Nordic EdTech News #43 : 2021-05-24
Your Week 19 and 20 update from the Nordic & Baltic EdTech ecosystem
Hello and welcome to this latest issue of Nordic EdTech News! Firstly, a big thank you to all the new subscribers who have signed up in the last few weeks. It’s great to have you on board and it’s really encouraging to see how much global interest there is in all things Nordic EdTech!
On that subject, congratulations to Labster and Yousician for their inclusion in the GSV Edtech 150 (Link). This global list highlights the “most transformational growth companies in digital learning”, so it’s good to see two of our leading companies recognised for their achievements over the last 12 months. Congratulations also to imagiLabs and School Day who are included in this year's Elite 200, a list of semifinalists in the GSV Cup. These 200 businesses are identified as the leading global “pre-seed and seed startups” in EdTech (Link).
It is, however, evident from both of the above lists that there’s some way to go before the Nordic and the wider European EdTech ecosystems can really challenge the global dominance of China, India and the US. One encouraging step forward in this mission is the formal launch of the European Edtech Alliance on 8th June 2021. Full details of the event and the great speaker line-up here. Nordic national EdTech associations and clusters are playing a key role in this really important initiative, so please do attend and show your support!
The biggest funding news from the last two weeks saw Finland’s Howspace close a €12M Series A funding round led by Forestay Capital and Inventure (Link). The investment will fuel the international expansion of this social learning platform in North America and Central Europe.
Next Monday’s Nordic EdTech News Interview will be with Annely Tank, CEO of EdTech Estonia, and I’m really looking forward to talking with her about Estonia’s digital innovation and transformation. To whet your appetite, this recording of a recent webinar from the Jõhvi Coding School is well worth a watch. It features the Estonian President, Kersti Kaljulaid, and Co-founder of Wise, Taavet Hinrikus.
If you missed last week’s interview with Jamie Poolton of Showbie, you can read it in full here. The Nordic educator films from Showbie’s Learning RedefinED virtual event last week are also available here.
Understanding the educator’s perspective is, of course, essential for many EdTechs, so this new report from Denmark’s Agency for IT and Learning makes particularly interesting reading. It reviews the “digital life” of Danish school teachers and highlights significant differences in how much teachers use and value digital tools. Although nearly 70% of teachers surveyed agreed that digital resources did support their work, 40% felt that the selection of digital teaching tools was too small. A similar percentage felt that they derived little value from their learning platforms.
As always, do let me know if you’ve got any feedback or a story to include in a future issue of this newsletter by emailing hello@10digits.org. Sharing this email with your network is also much appreciated!
Best regards, Jonathan
News from Denmark
Students at Aarhus University find serious vulnerabilities in nine widely used apps. (Danish)
Labster publish a detailed case study showing the impact of their solution on students at San José State University (Link) and launch resources in Italian. (Link)
Shape Robotics sign agreement with Lekolar to sell their Fable robot system to educational institutions across the Nordics. (Dan)
News from Estonia
Drops launch a new series on their YouTube channel called Bite Sized Learning. (Link)
Take a virtual tour of three amazing Estonian schools! (Link)
Useful summary of the EdTech companies underpinning Estonian education. (Link)
Interesting research from Tallinn University on how to sustain EdTech-led innovation in the classroom. (Link)
Register now for EdTest Estonia 2021. Further details here.
News from Finland
Great piece in EdTechX360 on “Finland’s Education System and their Unique Approach to EdTech Product Development”. (Link)
Carrot Kitchen close €500k pre-seed round to fund UK expansion. (Link)
Good to see Eduten’s growth continuing to accelerate - they’ll soon pass 150 million answers on the platform. (Link)
Elias Robot named ‘Best In Class’ at IMPACT EdTech’s ‘Remote Schooling’ accelerator. Great news! (Link)
Funzi support their move into D2C space with new content featuring top tips and career / life advice. (Link)
Nolwenture have launched OppiPlay Primary, a free web application for teachers and parents to easily create / share lessons and follow pupils' progress. (Link)
Kide Science founder, Sari Hurme-Mehtälä, outlines how they help “make science accessible to everyone.” (Link)
Reactored announce collaboration with Arffman to provide Finnish language learning services. (Finnish)
News from Iceland
Fascinating virtual conference on Reykjavík's approach to innovation in education and teaching. (Icelandic)
News from Latvia
Latvian teachers develop their computer programming skills (Link) as the Computer for Every Child initiative finally gets going. (Lat)
Edurio launch a Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Summit for schools - scheduled for 21 June 2021. (Link)
The Raccoons launch a new video series introducing STEM and digital careers. (Lat)
News from Lithuania
New EdTech resource platform and national Competence Centre is now under discussion as Government plans pandemic response. (Lith)
The National Agency for Education extends their list of recommended digital teaching resources. (Lith)
Code Academy Kids and Edukraftas partner up to develop new Minecraft Mars Mission resources for students. (Link)
TAMO Group make app available for free until the end of June. 10,000 users sign up on the first day. (Lith)
News from Norway
Industry bodies express disappointment that there’s no new money for school books or teaching resources in the national budget. (Link)
New review raises concerns about student privacy when using leading Norwegian EdTech resources. (Link)
The Kahoot! mobile app won a 2021 Webby People’s Voice Award (Link) as it’s revealed the business raised $206 million to fund the recent acquisition of US EdTech, Clever. (Link)
Ludenso leads the way with investors at recent Startup Norway ‘Creative Startups Roundtable’ event. (Link)
Revenues more than double at No Isolation - up to NOK 56.6M in 2020. (Link)
Showbie announce new additions to their Norway-based Nordic team. (Link)
News from Sweden
Akribian launch their research-based maths game, Count on me!, on the AppStore in both Sweden and the UK. (Swe)
Astrid Education signs new content deal with video on demand platform, WaterBear Network. (Link)
Humly continues to expand with acquisition of UK-based teaching agency, Supply Teaching Ltd. (Link)
Katarina Blomqvist has been appointed publishing director at Natur & Kultur with responsibility for teaching resources. (Swe)
Meitner raises a further SEK 5.8M from a group of angel investors. (Swe)
Great speakers at Sana Labs’ forthcoming ‘Frontiers of Learning’ event on 9th June. Full details here.
Swedish Edtest and the Swedish Edtech Industry form Sweden's first research accelerator for EdTech, working with UK-based Educate. (Swe)
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