ForSkills acquires Guroo to further strengthen its lead position in the post-16 e-learning market

Oct. 28, 2014 - PRLog -- ForSkills has acquired Guroo to consolidate and further strengthen its lead position in the post-16 student-centric e-learning market and to become the supplier of choice in maths, English and ICT Functional Skills and GCSE support. Combined, the two companies boast a comprehensive portfolio of over 10,000 content items, a 25% share of UK colleges and 30% share of the training provider market. Both companies will continue to trade under their respective brands, with Guroo being a wholly owned subsidiary of ForSkills.

Prior to the acquisition, ForSkills was ranked the second largest UK provider of diagnostics and e-learning resources for English, maths and ICT Functional Skills.  Formed in 2005, ForSkills’ virtual learning environment and SkillBuilder diagnostic assessment software is used by hundreds of training organisations, including the largest, such as learndirect, Babcock and Capita, as well as FE colleges including Ealing, Hammersmith and West London, LESOCO, Derby, Barnsley and Hugh Baird. In the past 12 months over 300,000 learners have been registered on ForSkill’s online platform and 1.4 million assessments delivered. ForSkills also supplies assessments for the National Numeracy Challenge (http://www.nnchallenge.org.uk/) – an initiative dedicated to helping adults learn the maths needed for everyday life – which is the subject of the Tonight programme: “Trouble with Numbers” aired on ITV on 30 October. ForSkills products can be used across a range of platforms from computers to mobile devices.

Guroo customers of note include awarding bodies OCR and City & Guilds, training providers NLTG, CT Skills, Kaplan and HTP, and a selection of colleges including Chesterfield, Myrescough, Oldham, and Haringey.

Content from both companies will be combined on the same technical platform enabling ForSkills customers to access the Guroo content, in particular GCSE assessment and diagnostic software, plus more than 60 tutorial videos.  Guroo customers will benefit from access to additional tracking and recording facilities.  All customers will benefit from a larger on-going development programme delivered by a highly experienced management team comprising Pauline Paley, chairman and founding director of ForSkills; Carl Gibson, commercial and founding director of ForSkills; Myles Ponsonby, technical and founding director of ForSkills and Jonathan Wells, marketing director and former founder and managing director of Guroo.

Commenting on the acquisition, Pauline Paley, chairman, said, “Improving the maths and English skills of the workforce is high on the Government’s agenda and we will be well placed to assist with this aspiration in a very efficient manner.”