Digital capabilities have continued to evolve and permeate the education landscape, moving the sector to redefine the learning experience, personalising instruction and student development, and better managing engagement and performance across students of all ages. Over the past two years, education technology enablers have been expanding their reach and driving digital transformation.

Jason Nordlicht, Vice President at GP Bullhound, commented: “As trusted advisors to technology entrepreneurs and founder-owned businesses, we keep a pulse on the latest trends impacting the education landscape, from early childhood to professional learning. We continue to build out our US-based EdTech practice, following our success with the sale of Busuu to Chegg and Lingoda’s growth investment from Summit Partners.”

Major trends moving the market

Asynchronous learning
By giving students the ability to practice self-sufficiency and time management skills, asynchronous learning allows them to adopt a more direct, hands-on role in their education.

Adaptive learning and artificial intelligence
With 99% of US educators believing that AI is crucial to an institution’s competitiveness, it’s no surprise that the education sector is one of the top areas where AI is driving growth and innovation.

Augmented reality, virtual reality, and immersive learning
Global education spending on AR/VR is expected to grow from $1.8bn in 2018 to $12.6bn in 2025 at a 32% CAGR. Key growth drivers include digital devices, enhanced software and demonstrable efficacy.

Gamification and game-based learning
The global game-based learning market was valued at $6.9bn in 2021 and is projected to reach $15.8bn by 2025, growing at a 23% CAGR, as educators turn to gamified and game-based tools to boost student motivation and learning achievement.

Professional licensing, upskilling, and micro-credentialing
With the education sector readjusting to increasing digitisation of learning and life post-pandemic, professionals are looking for ways to upskill and remain competitive in today’s evolving professional environment.

Cybersecurity, particularly within primary and secondary schools
As schools turn to technology, devices and digitisation, their vulnerability to cybercrime grows. Secure digital infrastructure and adequate staff training will continue to develop as digital learning progresses.

Social media and collaboration platforms
Social media has strong implications for deepening education and benefitting both students and teachers due to its breadth of reach and variety of ways in which it can be utilised across the board.

Enquiries
For enquiries, please contact:
Jason Nordlicht, Vice President, at jason.nordlicht@gpbullhound.com

About GP Bullhound
GP Bullhound is a leading technology advisory and investment firm, providing transaction advice and capital to the world’s best entrepreneurs and founders. Founded in 1999 in London and Menlo Park, the firm today has 12 offices spanning Europe, the US and Asia. For more information, please visit www.gpbullhound.com.

“With Log4j, ransomware, and nation-state attacks, governmental institutions have never been so exposed,” says Marten Mickos, CEO of HackerOne. “As attack surfaces grow, so does the gap between what digital assets organizations own and what they can protect. HackerOne is closing that gap and keeping its customers out of harm’s way in a way that no other mechanism can accomplish. In the past 12 months, we have identified over 17,000 high or critical vulnerabilities for our customers that could otherwise have been gaping holes for adversaries to enter through. To fuel our accelerating growth, we welcome GP Bullhound as our newest investor with their experience in supporting the most significant names in the global technology world.”

Per Roman, Managing Partner at GP Bullhound, said: “HackerOne is revolutionising the way in which companies reduce their risk of a breach. By leveraging the world’s biggest community of ethical hackers, who have the power and willingness to prevent cyberattacks, and coupling it with H1’s proprietary software, HackerOne is bringing a service to customers that no other vendor can match. GP Bullhound’s investment in this pioneering category leader is our contribution to securing the online world.”

The capital for this financing round was provided across GP Bullhound’s funds. Recent investments include Whoop, Patreon, DuckDuckGo, Discord, Revolut and Klarna among others.

Enquiries
For enquiries, please contact:
Hampus Hellermark, Principal, at hampus.hellermark@gpbullhound.com

About GP Bullhound
GP Bullhound is a leading technology advisory and investment firm, providing transaction advice and capital to the world’s best entrepreneurs and founders. Founded in 1999 in London and Menlo Park, the firm today has 10 offices spanning Europe, the US and Asia. For more information, please visit www.gpbullhound.com.

In a world where healthcare is more complex, global and urgent than ever, there is a clear need to improve efficiency throughout the ecosystem. Definitive Healthcare is a crucial part of solving this need with their cloud-based intelligence platform. Whether you want to increase your sales, develop marketing campaigns or find experts for clinical trials, Definitive’s platform will help you.

GP Bullhound Fund IV became a shareholder in Definitive Healthcare when they acquired Monocl, the leading subscription-based provider of medical and scientific expert data and insights. GP Bullhound Fund IV invested in Monocl in 2019 and has been an active shareholder ever since, as a member of the board, supporting the company through its internationalisation and strategic choices.

Joakim Dal, Partner at GP Bullhound, commented: “The whole healthcare industry is working in a more data-driven way. Definitive, and of course Monocl which we invested in originally, are leading this change. I would like to congratulate Jason Krantz, Björn Carlsson, and the rest of the team for this successful milestone. We are proud to be shareholders in this exceptional business.”

