CollabWorx, SumTotal in partnership

SumTotal Systems, and CollabWorx, a developer of cutting-edge collaboration solutions, have announced a strategic partnership for delivering secure, mission-critical learning and development programs to the US Department of Defense (DoD) personnel.

SumTotal, which has offices throughout the US and various other countries including at Hyderabad in India, also announced that Donald E (Don) Fowler has been appointed CEO, effective immediately.

An experienced Silicon Valley executive, Fowler has been serving as interim CEO since October 19, 2005, and had previously served as chairman of the board of SumTotal and also of Docent, which merged with Click2learn in March 2004 to form SumTotal.

The company stated that the current director and Audit Committee chairman Jack Acosta has been appointed chairman of SumTotal's board of directors, effective immediately.

According to a company press release here on Wednesday, the integrated SumTotal and CollabWorx platform links SumTotal's Enterprise Suite for delivering and analysing learning via the Internet with CollabWorx's Secure Real-Time Collaboration (SRTC) suite, which includes enterprise-class audio and video conferencing, a "presence engine", chat, instant messaging and document-sharing tools.

"This partnership marks an important relationship for servicing DoD clients, and creates a relationship that will improve learning and collaboration in secure enterprise environments," stated Peter McStravick, Learning Services program analyst for IDC, a leading provider of global IT research and advice.