JEDDAH — King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), one of Saudi Arabia’s premier research universities, is collaborating with Riverbed on a transformation project that will enhance its ability to deliver cutting-edge digital services to faculty, researchers and students, both within the Kingdom and beyond. Riverbed Network Performance Management (NPM) solution, AppResponse, will give KAUST comprehensive visibility across its entire network, enabling rapid troubleshooting for better network performance and visibility while significantly reducing IT complexity and management overheads it was announced on Tuesday. As a leading destination for scientific and technological education and research, KAUST leverages the latest technologies to facilitate corporate interactions, innovation, knowledge transfer and thus support the economic development of the country in line with Saudi Vision 2030. As a result, the university has successfully attracted over 2,500 talented graduates, student alumni and former postdoctoral fellows from over 80 countries. “KAUST aspires to be a destination for scientific and technological education and research. By inspiring discoveries to address global challenges, we strive to serve as a beacon of knowledge that bridges people and cultures for the betterment of humanity,” said Abdulmajeed Serajuddin, director of IT Operations at KAUST. “Our partnership with Riverbed will help us achieve two key objectives — giving our staff and students seamless access to the services, information and applications they need in this digitally-driven era and enabling seamless real-time collaboration with research institutes across the globe. In this way, the deployment will support our mission of establishing KAUST as an incubator for technological innovation and progress in the Middle East.” Riverbed was selected for its established market-leadership, strong presence in the Middle East and its ability to provide the University with a clear long-term solution road map. “Several members of our IT team were already aware of and have used Riverbed’s solutions. This gives us added confidence, as we have first-hand experience of the rich features and capabilities of Riverbed’s portfolio,” explained Serajuddin. Riverbed’s solutions will serve to replace the complex mix of siloed technologies that were limiting the university’s ability to gain full visibility across its entire network — a shortcoming that introduced complexity, increased licensing costs and translated to difficulties in identifying the root cause of network performance issues. The deployment is on track for completion in the first quarter of 2020. “Saudi Arabia is an important market for Riverbed in the Middle East, and our objectives are fully in line with the Kingdom’s vision in all its dimensions. Riverbed will continue to work hard and invest with enterprise customers across higher education and other verticals to help enable economic transformation under the Saudi Vision 2030, and to enable organizations to maximize performance and visibility across networks and applications. We are proud to support KAUST in their digital transformation strategy and the addition of this reputable University to our customer-base stands as a testament to the great strides we have been making in establishing ourselves as a leading technology provider to the largest and most prestigious organizations in the Kingdom,” said Moueen Zahreddine, regional sales director MENA, at Riverbed. KAUST is also looking to advance its hybrid cloud strategy to take advantage of the scalability, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness that this paradigm offers. "Our partnership with Riverbed strongly aligns with this vision as their solutions address the potential complexity of the hybrid cloud and provide a clear path to cloud success," said Serajuddin. — SG