Blackboard and SunGard Higher Education Partner To Better Serve Joint Customers

WASHINGTON and MALVERN, Pa., April 7 /PRNewswire/ -- Blackboard Inc. (Nasdaq: BBBB) and SunGard Higher Education today announced a new agreement to deliver better integration and support services to their common customers.  

Together, the companies will work to improve integration of Blackboard Learn^™, a leading Web-based teaching and learning platform, with select SunGard Higher Education Digital Campus solutions. The companies are responding to calls from their large base of joint customers for better coordination to make it easier to manage information and help improve the overall customer experience.

SunGard Higher Education will provide support and integration services for certain customers of Blackboard's online education platforms, while Blackboard will become a SunGard Higher Education integration technology partner. Support and integration services staff from both companies will be trained and certified on each company's products to provide better customer support and to help customers preserve and extend the value of their current investments.

"This partnership is a sign of our focus on improving client experience," said Ray Henderson, president of Blackboard Learn. "Our clients rely heavily on integrations between SunGard and Blackboard products. This is a positive step forward in our collaboration to improve both technology and product support for our mutual clients."

The agreement reinforces SunGard Higher Education's new vision for the Open Digital Campus, providing customers with more flexibility in shaping how technology meets their evolving needs. "We are pleased to announce this relationship with Blackboard to provide more choices and extensible approaches that give customers room to grow and evolve their unique vision of a digital campus," said Fred Weiss, senior vice president, SunGard Higher Education.  

The new level of collaboration, joint testing and training, and exchange of technology access and expertise will help enhance the ability for SunGard Higher Education and Blackboard to provide comprehensive integration support to customers. Ultimately, better alignment between Blackboard's leading online learning solutions with SunGard Higher Education's best-in-class academic technology and support services will benefit the significant number of institutions served by both companies.

As part of the agreement, Blackboard becomes a Select level member in the SunGard Higher Education Collaborative Program, and SunGard becomes a Blackboard Strategic Partner^™ in the Blackboard Alliance Program^™.  

About Blackboard Inc.

Blackboard Inc. (Nasdaq: BBBB) is a global leader in enterprise technology and innovative solutions that improve the experience of millions of students and learners around the world every day. Blackboard's solutions allow thousands of higher education, K-12, professional, corporate, and government organizations to extend teaching and learning online, facilitate campus commerce and security, and communicate more effectively with their communities. Founded in 1997, Blackboard is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia.

About SunGard Higher Education

SunGard Higher Education serves colleges, universities and foundations in 40 countries worldwide.  Through its Open Digital Campus strategy, SunGard collaborates with the higher education community and provides software and services to help institutions find better ways to teach, learn, manage and connect.  To learn more, please visit www.sungardhe.com.

About SunGard

SunGard is one of the world's leading software and technology services companies.  SunGard has more than 20,000 employees and serves 25,000 customers in 70 countries.  SunGard provides software and processing solutions for financial services, higher education and the public sector.  SunGard also provides disaster recovery services, managed IT services, information availability consulting services and business continuity management software.  With annual revenue exceeding $5 billion, SunGard is ranked 435 on the Fortune 500 and is the largest privately held business software and IT services company.

Any statements in this press release about future expectations, plans and prospects for Blackboard and other statements containing the words "believes," "anticipates," "plans," "expects," "will," and similar expressions, constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including the factors discussed in the "Risk Factors" section of our Form 10-K filed on February 17, 2010 with the SEC. In addition, the forward-looking statements included in this press release represent the Company's views as of April 7, 2010. The Company anticipates that subsequent events and developments will cause the Company's views to change. However, while the Company may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing the Company's views as of any date subsequent to April 7, 2010.

Trademark Information: SunGard, the SunGard logo, Banner and Open Digital Campus are trademarks or registered trademarks of SunGard Data Systems Inc. or its subsidiaries in the U.S. and other countries.  All other trade names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

SOURCE Blackboard Inc.