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National Competition Challenges Students to Design Apps That Remove Barriers to Degree Completion

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In partnership with Anthropic and Lovable, Stellic launches competition giving students access to free tools to design and build a working solution to a problem they’ve experienced during their higher education journey

SAN MATEO, Calif., July 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Stellic—the Bay Area-based developer of the innovative academic planning and degree management platform that now serves more than 1 million students across 100 colleges and universities—today announced the launch of a national competition that puts the tools for redesigning college in the hands of the students who navigate it every day. The Pathfinders Challenge invites college students to design, test and build real solutions to problems they’ve experienced firsthand—turning the friction they’ve lived through into working applications that can help other students and their institutions.

Participating students will gain access to free credits for Lovable, a vibe-coding platform that enables users to build full working apps based on plain-language descriptions, or for the Claude API for students who want to build with code.

Open to any enrolled university or college student aged 18 or older in the United States, Canada, Mexico, or Australia, the Pathfinders Challenge invites students to build a solution to a problem they’ve personally experienced in college. Students are rarely in the room when institutions choose the systems and processes meant to serve them, and the Pathfinders Challenge puts the people who live with that friction every day in charge of fixing it. Students can enter solo or in teams of up to three, including teammates from different schools, and no formal coding experience is required.

Submissions can address any of four categories: degree planning and discovery, overcoming obstacles like cost and paperwork, campus connection and belonging, or the transition from college to career. A complete submission includes a working link, a two-minute demo video, a 500-word write-up, and a list of every tool used.

Registration is open now, giving students access to free credits for Lovable or the Claude API. Rather than asking students to work around outdated systems, the challenge asks them to imagine what those systems could look like if they were built around the people who actually use them—and then to build it.

Prizes total $12,000, including a $5,000 grand prize plus a career conversation with Stellic’s leadership team, two $2,500 runner-up prizes, and four $500 category prizes. The top three teams will present live at Stellic Summit in front of college leaders from across the country, and every qualifying submission earns a digital badge for the student’s portfolio. Students do not need to attend a school that uses Stellic’s platform to participate.

Built to remove barriers and simplify the student journey, Stellic’s suite of tools—including Progress for degree management, Care for proactive advising and roster management, and now Explore for transfer evaluation—helps institutions create more affordable, efficient, and transparent pathways to completion. Founded by Sabih Bin Wasi, a first-generation immigrant and first-generation college student, Stellic began as a student venture during his time at Carnegie Mellon University. Today, the company works with institutions of every type and size, including community colleges, public and private universities and major research institutions.

Key dates and details:

Submissions close: August 21, 2026Winners announced: Early September 2026Finalist presentations: September 23, 2026, at Stellic Summit in Philadelphia, an annual gathering of Stellic’s partner colleges

Students can register and learn more at stellic.com/pathfinders. Questions can be directed to pathfinders@stellic.com.

About Stellic. Stellic is a leading student success and academic planning platform used by over 100 higher education institutions worldwide and more than 1 million students. The company empowers students, advisors, and administrators with modern tools to streamline degree progress, automate transfer evaluations, and make data-informed decisions that drive completion and engagement. Learn more at www.stellic.com.

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SOURCE Stellic

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Next Level Solutions Selected by Safepoint MGA to Deliver New Customer Self-Service Portal

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SPRINGFIELD, Mo., July 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Next Level Solutions (NLS) today announced a new engagement with Safepoint MGA, a Tampa-based property and casualty insurance underwriter specializing in coastal regions, to develop a modern customer self-service portal designed to enhance the policyholder experience. The engagement adds to a strong first half of 2026 for NLS, marked by expanding client relationships and continued growth across the property and casualty insurance industry.

The new portal will give policyholders of Safepoint MGA’s affiliated carriers a faster, more convenient way to access their policies, documents, claims, and payments online. NLS is building the solution on a modern React and Microsoft Azure foundation, connecting directly to Safepoint’s existing systems, including Heartland and Duck Creek.

Once live, the portal will give policyholders a single, secure place to manage their coverage, from viewing policies and accessing key documents to filing and tracking claims, updating account details, and making payments. Real-time notifications will keep policyholders informed with updates on policy, billing, and claims activity.

The launch is timed ahead of peak hurricane season, so Safepoint’s policyholders will have easy-to-use self-service tools in place when they need them most, whether that’s filing a claim, checking a document, or making a payment, all without picking up the phone.

