Skillsoft is an American educational technology company that produces

learning management system A learning management system (LMS) is a software application for the administration, documentation, tracking, reporting, automation, and delivery of educational courses, training programs, materials or learning and development programs. The lear ...

software and content.

History

Skillsoft was founded by Charles Moran in 1998. Moran served as Chief Executive Officer and President from 1998 to 2015. Skillsoft had an

IPO An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

under the stock symbol SKIL in February 2000 and a SPO in July 2001. In June 2021, Skillsoft became a publicly traded company once again under the same stock symbol. Skillsoft acquired Books24x7 in 2001. In 2002, Skillsoft merged with Dublin based IT courseware company SmartForce (formerly CBT Systems), with the combined company retaining the Skillsoft name, establishing a common headquarters in Ireland. The company acquired NETg from

Thomson Corporation The Thomson Corporation was one of the world's largest information companies. It was established in 1989 following a merger between International Thomson Organisation Ltd (ITOL) and Thomson Newspapers. In 2008, it purchased Reuters Group to fo ...

in 2007. In May 2010, the company was bought out for $1.2 billion by SSI Investments III Limited, a firm funded by

Berkshire Partners Berkshire Partners is an American private equity firm based in Boston. It has invested in over 100 middle market companies since 1986 through nine investment funds with aggregate capital commitments of more than $16 billion. Berkshire has devel ...

Advent International Advent International is a global private equity firm focused on buyouts of companies in Western and Central Europe, North America, Latin America and Asia. The firm focuses on international buyouts, growth and strategic restructuring in five core ...

and

Bain Capital Bain Capital is an American private investment firm based in Boston. It specializes in private equity, venture capital, credit, public equity, impact investing, life sciences, and real estate. Bain Capital invests across a range of industry se ...

. Skillsoft acquired Element K from

NIIT NIIT Limited ''(National Institute of Information Technology)'' is an Indian Multinational corporation, multinational Training and development, skills and talent development corporation headquartered in Gurgaon, India. The company was set u ...

in October 2011, and

MindLeaders MindLeaders was an e-learning and organizational development company with a global headquarters in Dublin, Ireland and offices in the UK, US, South Africa and Australia which has been described by Bersin as a "global e-learning player" along with ...

from ThirdForce Group in September 2012. Skillsoft was sold by Berkshire Partners to

Charterhouse Capital Partners Charterhouse Capital Partners is a London based private equity investment firm focused on investing in European mid-market companies valued between €200m and €1.5bn. The company targets investments across the services, healthcare, specialis ...

for $2.0 Billion on April 28, 2014. Later that year, Skillsoft acquired SumTotal Systems in September 2014. In May 2015, Skillsoft acquired Vodeclic SAS. In September 2017, Skillsoft launched virtual coding practice lab CodeX, which provides coding exercises with embedded video content. On June 14, 2020, Skillsoft voluntarily filed for

Chapter 11 Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code (Title 11 of the United States Code) permits reorganization under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. Such reorganization, known as Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is available to every business, wheth ...

bankruptcy protection in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. On August 27, 2020 Skillsoft was able to announce that it had emerged from bankruptcy. During the court-supervised process the company was able to reduce its debt by $1.5 billion US dollars. In June 2021, Skillsoft was acquired by Churchill Capital. Churchill Capital then merged with Software Luxembourg, then acquired the Global Knowledge technical training platform. The combined company would be known as Skillsoft. Leadership coaching platform Pluma was also acquired that same year. In December 2021, Skillsoft announced that it would acquire

Codecademy Codecademy is an American online interactive platform that offers free coding classes in 12 different programming languages including Python, Java, Go, JavaScript, Ruby, SQL, C++, C#, and Swift, as well as markup languages HTML and CSS. The ...

, an online

computer programming Computer programming is the process of performing a particular computation (or more generally, accomplishing a specific computing result), usually by designing and building an executable computer program. Programming involves tasks such as anal ...

learning platform, for approximately $525 million in cash and stock. The sale was completed on April 5, 2022.

References

{{reflist, 2, refs= {{cite web, title=Skillsoft, url=http://www.berkshirepartners.com/skillsoft, publisher=Berkshire Partners, accessdate=17 June 2015 {{cite web, last1=Bersin, first1=Josh, title=Skillsoft Acquisition of SumTotal: Corporate Training Market Disruption?, url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbersin/2014/10/01/skillsoft-acquisition-of-sumtotal-corporate-training-market-disruption/, work=Forbes, accessdate=17 June 2015, date=October 1, 2014 {{cite news, last1=Brown, first1=Rodney H., title=SkillSoft to go private in $1B buyout from Bain and partners, url=http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/blog/mass-high-tech/2010/02/skillsoft-to-go-private-in-1b-buyout-from.html, accessdate=19 June 2015, work=Boston Business Journal, date=February 15, 2010 {{cite web, title=Skillsoft Announces Acquisition of Vodeclic, url=http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150507005370/en/SkillSoft-UK-Regulatory-Announcement-Statement-Acquisition-Vodeclic#.VYGFi_l4rTo, website=BusinessWire, publisher=Berkshire Hathaway, accessdate=17 June 2015, date=May 7, 2015 {{cite web, title=Skillsoft Corporation Company Information, url=http://www.hoovers.com/company-information/cs/company-profile.SkillSoft_Corporation.3b3a38b54083591d.html, publisher=Hoovers, accessdate=17 June 2015 {{cite web, title=Skillsoft Corp (SKIL) IPO, url=http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/ipos/company/skillsoft-corp-67345-2886, publisher=NASDAQ, accessdate=19 June 2015 {{cite web, title=Skillsoft Corp (SKIL) SPO, url=http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/spos/company/skillsoft-corp-67345-14313, publisher=NASDAQ, accessdate=19 June 2015 {{cite web, title=About Skillsoft, url=http://www.skillsoft.com/learning-company.asp, publisher=Skillsoft, accessdate=17 June 2015 {{cite news, last1=Suria, first1=Asif, title=Merger Arbitrage Mondays: April 5, 2010, url=http://seekingalpha.com/article/197340-merger-arbitrage-mondays-april-5-2010, accessdate=19 June 2015, work=Seeking Alpha, date=April 6, 2010 Educational technology companies of the United States Software companies established in 1998 E-learning 2000 initial public offerings 2010 mergers and acquisitions 2014 mergers and acquisitions Companies based in Nashua, New Hampshire