Most of the recent focus on educational IT supplier UniServity has been the selection of its product, Connected Learning Community, for BECTA’s Learning Platform Framework Agreement. The recent £2.4m investment by Quester Capital Management was UniServity’s first institutional fundraising. According to Quester, the money will be used as working capital ‘to consolidate its market leading position in the UK and support its overseas expansion’. The target markets listed for UniServity’s possible expansion include the USA, Australia, China, Thailand and the Middle East.

News of Quester’s investment comes soon after UniServity’s announcement of a strategic partnership with Pearson (Pearson Learning Platform), its listing in The Sunday Times Techtrack 100 and its appointment of Stephen Heppell as Chair of its blue sky thinking reference group. Both Pearson’s product and UniServity’s are accredited for BECTA's Learning Platform Services Framework, yet are based on the same product.

Maybe this isn’t unusual when you hear so many IT suppliers privately fulminating about BECTA’s capricious decision-making processes. One small IT firm who seriously disagree with BECTA are Alpha Learning who have lodged a complaint with the EC via their lawyers TaylorWessing. We doubt Alpha’s claims will succeed, but it has already made it clear that local authorities who use the BECTA framework to enter into contracts may find these are invalidated if their complaint is upheld.
www.alphalearning.co.uk

www.quester.co.uk

www.uniservity.com