January

We started the year noting that organisations are demanding faster and more cost-effective e-learning. Research from the E-learning Guild found that:

• 78% of organisations need faster development
• 70% of organisations need to reduce costs of development

However, rapid tools do not necessarily mean great rapid e-learning, you need good designers. This is why we offered a new rapid e-learning service using some of the best designers in the UK, offering quality learning design, cost-effectively and at speed. The demand has been significant, so the Guild’s research appears to have been spot on.

February

We reported on the best Learning Technologies conference in London until the next one in January 08 when we will be exhibiting. Donald Clark, who was consistently mentioned as the best speaker by the people we met. You can rely on DC to stir things up and arouse a few passions.

Atlantic Link and Mohive had busy stands and we loved Atlantic Link's new mobile capabilities. You can now author courses for devices using the Windows Mobile operating system which opens vast possibilities for authoring content for mobile learning and information provision.

March

We did a round up of the e-learning blogs and found a new convert to rapid e-learning in Clive Shepherd. Clive went on to create a great free course on rapid e-learning design which we built for him.

April

We reported on our attendance at the E-learning Guild conference in Boston. We also made some new friends including Cammy Bean, read her blog at http://learningvisions.blogspot.com/.

The E-learning Guild has now made many of their reports free, so if you want some solid e-learning research head their way. Their latest free report is 162 E-learning Tips and Tricks is at  http://www.elearningguild.com/content.cfm?selection=doc.896

May

Big news from the market in May was Thirdforce’s acquisition of Mindleaders for $18m.

June

We issued a free report on rapid e-learning with Ufi/learndirect, one of four free reports we issued during the year as part of our partnership with them – and plenty more to come in 2008.

We also did a round up of authoring tools including a review of Captivate 2 which we’ve used on many projects for our clients.

July

We did a special market report on Rapid E-learning. We congratulated Bersin who predicted that after 2006 “most organisations with any e-learning initiative will be evaluating and using rapid e-learning tools and rapid e-learning approaches.”

The potential of rapid e-learning is being delivered on the ground today. Higher quality, lower cost e-learning developed in less than 3 weeks is not a tagline, it’s a reality. Those people adopting e-learning in their organizations are becoming heroes. As one of our clients put it, “we can now say yes more often”. We like that.

August

Adobe finally announced that they would no longer be developing Authorware. Adobe stated "The e-learning market has transitioned to Adobe Flash® and Adobe Captivate® software over the years. Authorware is a mature product and demand has continually declined to where it is no longer economically viable for Adobe to continue development." Adios, amigo…

Get reviews of some great alternatives to Authorware at http://www.kineo.com/rapid-e-learning/rapid-e-learning-authoring-tools.html.

September

We reported from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) conference. The financial pressures on training departments were highlighted by CIPD’s 2007 report on learning and development. 52% of public sector organisations said their training budgets were being cut. What to do when you need more for less? Call us biased, but rapid e-learning should be the first choice of any public sector organization looking to make the most of a limited training budget.

October

We gave away a free white paper on Designing for E-learning, which proved our most popular free download this year. There are over 30 free reports and white papers in our Free Thinking section - help yourself. It’s Christmas after all.

November

E-learning company of the month had to go to Skillsoft who forecast they would achieve over $270m of revenues next year and that their gross margin is currently running at 87%. Who said there wasn’t money in e-learning?

December

Allow us to close on some more of our own news…the big news for us was more than trebling our sales in 2007 and the year hasn’t closed yet! We also have some big plans for 2008, look out for some exciting new announcements in January and do come to see us at the Learning Technologies conference. We would love to see you at stand 71.