SMART Announces Warren Barkley as New Chief Technology Officer

CALGARY, Alberta, Nov. 5, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- SMART Technologies Inc. SMT SMA, a leading provider of collaboration solutions, today announces the appointment of Warren Barkley as SMART's Chief Technology Officer, effective November 13, 2012. Mr. Barkley brings over 17 years of technology experience and leadership, most recently serving as General Manager in the Microsoft Lync/Skype division.

Barkley held several key positions in Microsoft over his tenure and was instrumental in the development of Microsoft Lync as the communication and collaboration software of choice for Fortune 500 companies. At Microsoft he played a central role in establishing WiFi as a worldwide standard, and building world class real time communications technologies used by hundreds of millions of users every day. Barkley holds over 35 worldwide patents in networking, wireless and communications.

"SMART is a center of innovation for education and enterprise collaboration," says Barkley. "I am looking forward to joining the SMART Executive Team to continue to advance product development that will drive improved collaboration solutions in classrooms, enterprise and government across the globe."

"I am delighted that someone of Warren's talent, experience and technology leadership has decided to join our team," said Neil Gaydon, SMART's President and CEO. "With the growing need for collaborative solutions in education, business and government, SMART is well placed to capitalize on these opportunities. Today's announcement demonstrates our desire to accelerate our technologies and solutions so as to fuel our leadership position."

About SMART

SMART Technologies Inc. is a leading provider of collaboration solutions that change the way the world works and learns. As the global leader in interactive whiteboards, our focus is on developing a variety of easy-to-use, integrated solutions that free people from their desks and computer screens, making collaboration and learning with digital resources more natural. Our products have transformed teaching and learning in more than two million classrooms worldwide, reaching over 40 million students and their teachers. In business, our Freestorm^™ visual collaboration solutions improve the way that people work and collaborate, enabling them to be more productive and reduce costs.

The SMART Technologies logo is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=7573

Reader's advisory

Certain information contained in this press release, such as references to the growing demand for collaborative solutions in education, business and government, SMART's ability to capitalize on such anticipated demand and the impact of the development of technologies and solutions on SMART's leadership position, may constitute forward-looking information or statements. By their very nature, forward-looking information and statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties, both general and specific, and risks that predictions, forecasts, projections and other forward-looking information and statements will not be achieved. We caution readers not to place undue reliance on these statements as a number of important factors could cause the actual results to vary materially from the forward-looking information or statements. Except as required under applicable securities legislation, we do not assume any obligation to publicly update or revise forward-looking information. Any forward-looking information and statements contained in this press release are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. 

© 2012 SMART Technologies. Freestorm, the SMART logo and smarttech are trademarks or registered trademarks of SMART Technologies in the U.S. and/or other countries. All other third-party company names and products are for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Please note that SMART is written in all capital letters.