“Delivering a modern, intuitive experience for our policyholders on an aggressive timeline required more than technical expertise—it required a true partner,” said Ted Krueger, Director of Engineering at Safepoint. “The team at Next Level Solutions consistently demonstrated exceptional project management, disciplined requirements gathering, and meticulous attention to detail throughout every phase of the engagement. Their structured approach to documenting, tracking, and resolving issues significantly reduced project risk while maintaining an impressive pace of development. Together, we successfully delivered a fully functional insured portal experience that exceeded our expectations and positioned Safepoint for continued innovation in our digital customer experience.”

“Every new engagement is built on trust, and we’re grateful Safepoint chose Next Level Solutions to help advance such an important initiative,” said Chris Sawyer, CEO of Next Level Solutions. “Projects like this reflect the confidence we’re seeing from insurers who need experienced teams that can deliver modern solutions with speed, quality, and a genuine focus on helping clients succeed.”

Demand for Next Level Solutions’ expertise continues to grow as insurers invest in modern technology, stronger customer experiences, and trusted delivery partners to help them execute with confidence. That growth spans consulting, implementation, quality engineering, core system transformation, and managed services for property and casualty insurers.

About Next Level Solutions
Next Level Solutions (NLS) is a technology consulting and systems integration firm focused on the property and casualty insurance industry. Headquartered in Springfield, Missouri, with nearshore delivery hubs in Puerto Rico and Honduras, NLS helps carriers implement, stabilize, and get more from the systems their business runs on. Tech Powered. P&C Focused. Learn more at nlsnow.com.

About Safepoint Insurance
Safepoint MGA is a specialty homeowners and commercial insurance underwriter that manages Safepoint Insurance Company and two reciprocal insurance exchanges, Manatee Insurance Exchange and Cajun Underwriters Reciprocal Exchange.

Media Contact
Vicki Treptow, Sr Marketing Specialist, vicki.treptow@nlsnow.com

pr@safepointins.com

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SOURCE Next Level Solutions

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Telekom Srbija modernizes customer engagement and AI-driven marketing with SAS

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SAS Customer Intelligence 360 and SAS Viya help deliver personalized engagement, and scale AI decisioning initiatives.

CARY, N.C., July 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Telekom Srbija, the leading telecommunications provider in Serbia and a major presence in Southeast and Central Europe, is redefining what it means to be a modern telecom operator with the help of SAS, a global leader in data and AI.

Telekom Srbija implemented SAS Customer Intelligence 360, SAS’ AI-powered customer engagement platform, to consolidate campaign planning, orchestration and execution into a single solution.

Telekom Srbija is using SAS Customer Intelligence 360, SAS Intelligent Decisioning and SAS® Viya® to unify campaign management, deliver personalized customer engagement, support real-time decisioning and scale AI-driven marketing.

While communication, broadband and connectivity remain a priority, Telekom Srbija has moved beyond traditional telecom services to build one of the region’s most successful content production engines, creating TV series, films and documentaries – content that is consumed by people in local markets, and globally.

But as Telekom Srbija expanded, so did the complexity of its marketing operations. Multiple teams were running independent campaigns, often resulting in inconsistent messaging and a fragmented customer experience for its more than 8 million customers.

“Previously, we had nine different teams creating campaigns, and none of them knew who was executing what or when,” said Natali Delić, Strategy and Digital Officer at Telekom Srbija. “Customers were receiving conflicting offers across channels, which diluted impact and increased costs. We needed a unified approach.”

To address this, Telekom Srbija implemented SAS Customer Intelligence 360, SAS’ AI-powered customer engagement platform, to consolidate campaign planning, orchestration and execution into a single solution.

With SAS Customer Intelligence 360, Telekom Srbija can:

Centralize campaign management across teams and channels.Eliminate overlapping messages and customer fatigue.Enable coordinated, consistent engagement at scale.Enable real-time personalization.Create a scalable foundation for AI-driven marketing.

“With SAS we’re moving from broad, segment-based campaigns to highly refined offers tailored to micro-segments, even individual customers,” said Delić.

Driving smarter, real-time decisioning
Telekom Srbija is also modernizing its decisioning capabilities, evolving from trigger-based campaigns to fully contextual, real-time engagement. By combining SAS Customer Intelligence 360 with SAS Intelligent Decisioning, the company can:

React instantly to customer behavior.Deliver relevant offers based on real-time context.Extend engagement across channels including mobile, web and self-service apps.

“Context is everything,” Delić said. “A message might feel intrusive at one moment but highly valuable at another. With SAS, we can respond in real time with the right action, at the right moment, through the right channel.”

The combination of SAS Customer Intelligence 360 and SAS Intelligent Decisioning enables real-time personalization based on customer behavior and context.

Scaling AI with a cloud-native analytics foundation
To support its continued growth and innovation, Telekom Srbija has deployed SAS Viya, a scalable, cloud-native platform unifying analytics, machine learning and AI.

