Mergers and Acquisitions in the Education Industry in 2022
This post provides an overview of mergers and acquisitions activity in the education and edtech sectors in 2022
The education sector took some significant twists and turns when the COVID-19 pandemic changed the world. We saw a surge of new users, and new tools, around online learning; but we also saw people and organizations in 2020 and 2021 rethinking how to get the best out of learning environments overall. Now that COVID is largely behind us, 2022 is a year to take stock of how different education related companies evolved and grown.
McGraw Hill acquired Boards & Beyond, a provider of on-demand video libraries and comprehensive online resources for medical students, for an undisclosed amount.
Global University Systems acquired FutureLearn for an undisclosed amount.
GoStudent acquired Studienkreis for an undisclosed amount. This is GoStudent’s 4th acquisition.
The Riverside Company, a private equity group, acquired Applied Educational Systems (AES), a provider of digital career and technical education content for K-12 schools and career centers. AES is an add-on to Riverside’s iCEV platform, a leading developer of SaaS-based digital curriculum, instructional materials and industry certifications.
Universal Technical Institute, a provider of vocational education and skilled trades programs, acquired healthcare-related higher ed provider, Concorde Career Colleges, Inc., for $50 million. Concorde Career Colleges has 16 brick and mortar campuses and roughly 11,200 enrolled students in its allied-healthcare programs.
Solutions provider Follett School Solutions acquired the library management system Access-It Software Ltd.
Apogee, a company that offers technology services for higher ed, acquired Cumulus Technology Services, a cloud services consultancy.
The education communications and analytics provider SchoolStatus acquired Smore, a Tel Aviv-based K-12 email newsletter provider that’s widely used in the U.S.
Publisher McGraw Hill acquired the on-demand video library for medical students, Ryan Medical Education, LLC d/b/a Boards and Beyond. The amount was not disclosed.
As mentioned above, London-based FutureLearn was acquired by Global University Systems, a global for-profit higher ed provider based in the Netherlands.
California-based Mattel, one of the biggest toy sellers in the world, acquired Caribu, a digital reading app for families, for an undisclosed amount.
Higher education solutions provider Top Hat acquired STEM learning platform Aktiv Learning.
University Headquarters acquired Discover Early Childhood EDU, an informational guide about degree offerings.
BiC, one of the world’s biggest pen sellers, acquired Advanced Magnetic Interaction, a company that’s focused on “augmented” human-computer interaction.
Learnsoft, a learning management system provider, raised $16.7 million in Series A funding led by Elsewhere Partners.
Discovery Education, a digital edtech platform provider, acquired Pivot Interactive, which has a library of interactive educational science videos. Discovery has private equity backing from Clearlake Capital, and it also acquired DoodleLearning earlier in the month.
EarlyDay, an early childcare education career marketplace, raised $3.25 million.
The children’s publisher Scholastic acquired Learning Ovations, which runs a literary assessment and instructional system.
Edlio, a K-12 communications technology company, acquired SchoolInfo, a mobile app creator for schools.
LumiQ, a Canada-based company that runs a podcast for training chartered professional accountants, raised $5 million for expansion in the U.S.
Roper Technologies, Inc., announced it has reached an agreement to acquire the school administration software provider Frontline Education in a transaction valued at $3.725 billion.
Akili Interactive, which is developing a video game treatment for pediatric ADHD, raised $163 million in a merger with the special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Social Capital Suvretta Holdings Corp.
Upkid, an on-demand marketplace for childcare centers and teachers, raised $1.7 million in a pre-seed round.
Outcome Group, Inc., an education financing company, announced it has received new debt facility from Variant Investments, LLC, to expand its education portfolio.
Alchemy, a Web3 developer, acquired ChainShot, a coding bootcamp company, for an undisclosed amount.
Renaissance Learning, an educational software services company, acquired Illuminate Education for an undisclosed amount, according to an email sent to Illuminate customers.
Discovery Education, a digital learning platform, acquired the UK-based math and language arts product provider DoodleLearning for an undisclosed amount.
Vsauce’s Curiosity Box subscription service was acquired by science subscription provider MEL Science. It reportedly closed for $12 million.
The future-of-learning private equity firm Achieve Partners acquired Helios Consulting, a certified Workday advisory partner, to build out its apprenticeship programs.
Cybrary, a cybersecurity and IT career development company, raised $25 million in Series B funding.
Territorium, a skill acquisition edtech company, closed $4.4 million in seed funding.
Creative Galileo, an early learning platform, raised $7.5 million in Series A funding.
Pearl, leading research backed, all-in-one tutor management platform, announced its seed fundraising has passed $4 million.
Arist, a microlearning platform, raised $12 million in Series A funding.
APDS, a public-benefit corporation whose advanced career readiness platform offers career training to incarcerated people, raised $7 million in Series C funding.
Class Technologies announced it has closed its acquisition of Blackboard Collaborate.
Kangarootime, an early childhood education software management company based in Buffalo, NY, closed $26 million in Series B funding.
