Category: MENA

Transformative Initiative to Shape the Future of Business Education

TAMPA, Fla., Feb. 03, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — AACSB International (AACSB), the world’s leading accrediting body for business schools, has approved the AACSB Global Standard-Setting Framework. This framework formalizes the process for revising business education standards and establishes a structured five-year review cycle. This initiative reaffirms AACSB’s position as the global authority on business education quality and impact.

The AACSB Board of Directors has charged Chief Accreditation Officer Stephanie Bryant with implementing the new framework and initiating a review and revision of the current standards. A global task force comprising key stakeholders from across the business education ecosystem will oversee the revision process to ensure alignment with the evolving needs of business schools, industry, and society.

Anticipated to launch on July 1, 2026, the revised standards will be released as The Global Standards for Business Education. This initiative reinforces AACSB’s mission to advance the quality and impact of business education, providing more than 17,000 business schools worldwide with a structured framework for continuous improvement and global impact.

“For over a century, AACSB has been the de facto global standard-setting body for business education, guiding institutions toward quality, excellence, and impact,” said Lily Bi, President and CEO of AACSB. “As the business education landscape continues to evolve, AACSB is committed to ensuring that business schools remain agile, innovative, and aligned with industry and societal needs.”

The standards revision process will include an exposure draft and a public comment period, allowing for broad engagement from AACSB’s global community. The final version of The Global Standards for Business Education is expected to be voted on at the Annual Business Meeting in April 2026, with official implementation on July 1, 2026.

“The updated standards will provide all business schools with a clear, future-ready framework to drive excellence and innovation,” said Sherif Kamel, Chair of AACSB’s Board of Directors and Dean of Onsi Sawiris School of Business, The American University in Cairo.

About AACSB International

Established in 1916, AACSB International (AACSB) is the world’s largest business education association, representing 1,900 institutional members and 1,000 accredited schools, connecting business schools, businesses, and lifelong learners to create the next generation of great leaders. With members in over 100 countries and territories, AACSB elevates the quality and impact of business schools globally. Learn how AACSB and business schools from around the world are leading boldly in business education at aacsb.edu.

Media Contact:
Andrew Thriffiley
PR Manager, AACSB International
[email protected]
+1 813-769-6500

GlobeNewswire Distribution ID 9351956

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Feb. 03, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Relo Metrics, the leading sports measurement platform, and Meltwater, a leading global provider of media, social, and consumer intelligence, today announced a new partnership that will transform how sports and entertainment customers measure and maximize sponsorship performance in the digital landscape. This collaboration will enable customers to unlock unparalleled insights with Relo’s AI-powered sponsorship analytics platform alongside Meltwater’s media intelligence solutions.

2024 has been the year of sports, and the overall live entertainment industry continues to have a renaissance worldwide. The need for all parties to ensure that their messages are breaking through, and that all the value is being properly measured has risen in strategic importance.

The vast digital media landscape, the thousands of websites that cover sports, entertainment, and news are the source of trillions of impressions worldwide. Previously all of that engagement and brand exposure in stories, photos, and videos was not being measured and valued in relation to a brand and a sports team, or a brand and an entertainment event. With this partnership, customers will now gain access to even more actionable insights on sponsorship performance including media values and impressions, alongside all the other channels of measurement in the Relo and Meltwater platforms.

The primary customer profiles benefiting from this partnership include:

• Rights Holders (Sports Properties, Teams, and Leagues): Closing the gap between marketing, social, PR/comms and partnership sales teams with insights that measure partner performance across the season, assisting with renewing partnerships and growing revenue potential.
• Brands: Within marketing there are planning and execution teams that cut across all marketing and communication channels uniting it with media strategy and experiential marketing.
• Agencies: This partnership will enable various agencies within PR, Media, and Sports to collaborate on data strategy and measurement.

“This partnership with Meltwater is a game-changer for the sports and entertainment industry. By providing even more insights into media and sponsorship measurement we are unlocking a massive, previously untapped source of brand value,” said Jay Prasad, CEO of Relo Metrics. “By adding additional media insights alongside broadcast and social exposure, we’re empowering rights holders, brands, and agencies to see the full picture of their sponsorship performance, and ultimately drive more strategic and data-backed decisions. This is a huge leap forward in delivering actionable insights that transform how sponsorships are valued.”

Meltwater’s suite of solutions unlocks the power of media, social, and consumer data, transforming them into actionable insights to give customers a competitive edge. With the most comprehensive dataset in the industry and more than 1 billion pieces of media and social content analyzed each day, Meltwater empowers companies with easy-to-action insights that drive data-backed decision-making. Its suite of solutions spans media intelligence, media relations, social listening, social media management, influencer marketing, consumer intelligence, and more.

For brands, agencies, rights holders, and media companies who seek to maximize the impact and ROI of their sports sponsorship investments, Relo Metrics provides unparalleled performance analytics that delivers granular insights and full-funnel measurement. Relo differentiates itself by offering deterministic conversion and attribution metrics, empowering stakeholders to understand the true value and outcomes of their sponsorships.

A key part of this strategy is Relo Metrics’ partner ecosystem by which is enabling Relo to go beyond valuation, named strategic partnerships with complementary technologies in the sports marketing space, giving clients a complete picture of their sponsorship performance.

