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Pioneering Seattle-Based University Names Seasoned Higher Education Leader and Grantmaker as New President

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City University of Seattle announces Suzanne E. Walsh as its next president; transformational leader in higher education innovation, philanthropy and student success will drive CityU’s next phase of student success and community impact

SEATTLE, Feb. 27, 2025 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ — City University of Seattle (CityU)—a private, nonprofit leader in serving nontraditional, working, military students and offering diverse global study opportunities—today announced the appointment of Suzanne Elise Walsh as its new president, effective July 1, 2025. Walsh most recently served as the president of Bennett College, an all-women’s historically Black college in North Carolina, and brings extensive experience in higher education innovation, philanthropy, and community-focused leadership through previous roles at the Gates Foundation. She is the first woman and first person of color to hold the role in the university’s fifty-year history.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Suzanne Walsh as the next leader of CityU,” said Dr. Mark D. Milliron, president and CEO of National University and chair of CityU’s Board of Trustees. “Throughout her remarkable career, Suzanne has been a powerful catalyst for student success—working across HBCUs, public universities, and community colleges to expand access, enhance learning, and help students learn well and finish strong. Her deep commitment to student success, combined with her track record of innovation, makes her an ideal leader to guide CityU into its next chapter.”

Selected after a comprehensive national search, Walsh assumes the presidency during a period of continued growth and innovation at CityU, well-known for its distinctive focus on working adults and creative partnerships with employers. For more than 50 years, CityU has been a trailblazer in expanding access to high-quality, career-aligned pathways for nontraditional learners in the Pacific Northwest.

With a mission rooted in serving working professionals, international students, and lifelong learners, CityU specializes in flexible, workforce-aligned degrees and credentials that reflect the evolving needs of today’s workforce. More than 75% of its students take online or hybrid courses, and the vast majority study part-time, balancing their education with family, career or military service. Through global partnerships and a faculty of industry practitioners, CityU works in concert with regional employers—such as Boeing and Amazon—as well as partner institutions, community organizations, K-12 schools, and the military to meet the rapidly evolving needs of the workforce.

With more than 20 years of experience in education leadership, Walsh has pioneered policies and initiatives at the intersection of innovation, technology, data, and effective learning for nontraditional and underrepresented learners. Her expertise in transforming educational institutions and building impactful partnerships will be crucial in advancing CityU’s mission to provide career-relevant, flexible, and accessible education to lifelong learners.

“I’ve been fortunate to call Seattle and the Puget Sound region home for many years, and the opportunity to give back to this vibrant community by leading CityU is truly meaningful,” Walsh said. “What drew me to CityU is its student-centered mission of empowering students from all backgrounds—whether it’s adult learners balancing education with career and family, international students earning a U.S. degree, or professionals upskilling for the next phase of their career. At CityU, we will build on our strong foundation of student-centered success to foster career and economic mobility and empower students to lead in their professions and communities.”

Through a remarkable career spanning her time as president of Bennett College and in leadership roles at the Gates Foundation, Lumina Foundation and the Heinz Endowments, Walsh has led national initiatives that have reshaped the landscape of higher education. As deputy director of postsecondary success at the Gates Foundation, she spearheaded national initiatives aimed at increasing degree completion rates for underserved students.
A sought-after speaker at conferences like SXSW EDU, the Black Futures Summit, and ASU+GSV, Walsh is widely known for her focus on utilizing data-driven research, design thinking, and technology to solve complex challenges in higher education and society. She has also served on several nonprofit boards, including the Trellis Foundation, Achieving the Dream, and the Women’s College Coalition.

A graduate of Case Western Reserve University, Walsh holds both a juris doctorate and a master’s degree in social work. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and an associate degree in applied science from Hudson Valley Community College. Walsh has been awarded honorary doctorates from both Case Western Reserve University and Johnson C. Smith University. She is a past member of the Homeland Security Academic Partnership Council, having been appointed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

For more on Walsh and City University of Seattle, visit CityU.edu.

About City University of Seattle: Since 1973, City University of Seattle has been relentlessly reimagining higher education in the Pacific Northwest and around the world. As an accredited, nonprofit university with over 20 years in online education, our mission is to provide career-relevant education to busy professionals and promote their educational and career success. Today, CityU of Seattle is recognized as a Top 10 educator of adults nationwide, offering over 65 degrees and certificate programs in business, education, health and social sciences, and technology and computing. Whether students study online or on-site, they gain marketable skills from practitioner faculty, and network with students and alumni employed at top companies such as Amazon, Boeing, Microsoft, Starbucks, and Google.

