Collaborative Research Agreement with East China Normal University A Significant Breakthrough For New Zealand Internet Search Technology Supplier.
SHANGHAI, Oct. 20 /PRNewswire-Asia/ -- Pingar, the New Zealand based tech company that has developed the next generation "intelligent" search platform, announced in Shanghai today that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with one of China's largest and most prestigious tertiary institutions, the East China Normal University (ECNU).
The MoU was signed by Peter Wren-Hilton, the Managing Director and co-founder of Pingar, and Professor Junzhong Gu who is ECNU's Head of Computer Applications and Director of Multimedia Information Technology (MMIT). Wren-Hilton travelled this week with the New Zealand Minister for Communications and Information Technology Hon. Steven Joyce as part of a high level trade delegation to Shanghai, which included the signing of the Pingar - ECNU MoU as one of the major highlights. The other VIP guest who attended today's signing of the MoU was Wang Zhen, Director of International Collaboration at the Shanghai Technology Innovation Centre.
Peter Wren-Hilton says that currently the Chinese Government has a preference for technology products which feature Chinese language versions.
"Pingar's launch of its Chinese language version at the NZ Pavilion at the Shanghai Expo in July has led to interest from several of China's leading universities who have expressed a desire to work collaboratively with us so that they commercialise research outputs. As Pingar increases its collaboration with Chinese partners like ECNU these relationships can only lead to bigger networks and expose us to new Chinese customers," says Wren-Hilton.
Wren-Hilton adds that among other things, Pingar's MoU with ECNU includes specific research collaboration with Professor Gu's team of researchers.
"Professor Gu's team are at the cutting edge of complex algorithm development which is used in high performance search platforms such as Pingar which relies on advanced query and text search functions. This means that Professor Gu's team will no doubt be involved in the development of algorithms used in Pingar's next generation Chinese language search platform."
For this reason, Wren-Hilton says that the agreement with ECNU is another milestone as it is Pingar's first commercial engagement with a key Chinese university.
"What is so exciting about the MoU with ECNU is that it sets up a close R&D relationship with a leading Chinese university which is a first for Pingar. The joint collaborative efforts between Pingar and ECNU will help develop and grow Pingar's core search platform so that we will always be at the forefront globally of search technology for enterprise."
"Pingar has a proven model in forming close working relationships with research universities such as the University of Waikato, Auckland University of Technology, and the University of Wales. All of these have been successful in producing collaborative research outputs that have directly benefitted both partners and we are confident that this will also be the case with ECNU."
Pingar is very active in the region, having had a presence in Hong Kong since early 2009 at the Hong Kong Science and Innovation Park. Pingar's partnership with Hong Kong's Compose System, a major developer of print publishing solutions, is helping to expand its operations throughout China and Asia.
Wren-Hilton notes that the agreement with ECNU also holds even wider potential.
"We expect our collaboration with Professor Gu to generate other ideas that Pingar can work on jointly with ECNU. We are looking at new ways to enhance the Pingar search platform for the Chinese and global market. This is an extremely important step forward for Pingar as we continue to build our business in China and show that our technology is truly competitive in global markets."
About Pingar
Established in 2006, Pingar has developed a semantic search platform that returns comprehensive search query results inside formatted PDF documents.
Based in Auckland and Tauranga, Pingar also has offices in the United Kingdom and Hong Kong.
Pingar is a Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Search Partner.
Pingar's technology was developed in cooperation with the University of Waikato (WaikatoLink) and Auckland University of Technology and has received significant support from New Zealand Trade & Enterprise and the Foundation for Research Science & Technology.
For more information, please visit: www.pingar.com
About East China Normal University (ECNU)
One of China's key universities, ECNU is a high level normal university founded in October 1951.
The ECNU campus is spread over 220 hectares, and is made up of 18 full-time schools and colleges, 2 higher colleges and 4 advanced research institutes, with 54 departments offering 67 undergraduate programmes.
Based on the former Great China University and Kwang Hua University, ECNU was one of the first 16 universities officially graded as national Key Universities in 1959. This status was reaffirmed in 1978. Again ECNU was also one of the first 33 higher education institutions authorised, by the State Council in 1986, to establish their graduate schools. In 2006 the Ministry of Education and Shanghai Municipality signed into partnership for co-sponsoring the development of the university, qualifying ECNU as a member of Project 985 and facilitating ECNU's efforts and progress towards a world renowned high-level research university.
For more information, please visit: http://www.ecnu.edu.cn/english/
