Digi School signs commercial partnership agreement with UK's IOA

KATHMANDU: Digi School, a leading Nepali ed-tech organisation, has signed a commercial partnership agreement with the United Kingdom’s Institute of Analytics (IoA) to expand access to international data, analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) education in Nepal.

The agreement was formalised at a ceremony in Kathmandu on Wednesday by Raju Baniya, CEO of Digi Group, and Olga Sara, global commercial director of IoA. Under the deal, Digi School will work directly with IoA to offer programmes targeted at undergraduate students, separate from Digi School’s existing school-level IT programmes run with NCC Education UK.

The collaboration will enable the official launch of an IoA Nepal chapter, the first in the country, creating links between Nepali students, teachers and professionals and the global analytics community. More than 600 international-level courses offered by IoA will be accessible to learners in Nepal.

Students will be able to pursue globally recognised certifications and practical skills sought by industry, the agreement states. The programmes will include options for advanced training through a self-study system, opportunities to network with international experts and participation in professional communities.

Digi School said the partnership combines its local digital learning infrastructure with IoA’s global standards, which the organisations expect will help narrow the gap between Nepal’s education system and international industry requirements. The collaboration is a commercial venture aimed at expanding higher-education opportunities in data and AI.

IoA is an international professional body for practitioners in data analytics, data science and AI, promoting ethical data use, continuous professional development and evidence-based decision-making. Likewise, Digi School operates under the SoftEd Group of Companies and has delivered the British computing curriculum and e-learning at school level in partnership with NCC Education UK for the past five years.

Digi Group said the partnership is expected to broaden access to world-class data and AI education for Nepali students and contribute to the country’s digital transformation and the development of skilled human resources.