Celebrations for our 10 year anniversary went down a storm at the CASE annual conference in Edinburgh this August. From Managing Director Daniel Watts’ conference address, ‘Where Is The Love?’ to celebrations at the Voodoo Rooms, no one could deny that Aluminati has most definitely come of age in style.
We were joined by our valued clients from UCL, Cambridge, and Kent, as well as special guests from Oxford, Imperial, Glasgow and CASE. The night was a much needed opportunity for the Aluminati team and clients to meet together to celebrate their joint successes – not to mention the extremely popular whiskey tasting!
Representatives from UCL commented that they were ‘really pleased to be invited to the Aluminati anniversary dinner in Edinburgh last month. It was a delightful evening and we really enjoyed meeting the team behind Aluminati, and of course the champagne and desert canapes! As Aluminati’s first clients, we are delighted to see how much the company has grown, how well it has done, and look forward to it continuing to support UCL’s alumni engagement efforts long into the future.’
Looking back at the last decade, Aluminati has continuously evolved to meet client needs. From the grassroots beginnings of PidgeMe (the unofficial alumni email for graduates of the University of Oxford) , and its sister service CantabGOLD.net at Cambridge, to the first official partnership contract with UCL in the spring of 2005. Swiftly following came contracts with Manchester Metropolitan Business School, Oxford Brookes University and the company’s first independent school client, Haileybury and Imperial Services College. In the years following, Aluminati would grow exponentially, expanding a client base, strengthening networks of alumni worldwide, and developing apps (Aluminate, Social Network Syn, Pin) to enhance their clients’ ability to engage and interconnect their alumni.
It has been the sheer growth of Alumanti in 10 years that is testament to the vision and dedication of all involved. This growth not only encompasses the forging of new relationships with universities, but also lies at the heart of the Aluminati mission. The past decade has seen facilitated communication between thousands of university members on a global scale. As Daniel affirms, ‘We believe the answer is to embrace the concept of alumni-alumni relations, leveraging the abundant goodwill in alumni to facilitate intra-alumni relationships. Think about the impact your small team can have with the active help of 400 international ambassadors, 1000 travel hosts and 2000 alumni mentors. Not looking so small now are you?’
Working currently with 28 leading institutions across the UK, we look forward to strengthening these relationships further, as well as developing new links to promote alumni relations worldwide. As we look to the future, the importance of relationships will always remain a core value, as our global alumni networks expand and strengthen.
Daniel’s vision for the company is strongly rooted in these relationships: ‘Alumni-alumni relations is about unearthing the love buried in your alumni networks’.
This love for building relations was certainly evident in Edinburgh, as it was nearly 1am before everyone headed home from the celebrations.
Here’s to the next 10 years!
