No financial details have been publicly disclosed but it is believed Marlin has paid in or around €180 million to acquire the majority stake from Carlyle Cardinal Ireland (CCI). This is above the €160 million it was reportedly looking for. CCI is a €300 million fund co-managed by the Carlyle Group and Irish asset manager Cardinal Capital. It acquired a controlling stake in Learning Pool in 2016, reportedly paying out an initial £20 million in investment. Since that investment, Learning Pool has experienced dramatic growth as revenue has increased four-fold during this time mainly on the back of a series of acquisitions, including Remote Learner, a US-headquartered learning management system provider, which it bought last year. The e-learning company has more than 1,100 customers and claims over five million “active learners” globally. Employing about 200 people, the company’s clients include the National Health Service, the FA, Intercontinental Hotels Group, Sky, Swiss Re, Centerparcs, Unicef, Ofcom and Dell.
Learning Pool recorded revenues of £18.1 million for the 12 months ending April 2020, up 32 per cent on the prior year, with earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (ebitda) of £5 million. It said last August that it expected to continue to grow on the back of a rise in demand for online learning resulting from the Covid crisis. Bowmark Capital and ECI Partners are also believed to have tabled bids for the e-learning company. Marlin, a global investment firm with over $7.6 billion of capital under management, is headquartered in California and has completed over 180 acquisitions since inception. Among the companies it has backed are Allbridge, Prologic and VantagePoint.