“In today’s rapidly-evolving media landscape, it’s critical that brands have a comprehensive view of their performance and brand value across all channels. Meltwater is excited to partner with Relo Metrics to enable brands, agencies, rights holders, and media companies to gain a more holistic view of the impact of their sponsorships and optimize their strategies to reach even greater heights,” said Doug Balut, SVP of Global Alliances and Partnerships at Meltwater.

Relo Metrics
Relo Metrics is an AI-powered sponsorship analytics platform that enables brands to track and optimize their sponsorship investments and powers teams and leagues with the insights they need to retain and grow revenue. The company tracks sponsor exposure across live broadcasts, social media, and streaming platforms and delivers actionable insights via a fast, single-solution platform. For more information, visit www.relometrics.com

Meltwater
Meltwater empowers companies with a suite of solutions that spans media, social, consumer and sales intelligence. By analyzing ~1 billion pieces of content each day and transforming them into vital insights, Meltwater unlocks the competitive edge to drive results. With 27,000 global customers, 50 offices across six continents and 2,300 employees, Meltwater is the industry partner of choice for global brands making an impact. Learn more at meltwater.com.

Contacts:
Hannah Shain, VP Marketing, Relo Metrics, [email protected]
Jonalyn Morris (US) / Shawn Belluigi (EMEA), Bubble Agency, [email protected]

GlobeNewswire Distribution ID 9351610

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 03, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Meltwater, a global leader in media, social and consumer intelligence, today announces a new integration with Snap Inc., becoming the first social listening platform to provide Snapchat-specific insights for brands and agencies to inform their advertising and content strategies on the platform.

As brands increasingly recognize the importance of Snapchat, which is home to a community of 443 million daily active users¹, in their marketing efforts, the new partnership allows Meltwater to provide customers with tools to optimize their presence on the platform.

Through the integration, Meltwater customers can surface and analyze content coming from public Snapchat profiles, including Stories, saved Stories, and Spotlight videos, via Snapchat’s Public Profile API. Meltwater users can view post and profile-level Snapchat metrics like views and engagement, and gain insights on topics, sentiment and more.

Meltwater’s listening analytics are geared towards marketing teams who want to boost their Snapchat presence and drive better campaign results. By analyzing trends and best-performing stories, brands and agencies can gain deeper audience insights and improve content performance on Snapchat.

Key benefits of the new integration include:

• Comprehensive campaign analysis: Measure and analyze the resulting engagement, reach, and sentiment of branded content and campaigns on Snapchat, and easily report on the impact of campaigns.
• Image recognition: Measure brand exposure and ROI of sponsorship activities with AI generated tags on video and image content that can highlight brand names, logos and more.
• Optimized content strategy & performance: Analyze the types of public Snapchat content that perform best and incorporate insights and learnings to boost performance.
• Deeper audience insights: Analyze and learn audiences’ attitudes, interests, and preferences and craft more engaging content aligned to audiences’ wants, needs, and interests.
• Trendspotting: Detect emerging themes and trends across public Snapchat profiles.
• Competitive benchmarking: Benchmark and analyze competitors’ content performance on Snapchat and identify opportunities to outperform competitors.

“Meltwater’s integration with Snapchat represents a new milestone in social listening, enabling brands to gather meaningful public insights from Snapchat’s platform to help them stay informed, competitive, and engaged with their audiences,” said Ali Rana, Global Head of Revenue Partnerships, Snap Inc. “We are pleased to welcome Meltwater as an official API partner and look forward to seeing how this integration helps brands and agencies achieve impactful campaign results across the board.”

“We’re excited to partner with Snapchat and become an official Snapchat partner,” said Chris Hackney, Chief Product Officer at Meltwater. “With the increased importance of video content across social media, our customers are eager for greater insights into how they can craft standout campaigns and build stronger, more meaningful connections with their audiences. It’s fantastic to see Snapchat leaning into the power of social listening, and enabling brands to better understand how they are performing on this important platform.”

With this integration, Meltwater is well-positioned to support brands in navigating the competitive landscape of social media marketing and ensure they have the insights needed to reach audiences on Snapchat for years to come.

For more information please contact:
Kelly Costello
[email protected]

About Meltwater
Meltwater empowers companies with solutions that span media, social and consumer intelligence. By analyzing ~1 billion pieces of content daily and transforming them into vital insights, Meltwater unlocks the competitive edge to drive results. With 27,000 global customers, 50 offices across six continents, and 2,300 employees, Meltwater is the industry partner for global brands making an impact. Learn more at meltwater.com.

About Snapchat
Snap Inc. is a technology company. We believe the camera presents the greatest opportunity to improve the way people live and communicate. We contribute to human progress by empowering people to express themselves, live in the moment, learn about the world, and have fun together. The Company’s three core products are Snapchat, a visual messaging app that enhances your relationships with friends, family, and the world; Lens Studio, an augmented reality platform that powers AR across Snapchat and other services; and its AR glasses, Spectacles. For more information, visit snap.com.

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¹ Snap Inc. internal data Q3 2024 vs. Q3 2023

GlobeNewswire Distribution ID 9351644