Smart leads interactive whiteboard category in education

SMART Technologies has announced its continued leadership regarding the number of interactive whiteboards installed in education institutions around the world, according to Decision Tree Consulting (DTC), a UK research company that has documented interactive whiteboard sales for eight years.

The report also noted that SMART increased its 2007 product category share in the education segment by 4.4 points over 2006. The company’s closest competitor has less than half of SMART’s category share. SMART now holds 53% of the product category share in the education segment in the U.S. and 57% in the U.K.

In all, 377,000 interactive whiteboards were sold to education institutions in 2007. The two areas exhibiting the most significant growth were the United States (55%) and Europe, and the Middle East and Africa (48%). DTC forecasts that the worldwide interactive whiteboard category will increase by 200% in the next five years and that one in six classrooms will have an interactive whiteboard by 2011.

“It comes as no surprise that SMART’s interactive whiteboards are in such demand around the world. Even in the Middle East, we have been witnessing a steady increase in demand for SMART’s products from education institutions across the region, and we are certain that this growth in demand will further increase in coming years,” said Maher Husseini, Director, Intmark Distribution, SMART’s authorised Middle East distributor.

Twenty-two years ago, SMART’s executive chairman and co-founder, David Martin, conceptualized the SMART Board interactive whiteboard – the first and most widely installed interactive whiteboard in the world. In 1991, the first generation of the SMART Board interactive whiteboard was introduced. Currently in its sixth generation, the SMART Board interactive whiteboard line has expanded to include models integrated with projectors and other tools.

SMART’s focus has expanded to include a variety of supporting hardware, software and content to create complete classroom and meeting room solutions.