Mahboob Mahmood is the Founder and CEO of Knowledge Platform. In addition to setting overall strategy and direction, he plays a leading role in new learning initiatives and developing innovative learning solutions.
He has led the company in its design and deployment of Reusable Learning Objects, Scenario-Based Learning and Interactive Simulations and is now leading the company’s efforts in the area of Adaptive Learning Solutions for the schools sector. He has also acted as lead designer for online courses as well as blended learning courses in Compliance, Corporate Governance, Entrepreneurship, Intellectual Property Management and Risk Management.
Formerly a partner at the international law firm of Sidley & Austin, Mahboob spent 11 years handling corporate finance transactions in the firm’s New York office, before establishing the firm’s Singapore office in 1997. Mahboob has broad industry experience and has been lead counsel for many complex transactions in the high-tech, financial services, media, utilities and transportation sectors. He has worked with major clients in implementing their business strategies in the United States and many countries of Asia and has handled a number of privatization assignments for The World Bank in Asia and the Middle East.
Mahboob received his J.D. from Columbia Law School in 1986, his M.A. in Political Science from The Johns Hopkins University in 1987 and B.A. in Politics from Princeton University in 1981. He was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1987.
Mahboob is Member of the Board of Trustees of the Institute of International Education. He has served as Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship at INSEAD, where he has designed and taught an MBA program on social entrepreneurship and has developed case studies and led research on entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship and philanthropy.
Omer Iqbal
COO (Pakistan)
Omer Iqbal has been working in the software and e-learning industry for more than a decade. Over the past 13 years, he has been meticulously involved in product design, development and management of technology projects at various scales. His prime responsibilities involve software portfolio management, programme management, project management and end-to-end delivery of customised products and services to clients across the globe. With his expertise and competency in developing strong product teams and product cultures, he has been able to build, grow, and support a family of over 100,000 corporate learners. He has worked on multiple projects with Fortune 500 companies located in over 35 countries across the world. The major clients include but not limited to Thomson Reuters, Singapore Stock Exchange, United Overseas Bank and Bayer AG.
As the COO at Knowledge Platform, Omer performs a very diverse role by overseeing tasks like strategy planning and execution, critical revenue flow, cost management, business development, process optimisation, investor reporting and driving overall operational excellence in the organization. His key areas of focus are improving productivity, driving innovation, improving coordination among teams, ensuring business targets and operational excellence across all business activities.
Shahbaz Hussain
CFO
Shahbaz is fellow member of the Institute of Public Finance Accountants of Pakistan and is a CA Finalist. He has been working with Knowledge Platform for over a decade. He currently manages and maintains the Finance, Corporate, Tax and administrative functions for the Pakistan office. He also manages liaison with the holding company in preparation of monthly financial reports, yearly budget and projections.
Sajid Ali Anjum
Director Innovation
Sajid is committed to developing impactful and innovative educational technology solutions. He has over 10 years of experience designing and developing apps, games, AI and web platforms that reach over a million learners and educators around the world.
As Director Innovation at Knowledge Platform, Sajid heads the research and development of web platforms, apps, games, and AI. He leads multiple technology and research teams. He is also a member of the core design team that is responsible for the development of technology solutions at KP.
Sajid obtained a bachelor’s degree in Computer Systems Engineering from IUB, Pakistan and his master’s degree in Computer Science (Intelligent Information Systems) from NUST, Pakistan.
Salahuddin Azmat Isa
Director Content
Salahuddin oversees the activities of a team of over 45 people comprising instructional designers, content developers, animators, illustrators, and content management experts. He is responsible for designing the overall content strategy, as well as ensuring that his team delivers highly creative, original content on a consistent and ongoing basis.
Prior to this position Salahuddin was leading special projects at Knowledge Platform where he oversaw the development of learning modules and assessments for a wide range of demographics, including K-12 and university students, female home-based workers, corporate managers and mid-level professionals. He was also a master trainer for a national financial literacy project funded by The State Bank of Pakistan, where he gained experience in conducting needs-based surveys and analyses.
