Ever wonder how you’d fare in a zombie apocalypse? Sign up for a new massive open online course (MOOC) offered by UC Irvine and you may increase your chances of survival.

In fact, “Enroll and Survive” is the tagline for the course titled “Society, Science, Survival: Lessons from AMC’s ‘The Walking Dead’” It’s free, it comes with AMC’s seal of approval and it will last eight weeks.

The class will be offered on Instructure’s MOOC platform and will be taught by a team of four UC Irvine professors from the departments of public health, social sciences, physics and mathematics. Topics will include population dynamics, post-apocalyptic nutrition, the spread of disease, the science behind decay, how post-calculus math can be used to model population and epidemic dynamics and ask questions such as “What can we learn from past epidemics?”

While other schools and even outdoor retailer REI have offered zombie-related courses, UC Irvine’s MOOC will be the first with the official involvement of the hit AMC show. The network made Walking Dead cast members available to the professors for exclusive interviews, AllThingsD reports, and helped advise on weekly themes for the class.

The Walking Dead provides many poignant case studies related to the scholarly areas covered in the course, and it helps that it’s one of TV’s most popular shows,” said public health professor Zuzana Bic in a press release. “There will be something for everyone in this course, which will explore concepts as varied as post-disaster nutrition, the foundations of human survival and stereotypes in a Darwinian environment.”

“I’ve never taught a class on math related to zombies before, but this is the same mathematical content I’d teach to undergraduates at UCI, and a way to reach new students,” UC Irvine mathematics lecturer Sarah Eichhorn said in an interview with All Things D.

Enrollment in The Walking Dead course is currently available to anyone in the world via Canvas.net/TWD. The first class is scheduled for Monday, Oct. 14, the day after the Season 4 premiere of The Walking Dead.

Balihoo (www.balihoo.com), the premier provider of Local Marketing Automation (LMA) technology and services to national brands with local marketing needs, announced today the company has secured $5 million in new funding from OpenView Venture Partners, an existing Balihoo investor. Balihoo will use the new funding to fuel continued business growth and product innovations for its local marketing automation platform for national brands.

The new funding comes on the heels of Balihoo closing out 2012 with over 60 percent year over year revenue growth and continued customer growth across a wide range of industries and sectors in the first half of 2013, including financial services, retail, consumer brands, home goods and home improvement. Balihoo also enhanced its local marketing automation platform with a new Localized Social Media feature enabling brands with a corporate Facebook page to complement their national content with locally provided and relevant content viewable only by Facebook users in the appropriate markets.

“Balihoo continues to see strong new customer growth across all industry segments as well as continued growth from our existing clients taking advantage of new platform product features like Balihoo’s Localized Social Media capability,” said Pete Gombert, CEO of Balihoo. “The new funding from OpenView allows us to further invest into the technology which is currently powering marketing activations for over 300,000 local marketers.  The marketing landscape continues to change rapidly and Balihoo is committed to staying ahead of the market for our customers.”

“National brands recognize the huge revenue opportunity that is achievable through local marketing, but face steep technology, scalability, and implementation challenges,” said George Roberts, Venture Partner of OpenView Venture Partners.  “Balihoo has emerged as the leader in the software marketing platform technology market enabling brands to scale national campaigns at the local market level.”

According to BIA/Kelsey’s U.S. Local Media Forecast (2012-2017), local media revenues are expected to climb from $132.5 billion in 2012 to $148.8 billion in 2017.  BIA/Kelsey projects national brands to account for $51 billion of total local media spend by 2017. (See the “Local Marketing Growth Trend” infographic Balihoo produced in partnership with BIA/Kelsey for more local marketing research findings and statistics.)

“At BIA/Kelsey, we are tracking significant growth around the “national into local” marketing segment,” said Rick Ducey, Managing Director of BIA/Kelsey. “As dollars flow into local, brand managers and agencies are leveraging automation platforms to execute activation strategies that support brand awareness and sales lift in local markets. Innovative and scalable local marketing automation solutions offer the best opportunity for national brands to drive growth while maintaining brand integrity and delivering a local look and feel that really connects with local businesses and consumers.”

A frequent recipient of distinguished awards for its technology and company growth, Balihoo continues to attract top talent at all levels with its award-winning office culture and entrepreneurial spirit. Most recently Balihoo was named to Outside Magazine’s Best Places to Work in 2013 ranking of the Top 100 best places to work in the nation.

About Balihoo

Balihoo is the premier provider of Local Marketing Automation (LMA) technology and services to national brands with local marketing needs. By automating local marketing, Balihoo gives national brands unprecedented control over local marketing execution and the ability to control the customer experience closer to the point of purchase. Additional information about Balihoo is available at www.balihoo.com.

