With the acquisition of Market Motive, VC-backed Simplilearn aims to augment its offerings in the booming digital marketing field
Market Motive Co-founder Michael Stebbins (left) and Simplilearn Co-founder Krishna Kumar
Bangalore-based e-learning company Simplilearn has acquired Market Motive, a Silicon Valley-based digital marketing training company, for US$10 million.
With this acquisition, Simplilearn augments its offerings in the booming digital marketing field —where the global digital advertising spend is projected to reach US$278 billion in 2019 — with courses in social media marketing, digital advertising web analytics and marketing automation.
Turnkey solution for professionals and students
The merged company, which has already helped more than 400,000 professionals in over 150 countries see US$4 billion worth of pay raises, is turning its attention to an expanded presence in the US, where it can offer a turnkey solution to working professionals and college graduates who are trying to advance in their careers.
Post the acquisition, Market Motive will continue to operate as an independent arm of Simplilearn, with its Co-founder Michael Stebbins staying on as CEO along with his entire team. Stebbins will also join Simplilearn as the Chief Innovation Officer and work alongside the company’s Director of US operations, Prashant Parmar, in strengthening Simplilearn’s presence further in North America.
“Our focus continues to (be about) providing a wide range of short-term certification-based courses that have a direct impact on the learners’ career,” said Krishna Kumar, Founder & CEO of Simplilearn.
“The digital marketing ecosystem is at a tipping point and this is the right time for us to expand our products in this hot segment. We are impressed with Market Motive’s enriched content and domain expertise backed by industry experts apart from their approach towards online training, which fits strongly with our business strategy,” he added.
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About the firms
Market Motive was co-founded in 2007 by Michael Stebbins, John Marshall and Avinash Kaushik. It builds curriculum that trains professionals on digital marketing, and has delivered web-based certification programs to Fortune 500 companies, including Microsoft, Home Depot, Dell, Ogilvy, Federal Express and JP Morgan Chase, and education institutes like Duke University, Benedictine University and Concordia University. The courses and certification provide authoritative cross training in search engine optimisation (SEO), web analytics, social media marketing, conversion optimisation, mobile marketing, and content marketing.
Simplilearn is an e-learning company that caters to professionals across industries and functions.
With courses spanning vendors, industries and platforms, Simplilearn has a catalog of over 250 online courses across industries and functions. With a large India-based back office that operates 24X7, Simplilearn handholds a customer right from enrolling into an online course to getting industry-recognised certificate in hand. Till date, the company has trained over 400,000 professionals across 150-plus countries, led by over 2,000 qualified trainers.
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In April 2015, Simplilearn raised US$15 million in Series C funding led by Mayfield, with participation from Kalaari Capital and Helion Venture Partners, to expand rapidly in the US and other primary markets.
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