James Gray has over 30 years experience in the digital content and education sector. James founded BMBC / Coutts Information Services in 1992 and as CEO grew the business to become one of the world’s leading suppliers to academic and government libraries. The company supplied thousands of universities in over 120 countries from offices in the UK, Canada, the USA, Holland, and South Africa. The company led the transition in print content supply to digital and worked extensively with the likes of Stanford University in the US and Toronto University in Canada to launch a comprehensive digital content library platform, MyiLibrary. This was quickly adopted by major universities around the world, switching content acquisition from print to digital to better serve their faculty and students.
James sold this business in 2006 to Ingram Industries, a multibillion dollar US business and the worlds biggest distributor of print book content. He became CEO and President of Ingram Digital, a pioneer in the eBook industry, setting up and running Amazons eBook services prior to their launch of Kindle, as well as working extensively with Google, Apple, Microsoft, Sony, Barnes and Noble and others on their eBook and digital content offerings. He also ran the Ingram businesses, Vital Source and Core Source focused on eTextbook distribution for publishers.
In 2012 James returned to the UK and launched Kortext, now the fastest growing digital textbook & learning platform, to switch focus to helping universities and their students achieve more as the learning environment transitions to mixed / hybrid delivery, giving more choice to students combining their on campus experience with full online, anytime, anywhere access to their learning. Kortext is the lead supplier of digital textbook / learning content solutions on the UK’s National Universities Framework contracts, supplying over 140 UK universities.
In 2012 James returned to the UK and launched Kortext, now the fastest growing digital textbook & learning platform, to switch focus to helping universities and their students achieve more as the learning environment transitions to mixed / hybrid delivery, giving more choice to students combining their on campus experience with full online, anytime, anywhere access to their learning. Kortext is the lead supplier of digital textbook / learning content solutions on the UK’s National Universities Framework contracts, supplying over 140 UK universities.
The platform now supports over 2m learners across some 2,300 universities from around the world and is the first choice partner for universities managing a digital teaching and learning transformation programme. In early 2018 the Company was selected by JISC (the organisation that runs the JANET network connecting all UK universities to the internet) to work on national solutions, leveraging Artificial Intelligence, for the delivery of learning analytics into UK universities. Kortext is now used in over 200 countries and territories around the world as it continues its work to support learners everywhere achieve more.
James travels extensively but lives by the sea in Poole, Dorset, with his wife, two young boys, and their three dogs and enjoys all kinds of watersports with the family as well as supporting the local Bournemouth football team – now back in the Premier League!
