr Rafia Mumtaz, Head of Software Engineering department at NUST, said, “By working with Walee’s engineering teams, we aim to enhance our marketing and media technologies knowledge in context to in-demand programming languages, data science and Web 3.0.

SEECS Leadership & and their vision

This partnership will empower our students to be successful in their academics and future professional endeavours.” In the current economic climate, where startups are struggling to survive, Walee’s initiative to invest in the talent pool was welcomed by the faculty.  

Dr Muhammad Ajmal Khan, Principal, NUST SEECS, added, “We greatly appreciate the generous initiative of SEECS Alumnus, Muhammad Ahsan Tahir, and his efforts to pay back to the institute.” He added, “Industry-academia linkages are the need of the hour and NUST-SEECS will strive to strengthen this connection.”

An MOU signing and the Center of Excellence inauguration ceremony was held on 30 June 2022 at NUST campus and was attended by more than 100 CEOs, industry leaders, government officials, the development sector, leading NUST academics, media, and others. Visit the image gallery of the event here at Walee Nust Media.

Note:
* Influencer Marketing Hub
**Figures extracted from CNBB Solutions for e-commerce and Zenith Optimedia for internet ad spend.

About Walee

Walee, launched in November 2019, is Pakistan’s top influencer marketing and social commerce platform. It boasts over 100,000 influencers, 5,000 merchants, and serves global and national brands across 300 cities. Walee’s full MarTech suite includes Influencer Insight reports, Influencer Marketing services, Shops, Walee Payment Gateway, Social Listening and Digital Service Center.

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Google Accelerator, Ignite under the Ministry of IT, Amazon, and others have supported Walee. Walee currently operates in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and Dubai. In 2021, Walee announced Z2C Limited would fund its seed round.

Discover more about Walee Technologies, and its product suite. Download our app on Google Play or the Apple App Store to explore our Influencer Marketing solutions.

About NUST SEECS

NUST-SEECS is committed to providing world-class education and research opportunities in Pakistan. The school offers postgraduate and undergraduate programmes covering the disciplines of electrical engineering, software engineering, and computer science.

Our programs integrate a range of technologies, including digital systems, communication tech, AI, robotics, and data science. Students gain the essential skills to solve real-life problems and excel in their professional careers. These tools prepare them to face the challenges of the professional world ahead.