Salahuddin has a bachelor’s degree in International Business from the University of Sussex and a master’s degree in Globalisation, Business and Development from the Institute of Development Studies (IDS).
Sabahat Quadri
Head Secondary School Products
Sabahat brings over 26 years of experience in publishing to Knowledge Platform. Trained as a graphic designer, Sabahat brings a unique mix of talents to the table—she’s a designer, a writer, and an editor and has worked in both print and digital media. At Knowledge Platform, she is instrumental in defining the form and function of all secondary content, and creating and maintaining standards of design, instruction, and language across all teams. In addition to overseeing strategic decisions regarding secondary content, Sabahat manages the development of English language content for grades 6 – 10 with a small team. She is currently also overseeing the redevelopment of the Knowledge Platform brand and marketing standards.
Prior to Knowledge Platform, Sabahat was Associate Director of Digital Publishing and Creative Services at Oxford University Press Pakistan. She has worked for news publications such as Dawn, Herald (as a visualiser in Creative Unit), and Newsline. She also worked at BITS (Beaconhouse Information Technology Solutions) as a website designer, and was a member of the pioneering team that designed and developed Pakistan’s first interactive CD-ROM—a digital library of Pakistani art for ABN-AMRO. Since then, Sabahat has continued to work primarily in educational publishing.
Sabahat has a bachelor’s degree in Communication Design from the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture.
Umair Ali
Head of Outreach and Engagement
As Head of Outreach and Engagement at Knowledge Platform, Umair heads a passionate and impact-driven sales team that covers 12 regions and 130 cities and towns in Pakistan. He leads and manages all outreach activities, working with more than 1,100 public and private schools, reaching out to more than 10,000 principals, 8,000 teachers, and 300,000 students. He also leads multiple projects as a project manager, including FDE, AKU-EB, and FGEI.
Umair is committed to developing strong, impactful, and deliverable strategies of product integration, segmentation, and market penetration for Knowledge Platform. His role in the company is focused on improving product integration, designing and aligning strategies with client-focused outcomes, and driving initiatives for the sustainability of the business.
Umair has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Air University Islamabad and a master’s degree in mechatronics engineering, specialising in Artificial Intelligence industrial frameworks from the National University of Science and Technology Islamabad.
Anam Palla
Director Marketing
Anam Palla is an organizational change leader with a decade of experience mobilizing students, teachers, schools and communities. She is currently serving as Director Marketing at Knowledge Platform.
Previously, Anam has led complex school-reform projects in Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) with Zindagi Trust. She has worked extensively with the provincial education department on various projects, especially the development and approval of a customized teacher evaluation form for all government teachers in Sindh, Pakistan for the first time.
Anam has engaged with peers around the world through conferences, Teach For All Global Community of Practice and Leadership for Growth certification from Amani Institute. Anam is also pursuing a diploma in Humanistic Integrative Counselling and aims to integrate those practices in her work as a change leader.
Haleema Zaheer
Engagement Manager
Haleema manages the school engagement team across Pakistan that is responsible for product implementation, adoption, training, support, and expansion. It includes working with more than 1,200+ public and private schools, 8,000+ teachers, and 300,000+ students.
She is responsible to develop strategies that work to maintain high levels of customer retention and success. She works closely with prospective B2b clients to proactively anticipate and identify client needs.
She has a bachelor’s degree in Electrical (Communications) Engineering from the University of Engineering and Technology, Peshawar.
Adeela Kanwal
Head of Content Reporting and Metrics
Adeela Kanwal has 15 years of experience in the eLearning industry. She participates in planning and executing tasks related to content management, which includes upgraded versions of current systems, configuration changes, debugging issues, third-party solutions, and integration with our own blended learning solution. She is responsible for content audits, complete content inventories, and creating and managing content production metrics. She also serves a key role in helping to drive digital adoption, contributing to sales and engagement strategies, to program development (particularly with designing content objects), and for attracting investments into the platform.
Adeela also has experience packaging eLearning courses with SCORM, SCORM 1.2, SCORM 2004, and AICC standards. She maintains the compatibility of 500+ eLearning courses with these standards. These courses have been used by more than 500 clients across the world, serving the needs of more than 300,000 learners.
