Nordic EdTech News #115: 2024-07-01
Your Week 25 - 26 update from the Nordic and Baltic EdTech ecosystem
Hello and welcome to today’s Nordic EdTech News. It’s been a pretty quiet couple of weeks as summer holidays get underway across our region, but there’s still plenty to update you on.
Let’s start with a quick update on the ongoing Chromebook saga in Denmark (Link). KL, the municipalities’ association, has now submitted relevant documentation to the Danish Data Protection Authority - this, it believes, will enable pupils in schools to “use Google Chromebooks after the summer holidays.” Their press release is also notable for two other key reasons - firstly because it reveals that Google has “committed itself not to process data for the purposes that the Data Protection Authority does not find to be justified in Danish law.” And that “the problems are far from solved” as Kl calls again for government legislation.
News from Estonia highlights a more positive direction as their Ministry of Education launches an AI council to introduce AI into schools (Link). The move aims to achieve their strategic goal of implementing “a personalised education paradigm in Estonian schools.” The ministry is also looking at running courses for teachers and students to share and embed best practice.
Whilst in Estonia, their students came top in Europe (and 6th globally) for the PISA 2022 Creative Thinking test (Link). Great to see Finland, Denmark and Latvia also in the global top ten!
One further point on PISA - Skolverket, the Swedish National Agency for Education, released research showing that 15-year-olds who use digital tools for learning at school a few hours a day have higher results in PISA 2022, compared to students who do so rarely or lots. Those who use digital tools for things other than learning, both at school and at home, have worse results.
In a quiet fortnight for investment and M&A updates, the news that TicTac Group has acquired Skillhabit stands out as a notable development (Link). Skillhabit offers customers a platform that leverages AI “to simplify and accelerate the creation and delivery of learning experiences.” The integration into TicTac’s wider portfolio is described as “a strategic move towards cutting-edge AI-driven digital learning.”
Congratulations also to Skolon, who have been listed in The Deloitte EMEA Fast 500 (Link). This objective industry ranking “identifies and recognises the fastest-growing technology companies across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.”
Oliver Lundgren, Skolon’s CEO, is one of the amazing EdTech leaders speaking at the Nordic EdTech Summit I’m organising in Skellefteå, Sweden at the end of August. To hear his playbook for driving their international growth journey, get your ticket today!
Don’t miss an exclusive VC Panel at the Summit, where Europe’s leading VCs will be sharing their expert advice. The Summit also offers a unique platform to network with them plus other top-tier industry leaders and potential partners.
I’m also delighted to confirm that Maria Spies, Co-CEO at HolonIQ will be presenting virtually at the Summit. She’ll be sharing some of their trademark global impact intelligence as well as announcing the Nordic Baltic 50, HolonIQ's annual list of the most promising EdTech startups from our region.
This forms part of their Global EdTech 1000 Series, which identifies leading EdTech startups from different regions around the world. Applications to enter are now open - full details and eligibility criteria are available here.
And finally, the Helsinki-based UNICEF Global Learning Innovation Hub has opened applications to join its first cohort of Blue Unicorns. These are defined as EdTech solutions “with the potential to improve the learning outcomes of 100 million children.” If that’s you, then you’ll find full details on how to apply here.
I’ll be taking a break for a few weeks, so the next full newsletter will be published on 2nd August 2024. I’ll cover any breaking stories on LinkedIn, so do follow updates there!
Happy Birthday, Archie! ❤️❤️
Have a great summer! Best, Jonathan
News from Denmark
The government and a number of children / youth organisations have formed an alliance that will work for better child protection in the digital universe. (Link)
Publishers warn that the Nota service is giving away access to books “free of charge to so many students that there are books the publishers can no longer afford to publish.” (Link)
Proemial was the only Nordic EdTech included in Emerge Education’s list of the “Top 40 higher education companies you need to know about”. (Link - full detail published 2nd July)
Mark Abraham, CEO at Shape Robotics, held a Q+A to address recent negative press coverage about their share price and business model. (Link)
News from Estonia
News from Finland
Concern raised by MPs about access to quality teaching materials in primary and secondary education. (Link)
Finland International School sets up its third campus in India. (Link)
GraphoGame is now being widely used in Greenland after developing it with the Ministry for Education, Culture, Sports and the Church of Greenland. (Link)
Helsinki Education Hub will reopen in August. (Link)
Kide Science has been named as an approved preschool curriculum resource for the US state of Missouri. (Link)
Kwizie took part in a recent pilot project, led by the City of Helsinki, to support people in their transition from social services to employment or education. (Link)
Moi Panda won the Mission-Driven category at the EdTechX Awards. (Link)
How TEKLA, the mobile EdTech testbed, helps EdTech companies test and co-develop new products. (Link)
Valamis, together with its Norwegian partner, Task, has been selected by the Norwegian Customs Office, Tolletaten, as their LMS provider. (Link)
News from Iceland
More than 500 new courses have been created in the last few weeks using Atlas Primer. (Link)
News from Latvia
Further government investment announced (€25 million) to provide laptops to teachers and students - around 30,000 devices will be purchased. (Link)
News from Lithuania
Finland’s xEdu will work with Lithuania’s Civitta to grow / support startups through a new EdTech Accelerator. (Link)
EditAI has been named Lithuania’s Startup of the Year 2024. (Link)
Tech Philomaths reports that Corepetitus, Memby and Turing College all moved into profitability last year. (Link)
News from Norway
Cal & Bomba, a maths game from Filiokus, has been nominated for a GEE! Learning Game Award in the People's Choice category. (Link)
Inspera signs an agreement with Edutech to resell their solutions across India. (Link)
Kahoot! earned the ICEIE Gold certification recognising its “evidence-based learning solutions that deliver positive outcomes for students’ learning.” (Link)
Ludenso confirmed a new partnership with Karger Publishing (Link) and there’s a recording of their recent“Future of Textbooks in the Age of AI” webinar here.
Interesting podcast featuring Karen Dolva, Founder of No Isolation, talking about launching and growing the business. (Link)
Users of We Are Learning can now create content in Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian. (Link)
News from Sweden
The government commissions Skolverket to collect detailed statistics “on how much principals spend on textbooks and other learning tools such as computers.”
According to new research, only 5% of Swedish companies currently offer employees training on AI. (Link)
Graduates from Påhlmans Handelsinstitut will now receive secure, digital course certificates from TRUE. (Link)
Meitner’s 2023 results show improved revenues of SEK 900k (SEK 103k in 2022) but widening losses of SEK 10.2 million kroner vs SEK 9.5 million in 2022. (Link)
FullStack HR has a good roundup of Sana’s “mission to transform knowledge access” as the business launches a Summer 2024 release.
Good to see TechSverige and SKR highlight the importance of having a national strategy for school digitization. (Link)
Thanks for reading this newsletter. If you think that your colleagues and wider network would find it useful, please share it with them!