Coursera Expands into the Middle East    

 United Arab Emirate  

Sallam sallam

: Coursera, the world’s leading online learning platform, today announced its expansion into the Middle East region during an event in Dubai. As part of its growing commitment to the region, the company also launched its enterprise platform ‘Coursera for Business’ to partner with leading government and private organizations including the Abu Dhabi School of Government (ADSG), DEWA, Etihad Airways, TECOM Group, and Dubai Asset Management on their workforce development goals. Coursera will also be opening an office in Abu Dhabi to better serve the region.

Coursera, with over 3,000 courses, 300 Specializations, and 13 world-class degrees, underlined a strong commitment to the region and its youth. Coursera’s growth strategy for the Middle East includes working with both public and private companies to upskill local talent in the fields of machine learning, artificial intelligence, blockchain, software development and more.

“The Middle East is going through a major economic transition, shifting its industrial base from natural resources to one driven by technology and innovation,” said Leah Belsky, Vice President of Enterprise at Coursera. “We’re looking forward to partnering with government and major employers to develop a talent base that can realize the region’s ambition to emerge as a knowledge-powered economy.”

Coursera for Business delivers an enterprise learning solution that helps companies meet modern business challenges by developing superior business, technology, and data skills, drawn from a course catalog designed and delivered by 170 of the world’s top universities and industry educators.  To make the content more accessible, 70 courses will be offered with Arabic subtitles and 30 fully translated.

Coursera has kicked off its expansion in the region with a number of strategic customers. Most notable among those is an ambitious partnership with the Abu Dhabi School of Government (ADSG) to train 60,000 government employees on cutting-edge skills like data science, Artificial Intelligence, and digital transformation. This is Coursera’s largest partnership to date and establishes a new global model for public sector skills transformation.

“Training tomorrow’s leaders with globally-relevant skills is crucial for Abu Dhabi’s investment in the future and the UAE’s achievement of ‘Ghadan 21’. This partnership with Coursera provides the ability to simultaneously upskill every employee in the Abu Dhabi government,” said Solveig Nicklos, Dean of the Abu Dhabi School of Government.

Other major launch customers include DEWA, Etihad Airways, TECOM Group, and Dubai Asset Management.

“As a global leader in Aviation, we are delighted to partner with Coursera to provide our employees with high-quality content that helps them reach their full potential,” said a spokesperson from Etihad Airways

The need for continuous workplace learning and development has never been more urgent. In today’s ever-shifting technology landscape, industry-specific skills can go from relevant to obsolete in a short timespan. The Middle East Online Education market is expected to expand at a CAGR of 9.8% during the forecast period 2017-2023. The market growth is likely to be driven by the huge government investment and rapid adoption of online education and e-learning by educational institutes and corporate organizations