“We knew we needed a platform that could bring everything together. We needed a company that shared our innovative spirit and provided the capabilities to grow and scale,” Delić said. “That’s why we chose SAS Viya.”

Since deployment, the company’s vision for AI has increased rapidly, building on the breadth of SAS Viya’s capabilities, including:

Integrating analytics, AI and machine learning in one environment.Supporting multiple programming languages and teams.Enabling exploration of large language models and AI agents.

“The possibilities with Viya keep expanding,” Delić said. “We’re now exploring how large language models and AI agents can help marketers accelerate campaign creation, improve customer engagement and automate marketing workflows.”

SAS Customer Intelligence 360 helps organizations unify customer data, orchestrate personalized customer journeys, deliver real-time engagement and measure marketing performance across channels. For more information on SAS Customer Intelligence 360, visit: SAS Customer Intelligence 360

To follow updates and insights, visit the SAS Customer Intelligence LinkedIn page: SAS Customer Intelligence 360 on LinkedIn

About SAS
SAS is a global leader in data and AI. With SAS software and industry-specific solutions, organizations transform data into trusted decisions. SAS gives you THE POWER TO KNOW®.

SAS and all other SAS Institute Inc. product or service names are registered trademarks or trademarks of SAS Institute Inc. in the USA and other countries. ® indicates USA registration. Other brand and product names are trademarks of their respective companies. Copyright © 2026 SAS Institute Inc. All rights reserved.

Editorial Contacts:
Angela Lipscomb
angela.lipscomb@sas.com
919-531-2525
sas.com/news

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SOURCE SAS

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US Air Force awards Leidos ISR operations support task order worth up to $717 million

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RESTON, Va., July 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — As global threats become more complex, contested and fast-moving, U.S. airmen need timely intelligence that is trusted and operationally relevant. Leidos (NYSE: LDOS) has been awarded a new task order by the U.S. Air Force’s Air Combat Command (ACC) Acquisition Management and Integration Center (AMIC) to continue delivering intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) operations support for ACC.

The task order has a total potential value of approximately $717 million if all options are exercised. It includes a one-year base period with four one-year options. Work will be performed at more than 35 locations in the United States and overseas, positioning Leidos personnel alongside U.S. Air Force mission partners at the point of need and reinforcing the company’s role as an embedded partner in day-to-day mission execution.

Leidos has supported this mission as the prime contractor since 2019. The new task order extends that partnership at a time when military leaders need accurate, timely information to assess threats and support operations across air, space, cyber and intelligence missions.

“Airmen operate in an environment where decisions often depend on the speed, quality and clarity of intelligence,” said Jason McCarthy, Leidos senior vice president, Airborne & Mission Solutions. “Since 2019, our team has worked alongside Air Combat Command to provide mission-focused ISR support, training and analysis. This next phase of work builds on that foundation with the insight and operational expertise needed to help Airmen assess threats, prepare for missions and support operations around the world.”

Under the task order, Leidos will provide subject matter expertise, intelligence analysis, threat mitigation, ISR operations support, training, and mission support services for ACC headquarters, subordinate Numbered Air Forces, centers, and wings. This work reflects Leidos’ NorthStar 2030 commitment to helping Department of War customers maintain combat-ready forces and defeat evolving global threats.

Headquartered at Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Hampton, Virginia, ACC is one of the U.S. Air Force’s major commands and serves as a primary provider of combat air, space, cyber and intelligence capabilities to America’s warfighting commands. ACC AMIC provides acquisition services that support mission-focused capabilities across the command.

About Leidos

Leidos is an industry and technology leader serving government and commercial customers with smarter, more efficient digital and mission innovations. Headquartered in Reston, Virginia, with approximately 50,000 global employees, Leidos reported annual revenues of approximately $17.2 billion for the fiscal year ended January 2, 2026. For more information, visit www.leidos.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements in this announcement constitute “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the rules and regulations of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). These statements are based on management’s current beliefs and expectations and are subject to significant risks and uncertainties. These statements are not guarantees of future results or occurrences. Several factors could cause our actual results, performance, achievements, or industry results to be different from the results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. These factors include, but are not limited to, the “Risk Factors” set forth in Leidos’ Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 2, 2026, and other such filings that Leidos makes with the SEC from time to time. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof. Leidos does not undertake to update forward-looking statements to reflect the impact of circumstances or events that arise after the date the forward-looking statements were made.

Media Contact:

Brandon Ver Velde
brandon.p.vervelde@leidos.com
(571) 526-6257

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SOURCE Leidos Holdings, Inc.

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