Previous EdTechX Award Winner Showcase — PeopleCert
The story of PeopleCert is deeply intertwined with that of its founder, Byron Nicolaides. The son of two teachers, Byron’s profound appreciation of education as a key to expanding horizons led him to quit a lucrative career path in the shipping industry and follow his true calling. “One thing became clear early on: I wanted to be a part of the future of education. This is the path that I chose for myself and the one that I intend to stay on,” he told us.
This calling was to take Byron on a journey which would lead to the helm of a global player in the assessment and certification of professional skills. Born out of a response to a growing demand for certified IT skills, PeopleCert was first launched in 2000 with the license to administer the ECDL certification in Greece, the most established certificate for ICT skills globally.
Over the next 20 years, the company expanded their offering from a single product to a portfolio of 600+ exams, changing their focus from delivering third-party products to developing and delivering their own programs worldwide. Today, PeopleCert conducts exams in more than 212 countries, and aims to remain at the top of the field of certification by focusing on accelerating the Group’s growth through acquisitions and new product development. It is the mixture of hard work and a focus on quality that Byron believes is the secret to his company’s success. By re-orienting itself to serve international markets in 2008, PeopleCert was able to withstand the financial crisis in Greece and become a UK-based global player in the certification industry. “That was the most important decision I ever made,” says Byron.
“Our achievements come as the result of multiple actions that start from the individual.” — Byron Nicolaides
Being recognized and rewarded by the EdTechX Scale-Up Award in 2020 incentivized the team further to upgrade their services. “Awards come as a recognition of important work being done by great teams over time,” Byron explained. “At the heart of this important distinction lies PeopleCert’s continuous growth trajectory,” he added. Since receiving the Award, PeopleCert has further established its leadership position with the acquisition of the International Association for Six Sigma Certification (IASSC) in September 2020, followed by the launch in April 2021 of the first global Certification of Classical Greek by a member of the PeopleCert Group, LanguageCert. And in June 2021, PeopleCert announced an agreement to acquire the entire share capital of AXELOS Limited, a joint venture company created in 2013 to manage, develop and grow the portfolio of global best practice methodologies in project, programme and portfolio management, and IT and digitally enabled services. “This acquisition further cements PeopleCert’s wider relationship with the UK Government and is fully aligned with its strategy to accelerate growth,” Byron told us.
With the company motto, “One Team, One Dream, One Family”, Byron credits his team for the Group’s success. “Our achievements come as the result of multiple actions that start from the individual,” he said. “The best tip I can give to other companies thinking of entering the EdTechX Awards is to keep their focus on their business fundamentals and teamwork; recognition is bound to follow,” he concluded.
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