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I’ve updated the spreadsheet where I’m tracking on this year's ed-tech investment. Here are JSON files for startup funding (broken down by investors), acquisitions, and mergers.

It’s only been a month since I reviewed Q1 2015’s ed-tech investment data, but with the acquisition of Lynda.com by LinkedIn this month, I thought all this was worth revisiting – particularly since the crack reporters at Pando wondered if that would “kill the ed tech space.”

For what it’s worth – according to my record-keeping at least, investment was up just slightly in April over March. (But both are down from January and February when massive investments in Lynda.com ($186 million), SoFi ($200 million), and 17zuoye ($100 million) certainly skewed the numbers).

Perhaps the most interesting story to watch this year is the growing number of acquisitions – big deals not just in terms of the dollar figures but in terms of the brands involved. In April, LinkedIn bought Lynda.com for $1,500,000,000, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt paid $575,000,000 for most of Scholastic’s ed-tech business. These are the largest acquisitions of the year, topping Rakuten's acquisition of Overdrive for $410,000,000 and Pluralsight's acquisition of Code School for $36,000,000.

Among 2015’s Biggest Ed-Tech Investments So Far:

  1. Social Finance ($200,000,000)
  2. Lynda.com ($186,000,000)
  3. 17zuoye ($100,000,000)
  4. Yuantiku ($60,000,000)
  5. NetDragon Education ($52,500,000)
  6. Genshuixue ($50,000,000)
  7. Instructure ($40,000,000)
  8. FiftyThree ($30,000,000)
  9. GuideSpark ($22,200,000)
  10. XueXiBao ($20,000,000)

(As you can see half of the top funding rounds so far this year have gone to Chinese online education companies.)

Among 2015’s Most Active Investors So Far:

  1. Kapor Capital
  2. 500 Startups
  3. Deborah Quazzo
  4. Great Oaks Ventures
  5. New Schools Venture Fund

Download the data, and devise your own analysis. The GitHub repository is here.

Audrey Watters


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The History of the Future of Education Technology

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