Media Contact

Ashleigh Webb, City University of Seattle, 760-889-3494, awebb@nu.edu, https://www.cityu.edu/ 

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SOURCE City University of Seattle

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LYKSTAGE Launches Patented Video Platform That Pays Creators and Viewers — Now Live Across Five Countries

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MUMBAI, India, April 20, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — LYKSTAGE, a video-sharing platform owned by LYK Inc., a Delaware-based entity, and founded by New York-based entrepreneur Adris Chakraborty, is redefining how the creator economy works — with a patented monetization model no other platform can legally replicate.

Built by a technology team in India under Manhattan Tech Ventures, LYKSTAGE runs on a patented Watch-Time Monetization Model that fundamentally changes who earns from video content. Creators earn whenever their content’s watch time gets monetized — no subscriber minimums, no waiting periods, and no thresholds to cross before earning begins.

What makes the model unprecedented is that viewers earn too. Logged-in viewers are rewarded whenever their watch time gets monetized — when they watch content uninterrupted and the ad served during viewing is fully consumed. When that happens, the creator earns, the viewer is rewarded, and the platform earns. Every reward is funded by actual ad revenue — not venture capital subsidies. The model is entirely self-sustaining.

The platform serves both skippable and non-skippable ads, determined by an ad server algorithm that optimizes based on viewing patterns and content traction. For advertisers, impressions are served intelligently — matching the right ad format to the right moment, delivering higher completion rates and genuine attention.

LYKSTAGE is now live across five markets — India, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the UAE — and available on Samsung TV, LG TV, Roku, Apple TV, Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, desktop, mobile web, and native apps on both the App Store and Google Play Store.

Adris Chakraborty, a Kolkata-born Columbia Business School alumnus based in the US since 2003, co-founded Mediamorphosis Advertising & Technology Inc. in New York in 2006 with his spouse and business partner Poulami Mukherjee. The company expanded to the UK in 2012, followed by Manhattan Communications in India — building a multicultural advertising group spanning five countries with over 100 clients, providing LYKSTAGE with built-in advertiser relationships and market intelligence.

The platform has crossed over one million users across all markets, with more than 20,000 creators on board and growing across all five countries — achieved with minimal paid marketing.

LYKSTAGE is a transparent, patented system where the people who create the value are the ones who earn from it.

Sign up at:
Android – https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lykstage.app
Apple – https://apps.apple.com/in/app/lykstage-video-streaming/id6754064834

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2960187/LYKSTAGE_Logo.jpg

 

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Towngas and Tencent forge strategic partnership to drive “Energy + Tech” smart digital transformation

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HONG KONG, April 20, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited (Towngas) and Tencent have signed a strategic partnership agreement in Hong Kong. The two companies will collaborate extensively on unified cloud resource management, digital platform development, large artificial intelligence (AI) models and applications, customer engagement enhancement, and R&D tool synergy. Together, they aim to drive the smart digital transformation of the energy sector.

The partnership dates back to 2020, when Towngas Lifestyle, the extended business division of Towngas, first teamed up with Tencent Cloud. In 2021, Towngas Energy, the Group’s renewable energy arm, worked with Tencent Cloud to build a smart energy ecosystem, which currently supports over a hundred integrated energy projects for the business segment. In 2023, Towngas Lifestyle and Tencent Cloud entered into a comprehensive strategic partnership spanning cloud platforms, big data, AI, and customer engagement, delivering one-stop lifestyle solutions to 46 million household customers across Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland. This latest agreement marks a comprehensive, group-level strategic partnership between Towngas and Tencent. It is designed to pool their resources, achieve cross-divisional synergy, drive quality and efficiency gains, and accelerate AI innovation.

Over the past six years, this collaboration has yielded remarkable results. Powered by Tencent Cloud, Towngas Lifestyle has upgraded the digital foundation and driven application innovation for its Towngas Lifestyle Cloud (TLC) platform. Furthermore, leveraging Tencent Cloud’s TBDS (Tencent Big Data Suite), it built the Towngas Analytics Platform (TAP), which currently supports big data applications for over 70 affiliated city-gas companies as well as its Hong Kong operations.

