Nordic EdTech News #109: 2024-04-08
Your Week 12 - 14 update from the Nordic and Baltic EdTech ecosystem
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Hello and welcome to today’s Nordic EdTech News. Hope that you’re doing well!
After a quiet period since the beginning of the year, M&A activity has restarted with a bang over the last few weeks. Firstly, Keystone Education Group announced the acquisition of Finland-based education providers, Edunation and Asia Exchange (Link). The move “opens the door for millions of students to study opportunities in Asia, Europe, and Latin America” and accelerates Keystone’s growth into the Asia-Pacific region.
Furthermore, Denmark’s LMS365 confirmed it had bought Valuebeat, which helps businesses better understand what drives their company culture (Link). As a result, LMS 365 can further develop their engagement and performance platform to help customers “accurately measure the impact of people, culture, and engagement.”
Following the purchase, Valuebeat Founder, Nina Carøe, will join the LMS365 executive team as Chief Human Success Officer. I’m also delighted to confirm that Nina will be speaking at the Nordic EdTech Summit, where she’ll highlight how employee empowerment can be a significant business growth opportunity.
Whilst on acquisitions, Kirkbi, the investment company for the Lego founding family, has written down the value of BrainPOP, which it bought in 2022 (Link). The decision reflects lower growth at the learning platform following the end of US government funding during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Although the news has been widely covered elsewhere, Spotify’s move into elearning content is certainly one to watch and builds on the insight that many subscribers already consume such content through podcasts etc. Courses are only available to UK subscribers currently and feature content from partners including Skillshare and BBC Maestro. It’s an interesting move given the huge volume of video-based learning content already online but, of course, few providers have Spotify’s scale and reach to make it a success.
Look forward to meeting up with customers, friends and subscribers at SETT in Stockholm next week. Hit me up if you’re around and would like to catch up! Great to see that Georgi Dimitrov, head of the Digital Education unit at the European Commission, will be part of a great speaker line up in SETT’s new Nordic Track.
Applications are still open to join the Digital Education Accelerator 2024, a 6-month growth programme that’s part of the European Digital Education Hub. You’ll benefit from training and mentoring, testing in new markets, showcasing at a pan-European level and peer learning. Apply by 15th April. Full details here.
And finally, check out the Raise: EdTech bootcamp. It’s a series of seven 90 minute workshops to coach / prep you with everything you need to get a competitive edge in this fundraising market. Plus, you’ll get a guaranteed free spot at the EdTech Raise demo day on June 13th where you’ll meet the most active VC and impact funds in Europe. Applications via the above link before 22nd April.
Thanks as always for reading, Jonathan
News from Denmark
The Danish government presented a new agreement for folkeskolen, which adds technology understanding as a new subject to the school curriculum (Link). But the move has been criticised for not going far enough (Link).
Aarhus University: Students “must use AI for your thesis or bachelor's project.”
Danske Undervisningsforlag welcomed the new DKK 540 million investment for new books in the above agreement, but argued that more money is needed for teaching materials. (Link)
Research by Digitaliseringsstyrelsen concludes that popular gaming apps for children are harvesting large amounts of data for global tech giants. (Link)
Google's school solutions cost Danish municipalities DKK 15 per pupil. (Link)
Labster and OpenStax announce a new partnership to “expand equitable access to interactive science learning.” (Link)
Kim Bjørn Tiedemann of Lindhardt and Ringhof on some of the challenges around Unilogin and Single Sign-on. (Link)
Mark Abraham will become the new CEO of Shape Robotics, as current CEO, André Fehrn, returns to the CFO role. (Link)
How SKIDOS helps “improve students’ reading skills while having fun.” (Link)
UNIwise is planning to enter the Czech and Slovak markets (Link)
News from Estonia
Detailed feature in the Guardian reveals how a “deep embrace of the digital age” helped Estonia build the “best schools in Europe.”
The Good Deed Education Fund continues to support the work of Estonian education with private sector insight and investment. (Link)
Lauri Haav has been selected as the new head of kood/Jõhvi and will also lead the school’s international expansion. (Link)
News from Finland
Project grants are now available “for the development of digital learning environments in preschool and basic education.” Details here.
The Annie student support bot will be deployed in Catalan schools from this autumn following the first mSchoolsLab call. (Link)
GraphoGame is now available to users in Jamaica (Link) and Trinidad & Tobago (Link), thanks to financial support from local partners.
Insight from Sanoma suggests that Finnish upper secondary school teachers and students “ want to use printed learning material more than they currently can.” (Link)
News from Iceland
The Ministry of Culture and Trade has presented a plan to secure the Icelandic language’s digital future. (Link)
Interesting overview of Dr. Eythor Ivar Jonsson’s work building Akademias. (Link)
Bara tala are now working with pre-school teachers in 8 municipalities to develop customised online Icelandic courses. (Link)
News from Latvia
The "Exacto" team from Datorium came second at the EU Code Week hackathon in Brussels. (Link)
Edurio confirms new investment to accelerate its UK expansion (Link) as CEO, Ernest Jenavs, is named Chair of the Latvian Startup Association, Startin.LV (Link).
Turnover for the iPhone Photography School reaches €14 million. (Link)
News from Lithuania
STEAM Academy continues to scale internationally with 38 locations in Ireland and 11 schools in Chicago. (Link)
How Lukas Kaminskis and Turing College are “transforming tech education.” (Link)
A special badge has been developed to identify the solutions that have been tested through the national EdTech centre’s platform. (Link)
News from Norway
Almost one in three Norwegians have used AI at school, at work or for study in the past year. (Link)
Capeesh and its partners will offer digital Norwegian language training to immigrants and refugees across all of the country's 357 municipalities. (Link)
Fairsight have confirmed plans to sell their talent assessment solutions to Finnish customers. (Link)
Filiokus won an innovation award for their maths game, Cal & Bomba, at Spillprisen. (Link)
IKT Norge argues that AI should be a “separate subject in Norwegian schools.”
Inspera has now handled more than 20 million digital assessment submissions, with 7.2 million in the last year alone. (Link)
No Isolation has sold Komp, their tablet for the elderly. (Link)
News from Sweden
Astrid will join the NVIDIA Inception Programme for cutting-edge AI startups. (Link)
A new Nordic initiative between ILT Education, Bok-Makaren and Rights & Brands aims to spark a love for reading among children in libraries and pre-schools. (Link)
Learnster have launched a new AI service to “tailor unique learning experiences for each learner.” (Link)
Magma and Gleerups have started a collaboration to create “more learning opportunities in mathematics education.” (Link)
Meitner wins new agreements with Heby and Upplands Väsby municipalities.
Ridely launches a new AI Coach to offer personalised training programmes. (Link)
TicTac Learn has been recognised as a Core Challenger on the 2024 Fosway Group 9-Grid for digital learning. (Link)
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