Mumbai, India 26 August, 2025: In a first-of-its-kind initiative for the region enterprise skilling landscape, global skilling major upGrad and ETS have announced the launch of AI-Ready English – a joint program designed to deliver English + AI fluency to enterprise professionals navigating the region digital transformation across UAE and MENA regions.
This announcement follows upGrad’s recent strategic alliance with the Seed Group – a company of The Private Office of Sheikh Saeed bin Ahmed Al Maktoum. This joint venture seeks to accelerate AI-based learning adoption and large-scale workforce development across enterprises and businesses in the UAE and the broader MENA region.
As organisations race toward digital transformation, workforce readiness must go beyond just infrastructure – it starts with enabling professionals to think, communicate, and lead with and through intelligent tools.
The program will train 10,000 learners in this fiscal year, especially in transformation-critical sectors such as retail, logistics, finance, and public services.
Program Highlights:
- TOEIC-benchmarked English proficiency
- AI literacy modules: prompt writing, GenAI usage, productivity tools
- Communication Labs: voice AI coach, real-time meeting practice
- Capstone: business use case combining English and AI application
- TOEIC LINK profile for verified talent visibility
“As the region accelerates its digital transformation, this initiative empowers the workforce with the global language of business and the emerging language of technology, ensuring they are future-ready and globally competitive”, Ratnesh Jha, Global GM of Institutional Products, ETS.
Commenting on the partnership, Srikanth Iyengar, the CEO of upGrad Enterprise – the corporate skilling division of the brand said, “We live in times where English has evolved beyond its traditional status quo – it’s now the operating system of intelligent work.”
He further added, “Partnering with ETS TOEIC brings together two powerful forces in global skilling: their decades-long leadership in English language certification and our deep expertise in outcome-driven workforce development. This synergy is crucial to solving what we see as one of Saudi Arabia’s most pressing needs-a bilingual, AI-fluent workforce that can thrive in a rapidly digitising economy. This partnership is not just academic; it’s an economic enabler – one that fuels both national ambition and individual progress. At upGrad, our programs are thoughtfully reverse-engineered to meet regional skilling needs, bridging capability gaps with the speed, scale, and precision that this moment demands.”
This initiative is powered by the newly launched solution by ETS, TOEIC LINK, which is a fast, modular and online tool to assess practical competency rather than academic ability ensuring learners are equipped to communicate accurately & apply their knowledge confidently in real-world business environments.