Kareo, Inc., the cloud-based medical office software and services provider for small medical practices, announced today that Black Book has ranked Kareo number one on its list of Top 20 Seamless Electronic Health Records (EHR), Practice Management (PM) and Revenue Cycle Management (RCM) Software Vendors.

Kareo also received a number one ranking in nine of eighteen evaluation criteria and was the only vendor to achieve a top five ranking in every single category. Black Book’s new study is based on extensive input from more than 8,000 physicians and staff of medical practices and hospitals surveyed between April 2013 and July 2013.

A summary of the report, “2013 Top Practice Management and Revenue Cycle Management Ambulatory EHR Software Vendors,” is available at http://www.kareo.com/black-book-2013.

“We understand that physicians are frustrated that the business side of their practices too often gets in the way of delivering patient care, and we are dedicated to delivering integrated solutions that restore the patient as the central focus of the independent practice,” said Dan Rodrigues, CEO and founder of Kareo. “We are honored to receive this prestigious ranking and the validation from medical providers of Kareo’s approach in delivering an intuitive, affordable, and integrated EHR, practice management and revenue cycle management solution to our customers.”

Black Book’s survey found that 89% of physicians considering new software and services to improve revenue cycle management are seeking a seamless single source vendor and prefer vendors that offer software, outsourcing and consulting options to support EHR/RCM/PM transformations. Black Book’s survey also revealed that more than 90% of independent physicians agree that fully-integrated practice management/revenue cycle management systems equipped with EHR software are the key to ensuring practice survival and enabling independence from hospital or large group acquisition.

Black Book’s report noted that RCM is the life force of any practice, solo or group, private or non-profit. Effective patient registration, insurance, benefit verification, charge capture and claims processing are essential to maintaining practice viability. The advantages of physicians implementing a seamless electronic PM system along with EHR software are becoming increasingly apparent. Facilitating and accelerating these functions while providing patients access to their medical records and lab results can improve the patient experience and patient-physician relationship.

About Black Book(TM)

Black Book Rankings, a division of Black Book Market Research LLC, provides healthcare IT users, media, investors, analysts, quality minded vendors, and prospective software system buyers, pharmaceutical manufacturers, and other interested sectors of the clinical technology industry with comprehensive comparison data of the industry’s top respected and competitively performing technology vendors. The largest user opinion poll of its kind in healthcare IT, Black Book collects over 400,000 viewpoints on information technology and outsourced services vendor performance annually. For methodology, auditing, resources, comprehensive research and ranking data see http://www.blackbookrankings.com.

About Kareo

Kareo is the only cloud-based medical office software and services platform dedicated to small practices. At Kareo, we believe that, with the right tools and support, small practices can do big things. We offer an integrated suite of products and services designed to help small practice physicians get paid faster, run their businesses smarter, and provide better care. Our Practice Management software, Billing Services, and free, full-featured EHR help more than 20,000 medical providers more efficiently manage the business and clinical sides of their practices. Headquartered in Irvine, California, Kareo’s mission is to help providers spend their time focused on patients, not paperwork. For more information, visit www.kareo.com.

Media Contact:Christine QuernFeinstein Kean HealthcareP 617 761 6791 [email protected]

SOURCE Kareo

Copyright (C) 2013 PR Newswire. All rights reserved

Customers using AtTask’s Enterprise Work Management software are seeing unprecedented results driven by increased visibility and efficient work processes.

Draeger Medical Professional Services and Fremont-Rideout Health Group are both successfully using the AtTask Enterprise Work Cloud to improve on-time ratings and increase project capacity, ultimately streamlining their business processes and improving productivity, along with their bottom line.

Draeger Medical Professional Services Increases On-Time Delivery by 125%

Before turning to AtTask, Draeger Medical Professional Services, a manufacturer of medical devices, was facing significant organizational hurdles. Project managers were distributed throughout the country, the team was using various unwieldy project management tools, and they lacked visibility leading to missed deadlines and updates filled with inaccurate, incomplete data. To solve the work chaos they found themselves drowning in, Draeger’s professional services team implemented AtTask’s Enterprise Work Management solution.

The Draeger team chose AtTask due to its intuitive interface and cloud-based functionality which allowed team members to have all of their project data and documents centralized in one place, no matter where they were located. This newly adopted solution allowed management to stay informed of the team’s productivity and financial performance, improve the team’s visibility into project revenue and profitability, and harness project data to model the business and operational impacts of new business developments. This ultimately drove the growth of the team’s performance and increased their on-time delivery by 125 percent in the first 24 months.

