Kitchener-based D2L, a global edtech leader that owns Brightspace, has announced the acquisition of H5P Group for its unique content creation technology. The Tech Factor catches up with the company about this and its latest AI product launch.
Kitchener-based D2L has announced the acquisition of H5P Group and has also launched a new AI product, called Lumi. D2L is the developer of Brightspace, a leading SaaS-based learning management system (LMS), as well as Open Courses, a MOOC. In addition to Canada, the company has offices in Australia, Brazil, Europe, Singapore, and the United States. H5P Group, with its team primarily based in Norway, has built content creation tools to enable educators develop interactive content. Its product is a plugin that already integrates with Brightspace, as well as other publishing systems like WordPress and Canvas.
The company announced the deal as worth about US$33M, with a price of US$25.6M on closing and further US$7.4M performance-linked payouts. Stephen Laster, the president of D2L, shared some more details with the The Tech Factor. He said that H5P Group will remain a dedicated product group within the company post the acquisition. Moreover, no changes are planned as of now for its executive team. H5P Group’s CEO, Svein-Tore Griff With, will report to Laster going forward. The company declined to disclose the revenue scale of both D2L and H5P group.
Laster also mentioned that H5P Group’s customer base is global. He added that acquisition helps bring more outstanding, highly personalized learning experiences to help improve learning outcomes for learners everywhere. [Tip: Read all about acquisitions in Canada in our daily tech news].
“We’re so excited to have H5P join D2L. Our mission has always been to bring outstanding, highly personalized learning experiences to everyone, and this is another big step toward that goal. The bottom line is D2L plus H5P accelerates scalable online learning and enhances student success.”
Stephen Laster, President of D2L
H5P acquisition to help drive better learning outcomes for the company
Founded in 2014, H5P Group has developed H5P, an open source platform for creating rich, interactive HTML5 content. The company has a suite of over 60 tools to augment interactive learning, live-engagement, and formative assessment. At this time, it has about 30 staff members, mostly in Norway, and claims to serve millions of educators in over 50 countries. D2L joins some other startups with Canada-Nordic ties; we wrote about Hostaway funding last year, which has links to Finland.
John Baker, the founder and CEO of D2L, said in the announcement that H5P had a steadily expanding base of recurring revenue. Regarding product synergies, Baker mentioned that H5P’s software would complement the Brightspace learning platform. He added that D2L was bullish on easy-to-use learning creation tools as they led to improved engagement & better outcomes. H5P’s model to build revenue scale in a sustainable and effective manner was in line with D2L’s growth & profitability approach.
“By working together, we think we can quicken the development and release dates of these products and improve creator features, opening up new market opportunities and taking the lead in the expanding interactive learning industry.”
John Baker, Founder and CEO of D2L
H5P Group’s CEO and founder Svein-Tore Griff With highlighted that D2L’s commitment to empowering users was important for them. He said:
“I am extremely excited to join D2L and to accelerate the vision of H5P. Together, we will help more educators around the world create better interactive content faster, leading to stronger learning outcomes.”
Svein-Tore Griff With, Founder and CEO of H5P Group
Launches D2L Lumi, its new artificial intelligence (AI)-powered feature
Simultaneously, the company also launched Lumi, a new artificial intelligence based feature. The idea is to give users additional options for quickly creating quality & engaging learner-centred learning experiences. Despite 79% of educators embracing ChatGPT, the company believes that tech isn’t being built specifically for educators or with pedagogy in mind. As a side note, ChatGPT creator OpenAI was under investigation by Canadian government. D2L interviewed 12 customers and built Lumi with the customer and their learners in mind.
The product includes: Lumi Quiz, Lumi Idea, Lumi Practice and Lumi Chat. As the names suggest, they add functionalities for educators to add quiz questions, see suggestions, practice questions and generate FAQs. D2L Lumi was unveiled at D2L’s 2024 Fusion Conference, an annual event with over 1,000 edtech thought leaders and clients.
The company claims Lumi was developed with data governance, as well as privacy in mind from the beginning. It also shared the positive feedback from early users. To demonstrate, Jordan O’Connell, Professor at Northwest Iowa Community College, was impressed with Lumi’s speed. Another was Elizabeth Pearsall, Assistant Provost at the American College of Financial Services, who liked the ease-of-use and accuracy of the product. Laster said Brightspace will integrate Lumi into all of its major products in coming months to improve daily processes and save time.
D2L, originally called Desire2Learn, is a public corporation and trades on the Toronto Stock Echange (TSX) and went public in November 2021. Baker founded the company in 1999 while he was a student at the University of Waterloo. In 2017, Canada awarded him the Meritorious Service Cross in recognition of his efforts at the company to promote education both domestically and internationally.
