Learning Technologies (LTG) has announced the proposed acquisition of Open LMS from Blackboard for $31.7m (£24.3m). This is to be funded by the group’s existing cash and bank facilities. The group notes that the deal brings it a strong foundation in the “high value Moodle market”. Moodle is an acronym for ‘modular object-oriented dynamic learning environment’ – constituting a free and open source learning management system (LMS) for teaching, distance education and other e-learning projects in schools, universities and workplaces.
The Open LMS purchase supports LTG’s goal of achieving run-rate revenues of £200m and run-rate adjusted operating profits of at least £55m by the end of 2021. For the year ending December, it saw unaudited revenues of about $16m. Seventy per cent of Open LMS’s revenues comes from recurring subscription feeds. The acquisition is expected to complete within 30 days.