“Over the last three years AtTask’s solution has absolutely exceeded my expectations,” said Claudia Brozda, director of professional services at Draeger. “I love it when my colleagues look at our group and say, ‘You do what? How do you manage your projects so efficiently and meet so many deadlines successfully?’ And I say, ‘I have AtTask.'”

Fremont-Rideout Health Group Catapults Project Capacity 12-Fold

Fremont-Rideout Health Group, a group of medical providers, was burdened with outdated IT healthcare software systems and infrastructure. They needed a software system that could bridge the gap between the IT department and their various client departments and stakeholders, and needed a system that could be implemented quickly with little IT impact. There was a clear answer for the team – AtTask’s Enterprise Work Cloud.

This newly adopted tool allowed the team to create customized reports and dashboards to fit their visibility needs, all of which would be updated dynamically in real time. It was easy to use as well. It took less than a month for the full team to be completely operational on the tool, with no use of IT resources.

Since employing the AtTask tool, the organization’s software implementation jumped from one or two installs per year to more than 12 installs per year. The tool had become the hub for project management across many levels including the PMO, the entire IT department, and many of the company’s executives. The automation and transparency of AtTask allowed the PMO director to manage all of the project’s moving parts leading to more transparent and compliant work and previously unseen success at the company.

“AtTask reports are being used at the project level, at the portfolio level and at the division level to report up to the CIO,” said Tony Toglia, PMO Director at Fremont-Rideout. “If you look at the number of projects that we’ve been able to do with the new PMO and AtTask combined, it’s ridiculous. It’s like they were put on steroids or something.”

“Through these two customer case studies, as well as many others, it’s clear that the adoption of the AtTask Enterprise Work Cloud solution is a strong driver in increased productivity and success within an organization,” said Eric Morgan, CEO, AtTask. “Better transparency, visibility and collaboration from the worker level all the way up through the C-suite means work is less fragmented and management can keep track of what the teams are doing, ultimately solving work chaos and changing the way businesses do work.”

For more information on how AtTask can turn your project management hell into “hell yeah,” visit www.attask.com

About AtTask

AtTask is the only provider of cloud-based Enterprise Work Management solutions for enterprise teams. This provides a single, central place to better manage and control the chaos of enterprise work, which improves visibility and productivity by eliminating wasted time dealing with fragmented, siloed tools and processes. With AtTask, teams, managers and executives receive visibility into work planning, prioritization, resourcing and sequencing to help everyone work more efficiently toward achieving the organization’s goals. AtTask has a broad range of Global 500 and other enterprise customers, such as Nike, Cisco, ABC, ESPN, 3M, and Trek. To learn more, visit www.AtTask.com or follow us on Twitter @AtTask.

Contact: Shelbi Gomez

[email protected]

Xtium is pleased to have made the 2013 CRN Next-Gen 250 list. The annual list highlights up-and-coming solution providers that are new to the market, and take a smart and different approach to solution selling and integration.

The Next-Gen 250 honors those solution providers zeroing in on lucrative and emerging technologies, among them cloud computing, mobility, virtualization, unified communications, business analytics and business intelligence. These companies stand out from the pack when it comes to transforming their business or breaking into new technologies.

Since its founding in 2007, Xtium has helped numerous small- to mid-sized companies take advantage of the cloud by transferring the complexity and responsibility of infrastructure management to Xtium’s team, allowing the companies to focus on their core business competencies. Today, Xtium brings the cloud to customers’ premises through an on-site appliance called SmartFrame, which combines a variety of technologies and serves as the gateway to organizations’ improved cloud experience, enabling them to enjoy the security and reliability of a local solution.

“The challenges facing today’s channel executives are constantly evolving and we make it a priority to keep pace with that change to help the channel community effectively compete. The Next-Gen 250 represents the up-and-coming solution providers dedicated to addressing those challenges in a more complete and dynamic way,” said Robert Faletra, CEO, UBM Tech Channel.  “We congratulate these companies on being named to the prestigious list and look forward to covering their continued success.”

The complete list of 250 companies is available here:

http://www.xtium.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/335_CRN_NextGenFullList.pdf

Open-E, a leading developer of innovative data storage software, today announced it has become a certified technology partner in Dell’s Technology Partner Program.

By certifying Open-E Data Storage Software (DSS) V7 on the Dell PowerEdge R720,Open-E enables customers to set up cost-effective storage solutions for high availability environments.

