Quikr's Gagan Singla joins Simplilearn.com as its CMO

Online education portal for professionals Simplilearn.com has appointed Gagan Singla, former VP-digital marketing at Quikr as its chief marketing officer (CMO). In his new role, Singla will head the marketing team with SEM, SEO, affiliate and brand responsibilities.

He intends to bring a scientific and data driven approach to marketing and scaling the business globally to make it the preferred global destination for learning needs of professionals.

"We continue to expand rapidly into new markets and Singla's global experience gives him the ability and expertise to take our business to the next level," said Krishna Kumar, founder and CEO, Simplilearn. Earlier this year, Simplilearn had forayed into Singapore, as part of its expansions plans in Southeast Asia.

Singla comes with 12 years of experience in helping organisations realise the full potential of their information assets and data through analytics. At Quikr, he was responsible for all paid digital marketing including search, display, networks, affiliates and social initiatives. Prior to that, he had worked at companies like PWC and Deloitte. A graduate of computer science from IIT Delhi, he also holds a MBA degree from IIM Lucknow.

The startup was founded in 2009 by Kumar, a BE in electronics and communication from the National Institute of Technology, Karnataka. Prior to this venture, Kumar had worked with Infosys and TechUnified. Simplilearn is an online learning destination for young working professionals, who are looking at career enhancement through certification courses across industry verticals. With study centres across the globe, Simplilearn offers over 80 certification courses across 11 categories.

At present, the company claims to be training about 5,000 professionals on a monthly basis. It offers certification courses in Project Management, IT Services & Security Management, Financial Management, Big Data & Cloud Computing, SAP Certification, and Agile & Scrum Certification. The firm claims to have served over 100,000 professionals in 150 countries till date.

To meet the needs of busy working professionals, Simplilearn offers classes in several formats, including self-paced online learning and instructor-led classroom training. In August 2012, the company had raised an undisclosed amount in funding from IndoUS Venture Partners (now Kalaari Capital).