In terms of AI applications, Towngas Lifestyle has capitalised on Tencent’s AI computing power and large model technology to launch innovative tools such as smart safety inspections and AI service agents, significantly boosting the efficiency of frontline staff at gas companies. To better serve its customers, the company has deeply integrated Tencent’s WeCom to improve customer outreach. On the R&D front, Towngas Lifestyle has widely adopted Tencent’s AI development tools to streamline workflows. Moreover, the partners have successfully replicated their mainland successes in Hong Kong, completing the cross-border deployment of the TAP platform and advancing the upgrade of the city’s business systems.

Mr Peter Wong Wai-yee, Managing Director of Towngas, said: “Tencent’s leading position in AI and digital technology is obvious to all. Since 2020, the two parties have established a strong partnership, expanding from Towngas Lifestyle’s extended business to cooperation on the smart energy platform for the renewable energy segment, and gradually extending from the mainland to Hong Kong. As an enterprise with a 164-year history, Towngas has grown to possess a customer base of over 120 million since entering the mainland gas utility business in 1994. Facing such a massive number of customers, data security is of paramount importance. How to build a secure and efficient system for management and service has become a critical issue for business development. We are confident in joining hands with Tencent to co-build a secure and efficient digital system, comprehensively elevate the customer service experience and operational efficiency, and jointly pioneer more possibilities for ‘Energy + Tech’.”

Mr Dowson Tong, Senior Executive Vice President of Tencent and CEO of Tencent Cloud and Smart Industries Group, stated that as a household brand in Hong Kong, Towngas’s “customer-centric” service philosophy aligns closely with Tencent’s corporate mission of “Value for Users, Tech for Good”. Over the past six years, Tencent has engaged in deep collaboration with multiple segments under Towngas, empowering businesses with technology to achieve precise operations. Tencent looks forward to taking this exchange as a new starting point, further consolidating the “Cloud + AI” technological foundation based on existing cooperation, and deeply integrating Tencent’s digital capabilities with Towngas’s rich application scenarios. Through technological innovation, the goal is to achieve better customer service delivery and enhance operational efficiency, exploring a new path to sustainable development for the smart upgrade of the energy industry while ensuring data security and user privacy.

Looking ahead, the two companies will continue to deepen their collaboration in migrating core businesses to the cloud, co-building digital platforms, deploying large models and AI applications, and enhancing customer engagement. This will not only deliver a superior experience for gas customers but also set a benchmark for the high-quality transformational development of the energy industry.

 

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SOURCE Tencent Cloud

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DMEGC Solar Achieves EcoVadis Gold Medal, Underscoring Its Commitment to ESG Excellence

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JINHUA, China, April 20, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — On April 15, DMEGC Solar, a global leader in magnetic materials and renewable energy solutions, achieved a milestone breakthrough in sustainable development. With outstanding performance in environmental protection, social responsibility, and other key areas, the company earned a Gold Medal from the internationally recognized rating agency EcoVadis, scoring 82 points. This places DMEGC Solar in the top 3% of all rated companies worldwide, surpassing 97% of participants.

EcoVadis is a globally leading sustainability assessment platform, having rated over 150,000 companies across more than 250 industries and 185 countries. Its evaluation framework covers 21 indicators across four core themes: Environment, Labor & Human Rights, Ethics, and Sustainable Procurement. The platform aims to assess the sustainability performance and social responsibility of companies within global supply chains.

DMEGC Solar participated in the assessment at the group level rather than as a single factory, demonstrating outstanding strength across all four dimensions. In the Labor & Human Rights dimension, the company has established a comprehensive employee rights protection system, strictly implemented occupational health and safety standards, and promoted employee development and career growth, ranking in the top 1% of its industry.

In the Sustainable Procurement dimension, the company has built a full-chain green supply chain management mechanism, collaborating with core suppliers to create a “cooperative carbon reduction” ecosystem. Initiatives such as packaging material recycling, green electricity usage, and localized collaborative production have enabled a low-carbon, traceable supply chain, also ranking in the top 1% of the industry.

Coupled with strong performances in environmental governance and business ethics, the company achieved an impressive score of 82, surpassing 97% of evaluated companies and earning the Gold Medal. This distinction places DMEGC Solar at the top in the global solar module manufacturers to receive such recognition.

This Gold Medal rating will for sure strengthen the company’s competitiveness in overseas markets. On one hand, its industry-leading ESG performance helps meet policy requirements related to sustainable supply chains, enhancing both the premium pricing of its products in international markets and its ability to secure orders. On the other hand, this recognition will boost customer and partner trust in the company’s brand, supporting the expansion of market share for its core products—such as photovoltaic modules, residential energy storage systems, and magnetic materials—while consolidating its market leadership.

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