SAS adds analytics employment-readiness muscle to Ribit.

SAS Australia has joined forces with Ribit, an online platform developed within CSIRO’s Data61, to extend its long-standing practice of helping analytics students gain meaningful employment as data scientists.

 

Ribit is Australia’s leading job and internship matching platform for university and VET students. It seeks to match students and employers for jobs, projects and internships in skills-shortage fields such as engineering, marketing, design, technology and data.

 

The arrangement between the two organisations supports students across Australia’s higher education institutions who benefit from the facilities of the SAS Global Academic Program. These students will now also enjoy the advantage of being listed on Data61’s Ribit platform, which uses machine learning to match their skills to employers’ needs, leading to employment opportunities.

 

Ribit Director Liz Jakubowski, said “The partnership between Data61’s Ribit.net and SAS will enable our students to gain in-demand skills in a global high-growth industry, and connects them directly to innovative businesses for paid work. Everyone wins.”

 

David Bowie, Vice President of SAS Australia and New Zealand said the initiative could not be timelier. “Businesses of every type and size now look to predictive analytics to inform decision making. And with AI and machine learning entering the mainstream, the Ribit and SAS initiative will play a big part in addressing the critical shortage of skills in this area.”

 

Ribit’s window to SAS also provides students with free access to data analytics training programs which qualify them for globally recognised industry accreditation, enhancing their job prospects. In addition, they join the SAS Connection Program which offers access to data challenges, webinars and more.

 

Since the initiative went live in February, 1,300 new students at several Australian universities have begun accessing employment opportunities and SAS courses. Across STEM and digital disciplines, Ribit has students from 43 tertiary institutions across Australia.

 

Citing first-hand experience of using the SAS Ribit platform, Matthew Phillips, who is the Data Manager at the Black Dog Institute, said, “It certainly simplified our student recruitment process. It was easy to use, yet an extremely powerful platform with many features including the ability to search across multiple field types and areas of expertise.”

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About CSIRO’s Data61: CSIRO’s Data61 is the data and digital specialist arm of Australia’s national science agency. We transform existing industries and creates new ones through the application of science and technology. As an applied R&D partner, Data61’s capabilities range from cybersecurity, robotics, artificial intelligence and machine learning, privacy preserving technologies, blockchain, analytics and more. We partner with government, corporates and academia through the D61+ Network to solve national challenges.

About Ribit: Ribit is an online platform developed within CSIRO's Data61 that connects students with digital, STEM, research and business skills to innovative companies and startups that need these skills. In Australia, there are more than 1 million tertiary students that potentially have these skills. At Ribit, we’ve set out to make this early career talent pool more visible and accessible through an intuitive digital solution underpinned by a data algorithm.

 

For more information: chris.chelvan@data61.csiro.au and 0436 672 668

 

About SAS: SAS is the leader in analytics. Through innovative software and services, SAS empowers and inspires customers around the world to transform data into intelligence. SAS gives you THE POWER TO KNOW^®.

For more information: nicholas.quirke@sas.com and 0414 975 391