Adeela has a master’s degree in information technology from Quaid-i-Azam University.
Hammad Shafiq
Marketing Manager
Hammad Shafiq is a Marketing professional with years of diversified experience in digital and conventional marketing. His core competencies are digital marketing, optimization of digital marketing processes, and the development and execution of KPI based digital marketing strategies.
He is currently serving as Marketing Manager at KP, contributing to the development of the core digital marketing strategy of the organization while leading a 360 degrees team of content curators to manage the operations required to ensure successful execution of KP’s marketing strategy.
Before KP, Hammad has been credited with the total development of conventional and digital marketing verticals at several organizations while also providing strategic marketing consultancy to several brands across Pakistan.
Donna M. Spisso
Manager Instructional Design
Donna has taught in the U.S. and nine other countries in Europe and Asia. As an international educator, she taught the English literature and language courses offered by both Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate English programs, IB Theory of Knowledge, and scholastic journalism courses in yearbook and newspaper. She is an examiner for IB English Literature exams and for TOK papers, and she judges literary magazines for the National Scholastic Press and Columbia Scholastic Press Associations.
Donna holds two masters degrees (MA in English and M. Ed in Technology in Education). She was an early convert to Macintosh desktop computing in the 1980s and online learning in the 1990s. In the 21st century, Web 2.0 technology has become an integral part of her teaching, and online coursework is one of her favorite forms of professional development. At educators’ conferences sponsored by the Journalism Education Association, National Council of Teachers of English, and the European Council of International Schools as well as at individual schools, Donna has led formal teacher workshops on literature, writing, digital storytelling, desktop publishing, multimedia and publications. In an administrative capacity, she has served as head of English and as Service Learning Coordinato
Donna has coached drama and publications (yearbook, newspaper, literary magazine) and has organized young philanthropists training, fund-raising and numerous Habitat for Humanity builds in Asia and Africa. Other activities she has sponsored include Forensics, Global Issues Network and Model United Nations.
Donna is married to Tom Craig and enjoys traveling, Tai-chi, weight training, reading, theatre and gourmet cooking.
Ellie Cheong
Manager Instructional Design
Ellie works on the content development, design and production of learning solutions at Knowledge Platform.
Previously an editorial writer, Ellie developed ideas, composed and oversaw features for publications such as BBC GoodFood (Asia), Food and Travel and Arthop. She has a Bachelor of Arts (Hons), English Language and Literature, and a minor in Creative Writing from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
She often writes for leisure and has had her work published in an anthology of poems––Kepulauan: A Collection of Poems (2014).
JIANG YI
Director Design
Jiang Yi is in-charge of Knowledge Platform’s graphics and visual design work. He plays an important role in product conceptualization, design and development across a wide range of learning solutions.
Jiang Yi has a solid background in art & design. His portfolio and experience include fine arts, concept design for film and animation, character design, visual development, 2D character animation, 3D character animation, UI design, game design, and illustration.
Jiang Yi holds a master’s degree in international marketing from Bangor University, an honors degree in Animation from Limkokwing University and a Diploma in Fine Art.
Yvonne Qiu
Director Instructional Design
Yvonne Qiu is an international education professional with extensive experience in designing, managing and teaching English language/literacy programs to students with diverse language and cultural backgrounds.
She has got a M.S.Ed. in TESOL at the University of Pennsylvania and taught at Temple University in Philadelphia and XJTLU in Suzhou. Her expertise is in self-regulated learning, teacher professional development, curriculum design and language assessment.
Viewing language as a social construct, she also focuses on the development of language learners’ voice, identity and intercultural competence. At the moment, Yvonne Qiu’s research interests include intercultural rhetoric in second language writing and non-native English teacher’s identity development.
SANDY NG
Senior Financial Officer
Sandy has been with Knowledge Platform for over a decade, since the inception of the company. Over this time, she has spearheaded the setting up of the finance processes and systems. She currently manages and maintains the finance and administrative functions for the Singapore office. She is also closely involved in the preparation of group monthly financial reports and the yearly budget.