Open-E DSS V7 is designed for simplicity and ease-of-use but at the same time includes advanced storage features, fulfilling the expectations of both SMB and Enterprise users. These features include solutions such as Active-Active Failover for iSCSI volumes in high availability clusters, remote replication for disaster recovery and multiple scheduled snapshots for data protection. As a certified Dell technology partner, Open-E can now deliver a combined solution that can be rapidly adopted by organizations looking for high performance and reliability.

“We are proud to be in Dell’s Technology Partner Program and to have certified our solution on the PowerEdge R720,” said Krzysztof Franek, CEO and president of Open-E. “By using Open-E DSS V7 with PowerEdge R720, customers can benefit from a stable and high-performing storage platform.”

Open-E DSS V7 has been certified on the PowerEdge R720, undergoing heavy-load testing in various scenarios including performance and failover tests. Open-E’s engineers recommend the system for high availability storage clusters, database storage and virtual environments. More about the tests in the certification report.

About Dell Technology Partner Program

The Dell Technology Partner Program helps Independent Software Vendors (ISVs), Independent Hardware Vendors (IHVs) and Solution Providers build innovative and highly competitive solutions using Dell platforms. The program provides a global platform for engagement and access to Dell training, tools and expertise to help technology partners deliver value to their customers. More information can be found at www.dell.com/technologypartner.

About Open-E

Open-E, Inc. is a pioneering leader and developer of IP-based storage management software. The Open-E DSS V7 and Open-E DSS V7 Lite line of products are aimed at the SMB and SME markets.

Open-E DSS V7 is a robust, award-winning enterprise storage application which offers excellent compatibility with industry standards (vast variety of supported hardware), and is the easiest to use and manage. Additionally, it is one of the most stable solutions on the market and an undisputed price performance leader.

Open-E has over 27,000 world-wide installations in Fortune 500 organizations in over 100 countries for over a decade and has received numerous industry awards and recognition from PC Professional, Tom’s Hardware, Storage Awards, PC Pro and more.

Thanks to its reputation, experience and business reliability, Open-E has become the technology partner of choice for industry-leading IT companies such as Citrix, Intel, LSI, VMware, and Adaptec.

For further information about Open-E, its products and partners, visit www.open-e.com.  

Dell is a trademark of Dell Inc. Dell disclaims any proprietary interest in the marks and names of others.

Press contact:

Vera Neumeyer Open-E, Inc.

Office: +49 (89) 800777 18
Fax: +49 (89) 800777 17

E-mail: [email protected]

Xtium, Inc., a leading enterprise software and solutions company innovating managed cloud hosting, online backup and virtual disaster recovery services, today announced that Vess Bakalov, co-founder and chief technology officer of SevOne, was appointed to the company’s board of directors, expanding the board’s size to four members.

“I am very pleased that Vess has agreed to join Xtium’s board of directors,” said Tim Buckley, CEO, Xtium. “Vess shares our vision of building a company that delivers great technology as well as great service to our customers. His technical background will be particularly important to us in delivering on our vision of automating and enhancing our product offerings.”

Bakalov has over 20 years of experience in the IT industry and currently serves as CTO of SevOne, a technology company that provides the world’s fastest, most scalable IT monitoring and reporting platform. He is responsible for leading SevOne’s product development and design, and for overall vision of the technology architecture. Since co-founding the company in 2005, Bakalov has seen SevOne grow to 220 employees and be named the 75th fastest growing company in North America on Deloitte’s 2012 Technology Fast 500 rankings.

“I couldn’t resist being part of Xtium’s board,” said Bakalov. “The extremely bright, innovative and ambitious team makes Xtium one of the most exciting technology companies in the region with the ability to rival anyone out there. My background will help develop discipline and vision around Xtium’s software development and the go-to-market strategy for enterprise products.”

Prior to SevOne, Bakalov served in a number of senior technical positions at BankOne, including Assistant Vice President and Network Architect. He holds a BS in Computer Science from the University of Delaware.

In addition to Bakalov, Xtium’s board consists of Tim Buckley, CEO of Xtium and former COO of Red Hat, Scott Maxwell, founder and senior managing director of OpenView Venture Partners, and Bradford Stradler, founder of True and IronHill Partners.

About Xtium

Xtium is a leading enterprise software and solutions company innovating managed cloud hosting, online backup and virtual disaster recovery services. We offer companies the most secure virtual private cloud experience with guaranteed application performance across the network. Our architecture is flexible, allowing customers to remain in control. We are the only enterprise service company certified to deliver, SAP®, VMware® and Riverbed® technologies. To learn more, please visit http://www.xtium.com.