FREMONT, Calif., July 13, 2006 - Today, Unitek IT Education proudly announced it has won the Partner of the Year Award for Learning Solutions at the 2006 Microsoft Worldwide Partner Program Awards. Unitek received the award for the Sales and Marketing category. The company was chosen out of an international field of top Microsoft Partners as delivering market-leading customer solutions built on Microsoft technology. The awards were distributed at a ceremony on July 12 in Boston, MA, at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference.

Unitek won a second, equally important award at the conference. CMP Media and CRN magazine chose Unitek as the CRN Sales and Marketing partner of the year. The CRN Best in Show awards highlight innovative solutions developed by channel partners that serve as a source of inspiration for the entire channel. These solutions leverage a keen understanding of specific customer needs with emerging technologies to create new solutions that expand market opportunities for the channel as a whole.

"Testing and Certification is the logical culmination of training that ensures that ROI is measured and delivered for the customer. It is heartening that Microsoft recognizes that Unitek has fully understood the customer's perspectives on training ROI and has created a world class certification training methodology", says Paul Afshar, CEO of Unitek (Paul is an Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the year finalist). “I am also delighted that three industry vendors (CRN, Microsoft and Citrix Systems) have recognized Unitek as the best in the Americas, in a span of just six months.

“It is a privilege to recognize Unitek IT Education as a winner of this years’ Learning Solutions award in Sales and Marketing,” said Allison Watson, vice president of the Worldwide Partner Sales and Marketing Group at Microsoft. “It is this level of effectiveness in reaching out to our shared customers regarding the value of solutions built on Microsoft technology that enables continued success for us and for our Partners. We applaud Unitek for its achievements this year and offer gratitude for our ongoing collaboration through the Microsoft Partner Program.”

The Microsoft Partner Program Awards recognize Microsoft Partners that have developed and delivered exceptional Microsoft-based solutions over the last year. The Learning Solutions Award demonstrates a partner’s commitment and ability to deliver superior consultative learning services to provide the skills and knowledge businesses and individuals need to get the most from their investments in Microsoft technology. Unitek IT Education won this year’s award for its outstanding approaches to providing its customers with learning techniques that have maximized their technology investment and on-the-job productivity.

Unitek excels in providing need-based IT learning to corporate clients and certification training to IT career oriented individuals. Our strong focus on quality and customer service has been crucial to our success. This focus has helped us in expanding our client base to all 50 US states and over 40 countries worldwide. Headquartered in the heart of Silicon Valley in sunny California, Unitek offers IT training to thousands of clients nationwide. Unitek is the only IT training vendor in the United States that has achieved the dual status of Microsoft Gold partner for learning solutions (Gold CPLS) and Cisco Learning Partner (CLP). Unitek is also an award-winning Citrix® Authorized learning Center (CALC) and a Network Appliance Learning Partner. Microsoft and CRN have also recognized Unitek with Partner of the Year awards.

For additional information, contact Navraj Bawa, 510-249-1060, \n This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it