Coding Dojo, a coding boot camp company, raised $10 million. The Bellevue, Washington-based organization trains software engineers both in-person and online and has experienced more than 100% year-over-year growth over the last two years.
upGrad, a Mumbai-based “unicorn” and test-prep company, doubled its valuation after a $225 million funding round. It’s now valued around $2.25 billion. The nonprofit Educational Testing Service was involved in the funding round.
Elevate K-12, the leading provider of high-quality live-streaming instruction for US K-12 classrooms, raised a Series C $40M round of funding led by venture capital firm General Catalyst.
Velocity Career Labs, a startup that wants to create a blockchain-based platform to manage employee’s credentials, raised $6.5 million in funding.
Multiverse, an apprenticeship facilitator, founded in London and now co-headquartered also in New York — has closed a Series D of $220 million, with its post-money valuation coming in at $1.7 billion. StepStone Group (not to be confused with recruiting platform StepStone) and previous backers Lightspeed Venture Partners and General Catalyst all co-led this round, with Founders Circle Capital and past backers Audacious Ventures, BOND, D1 Capital Partners, GV and Index Ventures also participating.
Cambly, a language learning app, raised $60 million in Series B funding, which is encouraging because language learning apps are a rarity in the VC-backed consumer tech space because they have struggled to make money.
Prenda, a K-8 micro-school company, announced a $20 million Series B funding round. The Series B is being led by Seven Seven Six (776), Alexis Ohanian’s firm, with strong participation from edtech-focused VC Learn Capital, Modern Venture Partners, Peak State Ventures, and the companies original angel investors also participating.
Achieve Partners acquired a majority stake in Boclips, a company that curates educational videos. Boclips works with publishers and education providers worldwide to enrich learning with the world’s best educational videos and podcasts. Boclips is the trusted destination for rich media that are vetted for quality, sourced from leading creators, and curated specifically for education. Achieve Partners is engineering the future of learning and earning by investing in cutting edge technologies and novel business models to bolster skill development and secure the future of work for millions of Americans.
IXL Learning, a learning platform company, acquired Curiosity Media, which develops language learning services.
BibliU, a learning platform, announced it has raised $15 million in funding. All existing institutional Series A investors – Stonehage Fleming, Oxford Science Enterprises, Guinness Ventures, and Nesta Impact Investments – participated in the round.
Beable Education, an online literacy recovery platform, acquired Readorium, a leading provider of educational software that teaches reading comprehension skills through science text differentiated to students’ reading levels.
Go1, a hub of on-demand corporate training resources, announced that it raised more than $100 million in a new round of funding, bringing its total market valuation to over $2 billion. The funding was co-led by AirTree Ventures and Five Sigma, with SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Salesforce Ventures, Blue Cloud Ventures, Larsen Ventures, Scott Shleifer and John Curtius from Tiger Global, TEN13, M12 (Microsoft’s venture fund), Madrona Venture Group, SEEK and Y Combinator also participating.
Riverside Insights, a leading developer of research-based assessments and analytics, today announced its acquisition of Aperture Education, the leading provider of research-based social and emotional learning (SEL) assessments for K-12 schools. With more than 65 years of combined research and SEL experience, Aperture sets the standard for research-based SEL assessment solutions.
Elsevier, a global leader in research publishing and information analytics and part of RELX, has closed the acquisition of Interfolio, a provider of advanced faculty information solutions for higher education, headquartered in Washington DC, US. For over 20 years, Interfolio has supported academics, researchers, higher education institutions and funders. Interfolio’s portfolio includes Faculty Information System (FIS), Dossier, and Researchfish.
India-based startup PW, or PhysicsWallah, has raised $100 million in its Series A funding, the profitable startup said Tuesday. Westbridge and GSV Ventures financed the startup’s first institutional round, which values the two-year-old firm at $1.1 billion (post-money). The company offers low-cost education classes. According to the company’s CEO, “The firm has been profitable since inception with positive cash flow and reserves.”
Guild Education, which provides and manages education-as-a-benefit programs for employers, raised $175 million in a Series F funding round. The round was led by Wellington Management, with participation from Oprah Winfrey, Bon Secours Mercy Health, Citi Impact Fund, and existing investors. The latest funding brings the Denver-based company’s total valuation to $4.4 billion.
About the Author and Jackim Woods & Co.
Rich Jackim is an education industry investment banker, educational industry entrepreneur, and former mergers and acquisitions attorney.
For the last 25 years, Rich has been providing boutique investment banking services to middle-market companies in the education sector.
Rich also founded a successful training and certification company called the Exit Planning Institute which he sold to a private equity group in 2012.
Rich is also the author of the critically acclaimed book, The $10 Trillion Dollar Opportunity: Designing Successful Exit Strategies for Middle Market Businesses.
Jackim Woods & Co offers skilled mergers and acquisitions advisory services to privately owned schools, colleges, and EdTech companies in both sell-side and buy-side transactions. Jackim Woods & Co has arranged over 100 successful transactions, ranging from less than one million to more than eighty million dollars in value.
If you own an education-related business and are interested in exploring your options, I would welcome an opportunity to speak with you. Feel free to contact me at 224-513-5142 or rjackim@jackimwoods.com.