Enquiries
For enquiries, please contact Joakim Dal, Partner, at joakim.dal@gpbullhound.com

About GP Bullhound
GP Bullhound is a leading technology advisory and investment firm, providing transaction advice and capital to the world’s best entrepreneurs and founders. Founded in 1999 in London and Menlo Park, the firm today has 10 offices spanning Europe, the US and Asia. For more information, please visit www.gpbullhound.com

At GP Bullhound we believe in a continued awareness and focus on wellness, as consumers increasingly prioritise their health – with sleep becoming an integral part of the discussion. By giving users a deeper understanding of their sleep, Whoop unlocks a plethora of insights that can be used to enhance sleep quality and overall recovery.

The company has experienced hyper growth over the last couple of years, as consumers look for real-time actionable feedback on how their lifestyle choices impact their overall health, and embrace the subscription-based model. On top of this, many high profile professional athletes such as Patrick Mahomes, Steph Curry and Rory Mcllory, have started to embrace technology, as competition between the world’s best athletes is getting stiffer.

“I am in love with the Whoop software application!” said Per Roman, Managing Partner at GP Bullhound.

“Many of us at GP Bullhound have been experimenting with Whoop and other sleep and fitness wearables over the last couple of years. It became clear that in terms of being a software differentiated hardware company Whoop is far ahead of its competitors. The best technology products are able to provide an insightful user experience from minimal energy input. That is also why we believe that changing long term habits such as sleep, fitness and diet requires a hardware component to process and analyse data. Whoop is one of those rare products that have a real and beautiful impact on your life. Fun fact, 12 month retention at GP Bullhound is +65%,” added Hampus Hellermark, Associate at GP Bullhound.

GP Bullhound invested through Fund V, following other recent investments including DuckDuckGo, Discord, Vivino, Glovo, Lingokids, Wallapop, Sesamy, Elias and MariaDB.

Enquiries
For enquiries, please contact:
Alon Kuperman, Executive Director, alon.kuperman@gpbullhound.com
Hampus Hellermark, Associate, hampus.hellermark@gpbullhound.com

About GP Bullhound
GP Bullhound is a leading technology advisory and investment firm, providing transaction advice and capital to the world’s best entrepreneurs and founders. Founded in 1999 in London and Menlo Park, the firm today has 10 offices spanning Europe, the US and Asia. For more information, please visit www.gpbullhound.com

WHOOP, the human performance company, provides a membership for 24/7 coaching to improve health. The WHOOP membership comes with free hardware, a coaching platform designed to optimize your behavior, and a community of high performers. WHOOP members include professional athletes, Fortune 500 CEOs, fitness enthusiasts, military personnel, frontline workers and anyone looking to improve their performance. Studies show WHOOP can positively change behavior, increase sleep, and improve physiological biomarkers. Founded in 2012, WHOOP is based in Boston. Visit whoop.com for more information

Launched in 2016, Lingokids is the playlearning™ app for children between 2 and 8 years old, helping more than 30 million families to expand their children’s vocabulary, improve their literacy skills, and develop important social and emotional skills in a fun, 100% safe, ad-free environment.

Lingokids is dedicated to supporting parents in their child’s learning journey, giving them a parents portal featuring each child’s progress with weekly reports, curriculum overviews, activity timeline, as well as advice and tips for parents’ everyday lives through its Parents Community.

The funding will be used for further international expansion, development of new and engaging forms of content for kids, as well as global hiring, especially for the platform engineering and development teams. Lingokids has raised USD65m to date, reaching a positive EBITDA in 2020.

Cristóbal Viedma, CEO and Founder of Lingokids, said: “High quality, education options that parents can trust are more important than ever. With these new funds and support from GP Bullhound and all of our strategic investors, Lingokids will be able to reach millions more families to help young children learn through the most impactful type of education there is at this age: play.”

Per Roman, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at GP Bullhound, added: “The pandemic has accelerated the digitalisation of education and we are seeing a huge momentum in the edtech sector. With this new investment we are proud to support Cristóbal Viedma and the great team at Lingokids on their mission to break down educational barriers and create equal opportunities for children across the globe.”

GP Bullhound invested through Fund V, following other recent investments including Glovo, Wallapop, Discord, Sesamy, Vivino, Elias, DuckDuckGo and MariaDB. 

Enquiries
For enquiries, please contact Carlos de la Esperanza, Associate, at carlos.delaesperanza@gpbullhound.com

About GP Bullhound
GP Bullhound is a leading technology advisory and investment firm, providing transaction advice and capital to the world’s best entrepreneurs and founders. Founded in 1999 in London and Menlo Park, the firm today has 10 offices spanning Europe, the US and Asia. For more information, please visit www.gpbullhound.com